Children In Need 1996

The Survivor's Photo

Children in Need (CIN) 96 was much more than just a 4 hour live show featuring bands, rip-offs of Friends and custard pies it encapsualted everything that YSTV is about.

The Build Up

Often seen as a poor relation to its often more complex Election Night (EN), CIN is actually a great proving ground for those people who go on to produce the epic beast that is EN and the first opportunity for all those new members to experience the often organised chaos that goes hand in hand with YSTV's large braodcasting events.

And so it came to pass that Volunteers were asked to step up and take responsibility for the 1996 CIN production. When the call went out two people answered; Clare Mace would handle the production side of the evening and Chris Parker (making his second appearance as a first year) would handle the XLR and BNC side of the event.

The Plan

Now as we all know trying to fill even a 30 minutes news show is difficult enough so coming up with 4 hours of content based soley on CIN is a tricky affair. However the genius of the plan for CIN 96 came when we linked up with RAG and YUSU Ents and organised a charity campus band night. This meant that the amount of YSTV produced content could be significantly reduced as the directors could cut to the events unfolding in the dining room.

However with a live event now needing to be filmed a 2nd production unit was required, up stepped Owain Davies to take care of the filming and integration with the feed from YUSU Ents obscenely large sound desk.

Expectations of the live event were low as campus music events traditionally had a very low turnout but this would be the biggest CIN to date.

T minus 4 Weeks ish

The live music event was taking shape with Clare working wonders in managing to book a wide selection of campus bands who all agreed to play for free (well it was for charity), getting YUSU's doorsafe reps to manage the security and having RAG work the door and look after the takings.

Now organising a major campus music event is a difficult enough task but along with a 4 hour live show could be said to be stretching even the most experienced BBC Producer. So to help take the pressure off Clare Sophie Dennis started to direct the stations attention to the YSTV produced content.

The first couple of hours would prove the most difficult as the bands were'nt due to start till around 9 so until then it was all down to us. Graham Quince took repsonsibility for the first hours content with a

For Children in Need 1996, YSTV organised a band night in Goodricke dining room, featuring two campus bands - Sevenball and BrubakerUnverified or incomplete information. There were cameras in the dining room filming the bands, plus a live programme from the YSTV studio.

The staging/lights/sound for the bands was done by YUSU Ents. YSTV also took over the room between the Studio and Goodricke dining room (G/045) where there was a second sound desk remixing the feeds from the dining room so they could be broadcast over the network.

The programme was officially produced by Claire Mace and Chris Parker, 'ably assisted' by John Barratt, Sophie Dennis and Andy Robinson.

John Barratt also set a world record for the clearing of chairs and tables from Goodricke dining room (we weren't allowed into the dining room until dinner has finished...).