Robin Sutherland

I came across this interesting photo on the BBC Archive website which I had not seen before. More details anyone?

Keith Wicks

Taken in 1957, it shows Alicia Markova.

For more information, see: History of the BBC.

 

Peter Combes

CPS Emitron on a tiller-steer Vinten pedestal.  Oh, and Alicia Markova operating.

 

Tony Grant

Did I ever mention the most iconic (yes, putatively iconic) photo I never managed to produce?

I simply can’t remember which production it was, but we had the corps de ballet and a large cyc background in a Television Centre studio. I got this wonderful idea for a photo, and had my Pentax with me, so asked one of the (very attractive) dancers if I could take a picture of her and the camera.

Come tea break, I’d asked the TM to leave the studio lights on, and craned the Fulmar ped up, 2001 panned slightly down, column locked off, wheels in steer as opposed to crab, preventing base movement, and a couple of stage weights hidden behind bed base, so not in the picture.

I then asked ballerina, costumed much as the CPS Emotion photo here, to pose using the ring steer as a barre. I had hoped to persuade her to have a straight line of one leg straight up and the other 180 degrees down, so that she was slightly tilted towards the camera, one hand on pan bar, and one on viewfinder hood and I would shoot her in profile. I showed her how rigid the whole kit and caboodle was, but she backed out at the last minute!

Moan, groan, there was an award-winning magazine cover photo if ever I imagined it, but sadly that’s where it remains, in my imagination.

 

Hugh Sheppard

Tony’s story permits promotion of surely the most ‘iconic’ item ever of TV studio history; the Vinten hydraulic ped. (All models).  Right from the 1950s until today, Vinten peds, together with the company’s pan and tilt heads have dependably served the BBC and most broadcasters all around the world. I remember feeling so at home to find them in Moscow at the time of the 1980 Olympics and then in Australia a few years later.

Bernie’s website has the full story at How Lucky We Were To Have The Vinten Hydraulic Pedestal  and at TV Studio Engineering: The Pre-digital Age.

 

Albert Barber

Note: Robin Sutherland’s research too!