O/T: Walk and Talk Service Information

[Mark Dragicevic]

Hi All
Found this on You Tube:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNuRk87caBk

It's the only example I can find or have seen (mocked up or not) of the 'Walk and Talk' buildup to BBC Service Information. The voiceover doesn't sound genuine, and the Trade Test Film has been cut from the clip, but the rest looks real. Can anyone hazard a guess to the date of this clip and where it comes from? I was v v young when this was on (maybe 5 or 6) but the music has been burned into my subconcious ever since.

Keep the faith, Mark

[lpmoderator]

It's a mock-up. The very unconvincing voice gives it away! The captions and clock are (poor quality copies of) real ones added to the anoraky commentary! The captions themselves are probably taken from a real bulletin somewhere around the mid '70s (just prior to 1978, when the Walk And Talk music was replaced by an inferior synthesised theme).

[A.Doe]

It's interesting how he's done it. The clock and the TX slide are real, but with the magenta keyed out. They exist on an N1500 tape in green and magenta, I have jpgs of them, and that's probably where he's taken them from. Quite how he got a real clock to work with the picture, I don't know. It's an interesting video from the point of view that it shows how one of the bulletins would run, if indeed it is based on fact.

It's all a matter of taste and although Walk and Talk is OK, I prefer Swirly. Swirly accompanies the clock on the N1500 footage I'm told.

[lpmoderator]

Very easy to re-animate the clock though if you have a 'still' of it, which he obviously did. It's the later version of the clock though, the lettering layout as it is, which is why I said mid '70s (although it's post '78 if the later music accompanied it on the actual tape). Yes, I can vouch for the fact that the format is accurate though, watching the bulletins myself for many years (a real novelty in the days before there was much daytime TV!). Anyone know of more instances of off-air bulletins existing though? I know of two from the early '80s but the 1500 recording would be the earliest i've heard of.

I must say, you're the first person i've ever come across that actually PREFERS the later music though!

[A.Doe]

I think it's because I never got to see a Service Info bulletin, and I remember Swirly from the Schools Dots instead. It's a lovely happy tune, got quite a good bassline too.

Apparently, he didn't do the recreation, it's a Testcard Circle video. It also looks as though they have used off-screen photos as the source of the captions, rather than the jpgs I was on about.

[markdrag]

Hi again
It does look like an actual tape rather than a recreation, as there is picture wobble and some tracking movement at the bottom of the picture. Also, would anyone know what film was being shown? You can just about see the words 'Canadian Pacific presents:' before the test card comes on.

Keep the faith
Mark D

[A.Doe]

It's a recreation, just recorded to VHS tape for the purposes of the Testcard Circle.

[A.Doe]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1GG6T1aHEA

I thought I'd add this to see if anybody here could help with getting the details correct

[lpmoderator]

It's a genuine off-air audio of a Service Information bulletin from 24/8/73 (the final day of trade test films on BBC-2). The visuals have been mocked up (recreations based on poor quality 'stills' of the captions used in SI bulletins although the clock used at that point had slightly different spaced lettering). The announcer is John Leeson.

[A.Doe]

lpmoderator said:

It's a genuine off-air audio of a Service Information bulletin from 24/8/73 (the final day of trade test films on BBC-2). The visuals have been mocked up (recreations based on poor quality 'stills' of the captions used in SI bulletins although the clock used at that point had slightly different spaced lettering). The announcer is John Leeson.

Yep, sorry, I know all that, I made it ;D

I was just after little comments on how many other captions could have / would have been used in the sequence. Your comment on the clock is helpful, how exactly did the spacing differ?

Thanks for the reply though.