Loading ...Whilst it would be nice to publish good news all the time for Freesat, some things just can’t be ignored, and tonight’s attempt by ITV to deliver high-definition coverage of the Champions League final was appalling!
Throughout the first half there were constant break-ups in sound as well as picture, followed by 10 minutes of intermittent black lines down the screen. Eventually we were left to enjoy ITV flicking through cameras from studio to player, to pitch, before they pulled the plug on the HD transmission completely.
The second half was an improvement, but only because it was up-scaled HD but certainly better than the “is it my eyes that are blurry” standard-definition quality.
We can only hope that one day ITV will improve!
Update: 15:05 28/05/09
Statement from Freesat;
The disruption to last night’s football on ITV 1 and ITV HD was due to unforeseen technical problems in Rome and affected other TV services showing the match on ITV
May 27th, 2009 at 10:39 pm
I don’t even class ITV HD as a channel. It’s more of a “bonus content service” aka a “red button service”. That being said, I don’t like any programming that ITV show whatsoever apart from the occasional film of course. But that’s just me. I’m sure people will start taking ITV seriously when ITV take HD seriously.
PeterQuote
May 27th, 2009 at 10:46 pm
Itv hd football fails again but YOU -FREESAT MUST PUT SOME PRESSURE ON ITV AS PEOPLE WILL GET FED UP AND RETURN TO SKY.FREESAT MUST TAKE SOME RESPONSIBILITY HERE !
NickQuote
May 27th, 2009 at 10:49 pm
ITV HD, what a joke, I ended up switching back to Freeview to watch the Champions League Final after a frustrating first half of poor quality coverage. Sort it out ITV and put HD on a separate channel with the same quality as BBC! Until then, I’ll go to the pub and watch big events on Sky HD if they are not screened on BBC HD.
CarlQuote
May 27th, 2009 at 11:49 pm
I had some family and friends round to watch the game in glorious HD…. although the picture, when it worked, looked great, there was only so much i could take and at half time, I switched over to watch it on Irish DTT.
IrishMJQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 1:28 am
This ought to have been the highlight of the year as far as HD football on ITV was concerned, but what a terrible demonstration of their technical (in)ability.
If they can’t reach the required standard for HD delivery the coverage should go to BBC HD (I wish).
It is perhaps too much to hope that they might issue an explanatory statement and an apology?
DerekQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 7:23 am
Like IrishMJ, I had friends around to watch in HD on my Freesat Pana tele – how embarrassing ITV made it! Althougth the biggest laugh (other than the footie result which wasn’t really down to ITV) was trying to guess what they were up to in the studio when we got the unexpected ‘peek’, why were they looking so disappointed just as Teddy Sheringham was doing up his trousers???
Please don’t tell me that the FA Cup Final is on ITV (sortofmaybesometimes)HD this weekend, that is a showpiece program for Freesat HD, although being in the UK might help ITV technically?…
DavidQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 7:24 am
I sent the following email last night to “viewerservices@itv.com”. I’ll post the reply, if it comes, here.
“Why, after about the 42nd minute of play, did the HD feed die & why are you continuing to transmit SD on the HD channel without any apology or explanation?
BBC HD is perfect!”
DipperQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 8:13 am
Its not just ITV HD, you may have got a good pictur on freeview, sky etc but Virgin had it bad on the ITV SD channel, was to annoying to even watch…..even though i did.
AshQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 8:50 am
Not much good news on freesat recently, the service seems to have suffered in the credit crunch, I wonder if C4 or C5HD will ever appear.
Lee BQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 9:00 am
Any of us here who are engineers are sympathetic to the concept of “technical problems”.
Where ITV and, to some extent Freesat, are letting us down is in not offering any explanation/apologies or indicating when and how they intend to improve the HD service.
ITV should be active contributors to this and other similar sites, there must be somebody at ITVs’ customer services with access to the WWW surely, they should be disseminating the “official line” to us their audience.
Freesat should also surely be pressing ITV to do this for the sake of their own continued viability.
We’re getting fed up with it.
Start telling us what’s happening ITV.
KimRQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 9:22 am
It is becoming a joke to be honest and one that i dont see getting any funnier from the viewers point of view in the current economic and regulatory / beurocratic climate. Appreciate ITV’s HD service is not Freesat’s fault but they are all linked and it needs sorting. As does the issue of more HD channels (Can Freesat really sell HD boxes / services when we only have 1 channel ?!)
Whilst I fully detest SKY I am beginning to see little option but to revert. Without SKY it seems I am destined to wait until c2015(?) for anything near a HD service.
I echo the calls for INFORMATION from Freesat, my patience is fine but its the not knowing that hurts ! There is only so long you can wait for something that you dont even know is going to happen.
samQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 9:30 am
Like Man Utd’s performance ITV HD was 2nd class last night.
If I had the money I’d switch over to SkyHD as at least it offers a half decent (HD) service!
pedroQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 10:24 am
Last nights game was totally unwatchable for me. Very very poor. ITVHD in its current state certainly isnt a reason for getting freesat.
DavidQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 10:32 am
I suggest we bombard ITV with e-mails demanding an explanation. As posted above – viewerservices@itv.com. Thanks for this address Dipper. I have e-mailed them.
David RamsdenQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 10:52 am
I may be the odd one out here. I tuned into ITV London from Central Scotland and bar a slight glitch just before half time there was no apparent issues. Could it be regional?
I do however endorse the comments that something needs to be done to improve the service.
Iain.DQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 10:53 am
I watched it on Sky HD and they had a few sound dropouts at the start. Sky had 5.1 surround but ITV was only transmitting stereo. ITV had to pay alot of money for these matches it seems a very false economy not to get the transmissions right. ITV have had plenty of time to sort thier link problems out. Unfortunatly UEFA and the FA have little choice as ITV and BBC are the only FTA channels who bid for these major packages. The FA cup final is only available on ITV in HD so lets hope they can sort things out.
So the future of Freesat HD looks rather glum at the moment. Sky is pushing ahead with 3D television in the near future so the gulf between FTA and subscription TV is set to widen even further. The old addage is prooving true “You get what you pay for!”.
Some of you may not be aware that ITV West Country is transmitting 704×576 with over 6Mbit/s on satellite at the moment so you don’t have to but up with normal ITV fuzzy pictures.
Trevor HarrisQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 11:30 am
Do you think there’s any connection between ITV’s lack of HD content and the fact that Rupert Murdoch is a major shareholder?
John KingQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 11:31 am
CraigC on Digital Spy says there were thunderstorms at the ITV up-link sitewhich caused major problems so they switched to SD, Sky’s up-link wasn’t affected as they use a different site. Ho-hum.
DipperQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 11:48 am
ITV HD ?
What a joke!
In order to call it a “HD” channel they really need to have a stand alone channel like BBC HD.
This red button palaver should end.
YASARQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
And then at half time the comentators had the gall to say that the problems were outside ITV’s control !!!!
Nothing ever seems to be within ITV’s control – perhaps that is the REAL problem.
At least I thank the BBC for their HD channel, but I do wish that there own Radio Time Magazine would give better info about BBC HD programmes – The info is there when it is broadcast simultaneously, but not when it not on BBC1 or 2. – but that is another point
PS – Like John King earlier, I wonder if SKY’s shareholding in ITV is preventing any real competition to SKY HD service
JohnQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
Sky’s shareholding is not significant enough for them to have any input into operational decisions like the amount of HD content.
If they did have any sort of operational clout, isn’t it actually far more likely that they’d use it to get ITV on to their EPG with a proper channel listing, thereby enabling Sky to advertise themselves as the only supplied with ALL the UK’s HD content?
Sky has a shareholding of less than 18%, and no seat on the board, so it’s not really in much of a position to have direct influence. If it were to try and deliberately hobble ITV’s HD offering, it would be handing ammunition to those seeking to force the sale of its shares.
Other shareholders are hardly likely to support Sky if they wanted to vote in a way that would be deliberately detrimental to ITV, are they? So it’s hard to imagine (unless you’re a conspiracy theorist) that Sky actually has any control over what ITV is doing – certainly no more so than, say, pension companies throwing their weight around regarding executive remuneration or overall financial performance.
Nigel WhitfieldQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
To be honest I think a lot of the comments are over the top. I was a little bit frustrated with the pictures but as a UTD fan it did not detract that much. I find it would be better to be persuasive rather than telling companies how best to do their professions.
I have just switched to freesat with the Humax HDR and am very happy to have any HD totally free….remember free!
Ste rushQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 2:40 pm
Ste rush
It’s not free. You have to pay for the equipment and it’s all subsidised by the tax/license payer, is it not?
David RamsdenQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
David,
It may not be completely free with it’s one-off equipment cost & annual licence fee but it is far and away cheaper than the Sky alternative. What really galls me about Sky is that you have to pay large subscriptions for watching in addition to the licence and STILL have to put up with adverts!
At least ITV’s ads are free to watch. Or skip through with Freesat+.
DipperQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
What about the sound,it was about a week late and it did not help if you adjusted the sound sync on the Humax.
Steve CQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 5:18 pm
The only reason why I would not pay subscription TV, specialy SKY, that it is impossible to whatch TV 24/7. My family and I on the average only view TV 3 to 4 hours a day, so why pay those stupid subscription fees for the hours that you do not view. Also there is not enough decent content out there to fill all these channels, it’s all just an excuse to show all those repeats, like on Dave & Fiver and others I can name, as with all the radio + video channels, most I have deleted and only whatch what I like. C5 is being bombarded by more CSI programes that are getting all the same & boring, well ITV, rarely whatch it apart from Primevil and Doc Martin, roll on Doctor Who next year.
monkeymaniacQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 6:24 pm
An official reply from ITV. I suppose all their football coverage suffers from technical problems in Rome? Them Italians eh!!!
“Thank you for your enquiry.
The disruption to last night’s football on ITV HD / ITV 1 was due to unforeseen technical problems in Rome. Please accept our apologies for the inconvenience.
Your comments have been logged and will be seen by senior ITV management.”
David RamsdenQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 7:01 pm
Ah David Ramsden, you must have sent the same message to ITV that I did:
– please could there be an explanation announcement and/or on-screen
message if trouble is experienced with future HD programs
– are the issues resolved for this Saturdays FA Cup Final coverage in
HD?
I got exactly the same reply as you, makes me feel a special, valued Freesat customer
DavidQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 7:46 pm
Once again…a disgrace…if I was responsible for ITV HD over the last year or so I would resign…is it run by a group of MP’s and last night was an ‘error of judgment’.
SKY must be laughing at us Freesat lot.
ITV has a lack of standards, a lack of income, a lack of quality, a lack of income…and so on…….JOKE !!!
mjvQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 8:22 pm
I added ITV HD to my Sky HD box the other day so it was really interesting to see the difference between ITV HD and Sky Sports HD. Ok so ITV HD is a non subscription service but they cannot get away with showing content like this, the HD picture compared to Sky was much grainer and the lack of Dolby Digital surround sound (with you come to expect with HD) was a joke. Some people would say it’s better than nothing, and at least im not paying a monthly charge, but Freesat customer a paying a lump sum and deserve better. BUCK YOUR IDEAS UP ITV….
PPS Audio VisualQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 9:11 pm
@PPS Audio Visual
When ITV HD works (with regards to football), it looks stunning. Unfortunatley it seems to be 50/50 as to whether it will work.
This weekend is the FA Cup Final and they have a final chance for this season to get it right. Hopefully they will.
I think I am the only one who does not see the point of 5.1 surround sound for football.
MJ
IrishMJQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 10:01 pm
Fast and Furious is on ITV HD, lets see if it works fully for that.
and in 5.1, for all you 5.1 fans!
AlexQuote
May 28th, 2009 at 10:40 pm
Thats stupid.
The picture is super on itv hd at the moment for fast and furious.
buts its only in dolby digital (2/0) not (3/2 – which is 5.1)
ITV HD needs a separate channel in all honestly!
AlexQuote
May 29th, 2009 at 12:34 am
PPS Audio Visual say’s that he does not not see the point of surround sound for football. I would sugest that he tries to watch and listen to one of the Sky broadcasts. Switching between sterio and surround is really dramatic with premiership matches. You really feel surrounded by the croud. Sky have spent quite alot of money installing surround microphones at many sites.
I think it was Sky Italia who were providing the pictures on Wednesday but I would not like to start a conspiracy theory.
Trevor HarrisQuote
May 29th, 2009 at 12:52 am
Good comments about the duff ITV HD coverage from everyone… very disappointing! I too have written to complain.
Also, did anyone else think that the camera zoom level was set too far away – i.e. the players were indistinguishable. It felt like we were sitting in the back row of the stands!!!
Just my opinion….
NIck ClarkQuote
May 29th, 2009 at 10:27 am
@Trevor Harris
Actually it was me who made the comment on 5.1 sound and Football. I take your point that it can offer a dramtic improvement on the experience, but to be honest, I watch football with my mates and they make more than enough noise to create an atmosphere!
IrishMJQuote
May 29th, 2009 at 12:19 pm
Come on guys anyone can see that the issues they were having were out of their control? For whatever reason they didnt have the bandwidth to support an HD picture, it looked a bit atmospherical do you honestly think that ITV hosted that HD feed from Rome? Definately an Italian company, I bet you also didnt notice that you kept the ITVHD logo in the top corner of your picture during the problem period you still had a high def picture but with SD content. You are getting HD for free after all, its not a paid for service. If you really want to guarantee HD 24 hours a day why not pay $ky for it. This is still a fledgling service that is growing in popularity, as it becomes more popular you will see more services signing up. Most of the HD channels are stuck in contracts with Sky for indeterminate amounts of time and $ky will do all they can to keep them rather than let Freesat get them. As more and more people take up freesat the medium will become much more attractive to broadcasters/advertisers which in turn will attact the HD channels, they will come, not tomorrrow though.
We should be encouraging the services of these free channels to join freesat, with HD as an added bonus. Go pay $ky if you want it all now.
StumpyQuote
May 29th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
Yes we should be encouraging the service, but these kind of issues with quality are becoming too common with ITV HD, especially where the football is concerned. It is one thing for the technical problem to be out of their hands due to the broadcast feeds being supplied by the respective broadcasters in that country, but the failing is still ITV’s responsibility. Yes Sky Sports had no problems, and yes you pay, but ITV should at least invest enough in ensuring a watch-able service, especially when such a game is meant to be ITV’s highlight in HD. ITV is free, we all except that, but when they cram 4 advert breaks in to 40 minutes before the game, then 2 advert breaks at half time, they must surely earn enough advertising revenue to pay for a decent feed.
adminQuote
May 29th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Not sure if anyone is interested in reading what took me 20 minutes to write, but this is what I had to say to ITV.
I’ll post what I get back on here.
—-”Dear ITV,
I assume you’ve been inundated with e-mails such as this one I’m sending regarding your absolutely diabolical coverage of the biggest showpiece game of the year on Wednesday 27th May on your HD service via the red-button.
In a game which was supposed to display what was beautiful about the game, supposedly being broadcast in “stunning high definition.” as stated on your website main page, I failed to see apart from 10 minutes at the start any “stunning high definition” or “glorious” as you go on to describe it as on your HD homepage on the website.
Frequent black lines buzzing across the screen from the first minute were clearly visible, and regular drop-outs in both sound and picture meant my viewing experience was severely effected, and actually made it embarrassing for me as I had invited friends around to show how fantastic watching football in high-definition is. What a joke I looked as we looked on, myself in embarrassment as a piece of equipment which had cost me altogether £980 (both HD Television and Humax Freesat box) looked worse than it’s considerably cheaper standard definition counterpart.
If this wasn’t worse enough, to further add insult to injury, part way through the first half during play, shots of the studio boys was shown, on a continuous loop so when footage of play was resumed, it was only to be replaced by shots of the boys in the studio a couple of seconds later. This shoddy attempt at broadcasting not only reduced the quality of my viewing experience of what was supposed to be a amazing spectacle, but it made me embarrassed that I had wasted a trip for my friends to watch a game that in the second half was broadcast in blurry upgraded standard def, which looked even worse than was was being shown on your main channel.
The second half was a pain to watch, as I said above you yourselves at ITV chose not to upscale Standard def, but to decrease the quality so that the picture was like watching the game through a lens which had just been submerged in a swimming pool.
I understand that the problems were because of technical difficulties (well I sincerely hope so), but the fact that we had to settle for a shocking quality of picture that was actually worse than the main channel just adds insult to injury seeing I had paid so much money just so that I could watch games like these in your promised “stunning high definition”.
I am hugely disappointed in ITV’s effort on the HD channel front, and I would at least expect a reply from yourselves apologising for the frankly disgusting quality you expect us to accept when watching football in your supposedly “glorious high definition”.
Infact, taking into consideration the sheer un-professional approach yourselves have taken at ITV recently with Sport coverage (the Everton- Liverpool game in the F.A. Cup earlier on in the season being a prime example), I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you didn’t even dignify the time I have spent to write this to you with a response.
I would dearly appreciate a response from yourselves, not only explaining what happened, but what you are going to do about it, and a reason why I should continue to use your promised “glorious” service of HD via the red button.
I would also expect more than “The disruption to last night’s football on ITV 1 and ITV HD was due to unforeseen technical problems in Rome and affected other TV services showing the match on ITV” which I have seen is the universal template you’ve been sending to anyone else enquiring about what happened. I can almost guarantee myself that will be all I get however…
Jamie Smith.”—-
Jamie SmithQuote
May 29th, 2009 at 7:42 pm
maybe just maybe itv hd will score tomorrow
and not score another own goal
as they did on wed nights so called showpiece
itv hd stands for itv hopeless definition tv imo,
m o malleyQuote
May 29th, 2009 at 7:52 pm
All this correspondence because some football match went t*ts up! Come on guys – get a life.
HDScepticQuote
May 29th, 2009 at 9:46 pm
I’ve just spotted that the FA Cup is only being covered by ITV this year, I do hope they don’t make a “FA-Cup” of the FA Cup this weekend.
BoingleQuote
May 30th, 2009 at 7:52 am
In the event of the lack of HD on ITV, ive come to discover FREESAT is infact CRAP, bad channels, no Iplayer yet! or any info about the future of it, BBCHD is good when there is somrthing on, I noticed its loads of kid shows…what does an 11 year care about HD???….Think its time to sell the box on ebay with a false selling point which was sold to me and bring out the old sky box!
NovaBlueQuote
May 30th, 2009 at 8:13 am
Strange justification to be honest; your Freesat box has access to the same channels as a Sky digibox plus BBC HD and ITV HD when a programme is on to suit your personal viewing. The only channels missing have been clearly discussed and never promised by Freesat. As for content, well that is surely the broadcasters fault, not Freesat’s? As with everything, if you want more content, more HD, more channels to your personal taste, you’ll have to pay Sky for it!
adminQuote
May 30th, 2009 at 9:40 am
Isn’t it strange that when people have a choice and they choose the free option ( human nature leads us this way ) they complain more? Are we to embarrassed to complain when we pay lots of money for a service because we know we are being fleeced and don’t want to own up?
Iain.DQuote
May 30th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
So far so good today(FA Cup Final)…..no sound drop outs …………but still 75 mins to go until game starts……….
kdhukQuote
May 30th, 2009 at 3:51 pm
Still OK up to half time……………….
kdhukQuote
May 30th, 2009 at 5:11 pm
My perception of Freesat is that it is a free service provided by the terrestrial broadcasters to give the benefits of SD digital TV to areas where Freesat does not reach – and which will still be in trouble after digital switchover. The characteristics of satellite broadcasting make it suitable to develop an HD service. T
he BBC has a guaranteed income from the licence payers and has been able to make more headway than the broadcasters who depend on advertising and sponsorship. I doubt if anyone expected the present financial climate at that time. ITV, amongst others, is facing an uncertain future, and has to balance its investment in HD with other survival strategies.
Perhaps iITV’s HD offerings should contain a health warning, especially for those who become apopletic over the sight of 22 grown men fighting over a ball. As I understand it, if an HD transmission runs into trouble, viewers can quickly revert to SD – if the game is that exciting they will be too involved to care about the difference.
Give the content-providers time to recover from the recession, then judge their HD performance.
HDScepticQuote
May 30th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
Just like to say that the HD picture for the FA Cup Final was superb this afternoon. Well done !
DavidQuote
May 31st, 2009 at 1:32 am
Yeap, credit where it is due, todays FA Cup coverage was excellent.
@Admin, perhaps a follow up piece along the lines of ITV finish the season with a flourish is in order. We (myself included) are quick to criticise when things go wrong, perhaps we should offer praise when they get it right.
With regards to the Champions League, there are postings in the Broadcasting forum on DigitalSpy by HGWells that offer up some insight into the problems for the Champions League final.
IrishMJQuote
May 31st, 2009 at 1:10 pm
Very happy with yesterday, and credit where credit is due the picture quality was immense. Sharp detail, and the sound wasn’t too shabby either. Well done ITV.
@ Iain.D: The arguement you use that we are quick to criticise things that are free, is because believe it or not, we DO actually have to pay for this service, and it’s not free. Admittedly we don’t have to pay a monthly fee, but we do correct me if I’m wrong, have to dish out in the region of £150-£200 for a box which enables us the user to access HD content.
You might harp on about being “quick to criticise” some of you, but to be honest, I’m perfectly within my right to do so if I don’t feel the service I’ve paid for is up to scratch.
I will admit however, what I might pay for ITV HD on Freesat is considerably less than what I would pay for Sky, but it still doesn’t detract from the fact I could barely see which player had the ball on Wednesday evening when the HD went dodgey on the Champions League final.
So overall, one shockingly bad performance, and one very decent one indeed. Hopefully that ratio from good to bad performances can be rectified next season, I for one hope so.
Well done ITV this time. =)
Jamie SmithQuote
May 31st, 2009 at 6:09 pm
how can itv get hd right they cannot even get sub titles right yet
gordon baconQuote
June 1st, 2009 at 9:52 am
We purchaesd a freesat box and cancelled Sky on the promise of 240 channels plus, and HD.
So where are we now, a few channels worh watching, and the rest well just CRAP. Only one effective HD channel, no CH4 or 5 HD and one useless HD channel called ITV. Anyone wnat to buy a slightly used Humax Box.
Sky can I have my connection back.
JohnQuote
June 1st, 2009 at 10:35 am
In fairness John it would have only taken a cursory look at the channel offerings from the two satellite providers to see that Sky offers a vast range of channels compared to Freesat, at a price.
Sky has at least 30 HD channels (bit of a cheat really given that they’ve created a load of film genre channels, but even so, still impressive for the UK).
You can’t really suggest that you were misled in any way. You generally do get what you pay for, though ironically even Freeview is better than Freesat in many respects, except for missing out on BBC HD.
There’s always the hope that Freesat will add genuinely decent channels in the future. Trouble is, it is a free system and generally free platforms aren’t going to provide the depth and range of quality (expensive) programming that a pay-for system (either subscription or per-view) can. That’s just economics.
Andy MerrettQuote
June 1st, 2009 at 6:05 pm
@John
I would love to know where you got the promise of 240 channels from. Freesat themselves gave a figure of 200 which was quickly revised down to 150.
With regards to HD, the only channels mentioned were BBC HD and ITV HD. Before you go on a rant about ITV HD, yes, we all know that it is a poor service, no need to tell us. Ch 4 HD and Ch 5 have never been promised by Freesat.
The channel list for freesat has been available for a long time from their website, perhaps you should have checked that out before buying??
IrishMJQuote
June 1st, 2009 at 6:18 pm
Regarding the FA Cup HD coverage, I would say it was passable. But in a world where large objects cast large shadows when the sun comes out, why haven’t the camera crews sorted out the apparent problems of panning from shadow into sunshine… maybe I’m too picky, maybe the occasional burst of “bright light” that obscures the picture isn’t the same as not seeing the picture for “other” technical reasons ;o)
John_MQuote
June 2nd, 2009 at 12:06 am
John@55
The racking for the cup final was awful – it was slow to panning changes and not very accurate on standard still shots.
It’s not normally the camera crews that deal with this, it is normally lighting or engineering.
I’m not sure what company was dealing with the coverage but they definitely had a trainee on the controls.
SteveQuote
June 2nd, 2009 at 6:27 pm
@Steve
)
Cheers for the info
John_MQuote
June 3rd, 2009 at 8:38 am
Much worse news is that ITV has been in discussion with Sky about making ITV2, ITV3,and ITV4 pay channels on the Sky EPG in order to raise their flagging revenues. This would mean the loss of this channels to Freesat and Freeview. So much for their commitment to Freesat!
(See Guardian business news Mon Jun 1st)
Nick GreenQuote
June 3rd, 2009 at 8:43 am
Nick, the news published by the Guardian is in their weekly publication but is believed to have already been quashed.
adminQuote
June 4th, 2009 at 2:42 am
ITV HD is on a sepaate channel. If you check it out you should be able to assign the channel to a number of a freesat box, I would have thought. I get ITV HD via my computer’s satellite PCI card and don’t have access to Red Button without setting it up. But I can get ITV-HD, BBC-HD and LUX-HD without a freesat box or sky subscription.
It is service ID 304 on the Satellites handling the UK’s FTA, Sky and Freesat services.
Don’t care about football, one iota, but to suggest ITV HD is a “Red Button” service only applies if you think within the box created by the Sky & Freesat EPGs.
RobQuote
June 4th, 2009 at 2:50 am
Re Sky, Freesat & FTA (free to air)
The only reason for using these two EPGs is to access the “encrypted” channels. Freesat channels aren’t encrypted to the best of my knowledge, and the channels simply subscribe to the Freesat EPG to get noticed. There are literally hundreds of FTA channels. But you can use the TV Guide website to create your own non-interactive EPG (ie you can’t assign programmes to a recording queue).
Having said that, most channels have a schedule assigned directly to their channel, and the computer software I use can detect that, and will allow me to assign programmes listed there to a recording queue.
I use Hauppauge’s free WinTV7, provided with their satellite cards.
RobQuote
June 4th, 2009 at 7:18 am
This is true, but as a freesat website, it is fair to suggest it is a red button service for the masses.
adminQuote
June 4th, 2009 at 9:56 pm
Sure, but it is doing Freesat customers a disfavour to not give them the information that in addition to those channels registered on the Freesat service they have access to so much more and all they may need to do is to dig a little deeper to find the information that will add so much more to their choice and (hopefully) enjoyment of free to air satellite TV.
RobQuote
June 5th, 2009 at 12:47 am
Mind you, if ITV HD are going to broadcast great movies with straight two channel audio, then what’s the point?
RobQuote
June 7th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
I understand the point you are making Admin, but this is a very popular and well informed website. In addition to those who you describe as “the masses” you attract people who are interested in more in depth information. I don’t see what disadvantage arises by including additional information (e.g. about the ITV HD channel) providing the material is accurate and legal.
“The masses” will not respond to it, and the more advanced users will be better informed.
Best wishes
DerekQuote