Now, I could post this in the Newsroom, over at t'other place, but I think it'll last longer without a padlock here, in view of who I'm about to dare to criticise.
Tonight's Six O'clock News talked about schoolchildren who'd been given the day off becuse their schools were closed; and the fact they could go out and play in the snow.
The commentary was accompanied by footage of a load of youngsters, all smartly dressed in ties and blazers, gently throwing snowballs about.
I originally saw the footage at lunchtime, as the BBC helecopter flew over Surrey (uselessly using up more of the world's precious fuel, but that's another rant).
It was quite obviously of children who were AT SCHOOL, probably a fairly posh private one from the quality of their dress, who were outside on their lunch break.
No child who had the day off would have been dressed so smartly to just mess around in the snow, and there most certainly wouldn't have been such a large group, all identically smartly dressed, if they weren't in school, even in Surrey.
This is just one recent example of what I see as an increasing trend in "sloppy journalim", where they just show any old footage which might be considered to be roughly near the point, but with no concern for proper accuracy.
Does this annoy other people as well, or am I just off on one again?
BBC News Showing Completely Wrong Footage
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Nick Harvey
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A little from column A, a little from column B.Nick Harvey wrote:Does this annoy other people as well, or am I just off on one again?
It is sloppy. I assume footage like that will come off a video server?
Perhaps they should rethink the accuracy of their boolean strings?
I'm sure the NUJ will happily tell you it's because of complusary cut-backs and job-losses in BBC News and therefore the quality and accuracy is suffering.
I think that may have a small part to play, but there's no excuse for sloppiness.
I think that may have a small part to play, but there's no excuse for sloppiness.
On a similar note, I was watching News 24 on Saturday and they went live to a reporter standing outside a Morrisons supermarket in West London to discuss whether the bird flu outbreak had affected poultry sales in the shops.
The reporter said he'd gone inside the supermarket "a little earlier" to conduct a straw poll of whether customers were bothered by the bird flu, and his words were accompanied by pictures of customers taking pre-packed poultry off the shelves.
But the accompanying footage was shot inside a Tesco store, and looked at least five years old (but only to the trained eye of a presentation anorak).
So either he was lying about his straw poll inside Morrisons, or he was just too damned lazy to film it and decided to pass off some old stock footage instead.
But this kind of thing isn't new. Until as recently as 1999 BBC News used to use a bit of stock footage from inside a Post Office, showing the clerk counting out bank notes, whenever they ran a report about pensions or inflation. The bank notes in the footage were the big old brown £10 notes with Florence Nightingale which were withdrawn in 1994.
The reporter said he'd gone inside the supermarket "a little earlier" to conduct a straw poll of whether customers were bothered by the bird flu, and his words were accompanied by pictures of customers taking pre-packed poultry off the shelves.
But the accompanying footage was shot inside a Tesco store, and looked at least five years old (but only to the trained eye of a presentation anorak).
So either he was lying about his straw poll inside Morrisons, or he was just too damned lazy to film it and decided to pass off some old stock footage instead.
But this kind of thing isn't new. Until as recently as 1999 BBC News used to use a bit of stock footage from inside a Post Office, showing the clerk counting out bank notes, whenever they ran a report about pensions or inflation. The bank notes in the footage were the big old brown £10 notes with Florence Nightingale which were withdrawn in 1994.
Maybe the store manager wouldn't give him permission to film inside the store?rdobbie wrote:But the accompanying footage was shot inside a Tesco store, and looked at least five years old (but only to the trained eye of a presentation anorak).
So either he was lying about his straw poll inside Morrisons, or he was just too damned lazy to film it and decided to pass off some old stock footage instead.
It's more to do with the fact the BBC no longer trains people and expectes them to pick it up as they go along.Aston wrote:I'm sure the NUJ will happily tell you it's because of compulsory cut-backs and job-losses in BBC News and therefore the quality and accuracy is suffering.
I think that may have a small part to play, but there's no excuse for sloppiness.
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Spencer For Hire
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I think my two favourite bits of over-used library footage are...
1. The Child Support Agency footage featuring an ancient-looking computer with the words 'THE BOSS' Dymo-taped to the top. Every single bloody report about the CSA featured this on the BBC.
2. The antisocial behaviour CCTV footage of the kids smashing the window of a transit van. I notice now they've made the decision to fuzz out the date-stamp bit. I guess it was a bit embarrassing when it said 1991.
1. The Child Support Agency footage featuring an ancient-looking computer with the words 'THE BOSS' Dymo-taped to the top. Every single bloody report about the CSA featured this on the BBC.
2. The antisocial behaviour CCTV footage of the kids smashing the window of a transit van. I notice now they've made the decision to fuzz out the date-stamp bit. I guess it was a bit embarrassing when it said 1991.
Whenever there is a story about drunken yobs they show stock footage of outside the "Two Trees" pub on Union Street in Plymouth.
OK, Union St has a reputation locally as it's the concentration of clubs and pubs in Plymouth frequented by alot of "matelots" (Junior Ratings) from the Naval Base (who have far too much money to spend, so get drunk). But it's hardly a den of iniquity and shouldn't be used to visualise national news items. I'm not sure how old the footage is, but I've seen it used for at least 10 stories by BBC News over the last few years.
OK, Union St has a reputation locally as it's the concentration of clubs and pubs in Plymouth frequented by alot of "matelots" (Junior Ratings) from the Naval Base (who have far too much money to spend, so get drunk). But it's hardly a den of iniquity and shouldn't be used to visualise national news items. I'm not sure how old the footage is, but I've seen it used for at least 10 stories by BBC News over the last few years.
I know about 4 years ago some big research was done as to what people liked/disliked about the news. The main thing they said was that it was the same pictures used into reports all the time (I think the example was BSE cows). It would seem that things have perhaps started to slip down the pecking order - some may well argue that it's the content and quality of the news we should be taking notice of though.
PS, next time there's a prison report, look out for the darkened footage of a cell door being closed and a huge old style key locking it!
PS, next time there's a prison report, look out for the darkened footage of a cell door being closed and a huge old style key locking it!