TV recordings pre VHS

[susanduic]

When clips turn up on places like YouTube of TV from the days before video-home recording was generally available-where do they come from? Is there a site somewhere I've missed? I want to find an edition of Late Night Line Up from late 1968, possible the BBC have wiped it........I've checked out many places eg BBC Motion Library but nothing. Has anyone any ideas or suggestions-beyond 'give up you daft bat'?

[Steve Crook]

name='susanduic']When clips turn up on places like YouTube of TV from the days before video-home recording was generally available-where do they come from? Is there a site somewhere I've missed? I want to find an edition of Late Night Line Up from late 1968, possible the BBC have wiped it........I've checked out many places eg BBC Motion Library but nothing. Has anyone any ideas or suggestions-beyond 'give up you daft bat'?

There were some TV programmes that were recorded onto tape back in the dark ages. But the tape machines were the size of a large filing cabinet, or larger. And the tape had to go through them very fast so was very dangerous if it broke.



A few programmes were even recorded onto film.



The tape especially was very expensive and quite a lot were re-used, recording other things over the top of them. Many of them were just thrown out when storage was at a premium.



Some of those old tapes & films survived and have been copied onto other formats. But the programmes that were recorded and the tapes or films that survived were very patchy with little rhyme or reason as to what was to be saved for posterity.



Steve

[susanduic]

Yes, that's what I thought........do you know if its possible to arrange access to such archives? Years ago I had a friend who worked at the BBC Film Library, somewhere west of London.....but then I wasn't looking for anything esoteric!

[johng]

One often wonders what is the point of people like the BBC saving material for posterity when they have no intention of re-broadcasting it or even issuing some of it on DVD. Otherwise it just goes into a black hole when there seems no point in preserving it if the material is not to be made available for viewing.

[Fellwanderer]

name='susanduic']Yes, that's what I thought........do you know if its possible to arrange access to such archives? Years ago I had a friend who worked at the BBC Film Library, somewhere west of London.....but then I wasn't looking for anything esoteric!

You could try the BFI - if they don't have it, they may try the BBC. That was certainly the case with a couple of programmes I was looking for - one they had and the other they would arrange to get from the BBC so that I could view it.

[CaptainWaggett]

name='johng']One often wonders what is the point of people like the BBC saving material for posterity when they have no intention of re-broadcasting it or even issuing some of it on DVD. Otherwise it just goes into a black hole when there seems no point in preserving it if the material is not to be made available for viewing.

A couple of problems



1. The BBC don't actually have the full rights to all their programmes. Which is why some shows are on a loop on BBC7 and others are waiting for the lengthy rights negotiation process (which apparently takes about three months for a radio series so presumably could be much more complicated for tv with the larger number of creatives).



2. A lot of stuff simply has no commercial value. Would there really be a market for dvds of Late Night Line Up at £12 a time? I'd love to see more 1960s material (and BBC4 has done good work in repeating interesting shows) but it's a very niche market.



I believe the BBC are working at making a lot more stuff available on-line but preumably there are huge technical issues with this. Their archives do have potentially huge value so they'd be mad to make it all available for free - and an on-demand service could soon be hacked by those who understand bittorrent (not me, then!)

[julian_craster]

Some off-air video recording on Sony equipment was done in the education sector (universities, teacher training colleges) in the late 1960s and early 1970s . The equipment was far too cumbersome and expensive for domestic use. Some tapes may survive...



Incidentally, the BBC and ITV companies regard members of the public who enquire about archive material as a bl**dy nuisance !

[susanduic]

I know that progs. that are available, are available from 'ITV' companies @£99 per 30mins!



Do the BBC have a similar arrangement?



Could the actual procedure for getting the BFI to ask the BBC for material which can then be viewed be explained to me? Please..........(where I'm doing this reply I can't see who 'messaged' this info.)...



I'm assuming the edition I want of Late Night Line Up is still around because I read a comprehensive account of the interview, word by word nearly.............but it may have come from the contemporary index/catalogue............

[CaptainWaggett]

name='julian_craster']Some off-air video recording on Sony equipment was done in the education sector (universities, teacher training colleges) in the late 1960s and early 1970s . The equipment was far too cumbersome and expensive for domestic use. Some tapes may survive...



Incidentally, the BBC and ITV companies regard members of the public who enquire about archive material as a bl**dy nuisance !

There was a Philips vcr on sale for a squillion pounds from 1965 which is how some stuff was preserved. Anyone who has attended the BFI's annual 'Missing Believed Wiped' events will have had to listen to at least one 20 minute speech about cleaning tape with q-tips and paraffin, only to discover that the result was completely unwatchable anyway!

[orpheum]

I had the first commercially available VCR,the Phillips which i bought for around 400 pounds back in 1973.It was av ery primitive machine.It could only record for one hour.The end used to snag on rewinds and the heads had to be renewed after about 200 hours.I still have the machine in the vague hope that it might become a valuable antique in years to come!

[CaptainWaggett]

It probably isn't the one you want, susanduic, but you can see an edition of Late Night Line Up on the BBC Parliament channel tonight. They have some good stuff buried in their schedules if you have the patience to look through all the Select Committee and Scottish First Minister Questions

[susanduic]

Thank you for that Captain...I'll have a look..........

[retroman]

name='CaptainWaggett']It probably isn't the one you want, susanduic, but you can see an edition of Late Night Line Up on the BBC Parliament channel tonight. They have some good stuff buried in their schedules if you have the patience to look through all the Select Committee and Scottish First Minister Questions

I presume this is the same Late Night Line up which was shown last Bank Holiday monday on the Parliament channel as part of their Permissiveness night ( I think it was discussing homosexuality) . There were some excellent documentaries featured, and it also included a live modern day one-off edition of Late night line up to discuss the evening's output ( with Joan Bakewell, Peter Hitchens, Lord Winston and Michael Howard.

[orpheum]

phillip jenkinson always had a spot on sunday night showing clips of vintage films.these he subsequently repeated at shows at the NFT.he hasnt been on tv for many years.anyone know what happened to him?

[CaptainWaggett]

name='orpheum']phillip jenkinson always had a spot on sunday night showing clips of vintage films.these he subsequently repeated at shows at the NFT.he hasnt been on tv for many years.anyone know what happened to him?

He vanished from the media in the late 1980s. I remember a very camp show looking at rubbishy old trailers (Coming Soon rather than mobile homes) that was great fun but nothing after that.

[orpheum]

Just looked at his entry on IMD but nothing very much.I will never forget his interview of John Ford.He was questioning Ford about his treatment of native americans in westerns.Ford then turned on Jenkinson querying him about Britains treatment of the irish in the troubles.I felt rather sorry for poor phil

[CaptainWaggett]

name='orpheum']Just looked at his entry on IMD but nothing very much.I will never forget his interview of John Ford.He was questioning Ford about his treatment of native americans in westerns.Ford then turned on Jenkinson querying him about Britains treatment of the irish in the troubles.I felt rather sorry for poor phil

Interesting considering The Quiet Man probably does more to stereotype the Irish than any other film. Wasn't Jenkinson the Radio Times film reviewer back in the 1970s?

[orpheum]

Yes he was the RT reviewer.He did some very good shows at the NFT.In the days before video his shows were about the only way of seeing big musical numbers eg Lullaby of Broadway ,By a Waterfall,Forgotten Man on tv.

[Fellwanderer]

name='susanduic']I know that progs. that are available, are available from 'ITV' companies @£99 per 30mins!



Do the BBC have a similar arrangement?



Could the actual procedure for getting the BFI to ask the BBC for material which can then be viewed be explained to me? Please..........(where I'm doing this reply I can't see who 'messaged' this info.)...



I'm assuming the edition I want of Late Night Line Up is still around because I read a comprehensive account of the interview, word by word nearly.............but it may have come from the contemporary index/catalogue............

I simply emailed the BFI with the full name and broadcast date of the programmes I was interested in and asked if they could confirm whether or not they had them. The answer was yes for one and that the BBC had the other and they could arrange for it to be made available for viewing.



The cost isn't as great as ITV but one can only view the material - no copying.

[bhowells]

Eric Idle did a great impersonation of Philip Jenkinson in a 1972 edition of Python.