BBC TV Studio N and Studio A, Manchester - 1979 Guided Tour

BBC Studio N was the BBC's North West of England news studio in Broadcasting House, Piccadilly Gardens, Manchester until Saturday 16th May 1981 and shown in the exterior shot - it was above a bank and the building included numerous radio studios too. It then moved to Studio B, NBH, Oxford Road, Manchester on Monday 18th May.

Studio A was the main production studio in Manchester from 1976, having moved from a converted church to NBH in that year. Many notable programmes were produced in Studio A, NBH - Red Dwarf, A Question of Sport, Old Grey Whistle Test, Cheggar's Plays Pop, The Oxford Road Show, Rough Guides, Going for Gold, No Limits, The Travel Show, Reportage and many other prime time programmes.

The presenter on this video is Chris De Witt, who came to Manchester from BBC Television Centre, London, and eventually moved to Dutch Television. He now has a web site and lives in Berlin. The Camera Operator is Chris Bruce, who at this time was a Camera Assistant and eventually became Freelance. The Vision Mixer was myself and the Sound Operator John Stables, who is now a Senior Sound Supervisor. In Studio A I was the cameraman and think the Vision Mixer was the actual vision mixer for the programme about to start rehearsals! Also, we had to do three takes in Studio N and four in Studio A before it was usable. There was some 'interference' in Studio A during recording from the Sound Department who seemed to enjoy feeding in sound FX.

The cameras in Studio N are EMI 2001 and in Studio A EMI 2005 (not 2008 as Chris says....), using Rank Taylor Hobson Varotal 30 zoom lenses, giving a horizontal viewing angle variable between 5.6deg and 56deg. The camera used for the clock and exterior scene was my own 1979 JVC G-71 PAL colour camera. This used a single vidicon tube with a coloured striped filter in front of it to produce colour. The whole video was recorded on to the first JVC portable VHS recorder. The video was just something we did for ourselves and the management knew nothing about it....