The Grand National
Thu/02/Apr 11:53 AM Filed in: Work
And “They’re Off!!”
There is something special about the Grand National... There’s a lot of excitement surrounding this years John Smiths Grand National here at the TurfTV gallery at Teddington Studios. All of the big race festivals seem to get a bit of a stir going; Cheltenham Gold Cup, Dubai Gold Cup, Royal Ascot, Glorious Goodwood. Now, I’m not really interested in horse racing, per se, but you get infused with the enthusiasm that seems to envelope everyone in the gallery during a race festival. You get the obligatory sweep steaks (organised by either graphics or VT ops), numerous TV promos, racing packages detailing all of the runners, riders, trainers, stables, tea boys, camera men... you name, they’re in it!!
The producers are all racing fans so they’re as excited about the meeting as any regular punter! As a sound man, you have to be prepared for anything. I mean anything. e.g. We usually get regular guests in the sound room, but this one day, during a live broadcast, managed to turn the desk and FX units off by pushing a set of desk drawers back ever so slightly under neath the mixing desk. This flicked the master power switch off to a power distributor which in turn, turned everything else off. Needless to say, the sound of pants filling over the deathly silence that ensued, could be heard as far as Studio 1. Quickly tracing back the steps soon uncovered the problem.
Because we get feeds from South Africa as well as the UK race courses, we need to make sure that all the feeds are coming in clean, tones lined up, voice over booth is setup for the VO talent, etc... During the show, we need to make sure all the audio feeds are PFL’d so that we can sync the VO talent with the commentators at the courses... when done correctly it’s almost as though we have direct comms with the course, we can almost fool the viewer into thinking that we’re managing everything. This is, of course, far from the truth...
Since working in TV, you quickly come to realise there’s a lot of smoke and mirrors in producing a top quality show. The visual and audio FX used to ‘enhance’ the viewers perception of what’s happening is all down to the director. The sound man has everything at his fingertips but it’s the producer and director that tell you where and when to do your bit.
I wont be working on Grand National day... but my money is on a top performance from the guys at Turf TV.
The producers are all racing fans so they’re as excited about the meeting as any regular punter! As a sound man, you have to be prepared for anything. I mean anything. e.g. We usually get regular guests in the sound room, but this one day, during a live broadcast, managed to turn the desk and FX units off by pushing a set of desk drawers back ever so slightly under neath the mixing desk. This flicked the master power switch off to a power distributor which in turn, turned everything else off. Needless to say, the sound of pants filling over the deathly silence that ensued, could be heard as far as Studio 1. Quickly tracing back the steps soon uncovered the problem.
Because we get feeds from South Africa as well as the UK race courses, we need to make sure that all the feeds are coming in clean, tones lined up, voice over booth is setup for the VO talent, etc... During the show, we need to make sure all the audio feeds are PFL’d so that we can sync the VO talent with the commentators at the courses... when done correctly it’s almost as though we have direct comms with the course, we can almost fool the viewer into thinking that we’re managing everything. This is, of course, far from the truth...
Since working in TV, you quickly come to realise there’s a lot of smoke and mirrors in producing a top quality show. The visual and audio FX used to ‘enhance’ the viewers perception of what’s happening is all down to the director. The sound man has everything at his fingertips but it’s the producer and director that tell you where and when to do your bit.
I wont be working on Grand National day... but my money is on a top performance from the guys at Turf TV.