Mark Hansgate

Mark Hansgate joined YSTV at the Freshers Fair of 1992. YSTV had been one of the major reasons why he had chosen to do his course (Computer Science) at York University due to his keen interest in photography and video. In his first year he was involved in such productions as Campus Today and Jim'll Sodomise You before the studio was closed in June 1993. He was so upset at this that he created the Closure promo to try to get fellow students to sign the petition to re-open YSTV.

He was voted in as Production Director at the beginning of the 1993-94 university year. This was an awkward time due to a lack of studio but everyone pulled together and still managed to make a few recorded programes (see Middletons) and live shows (see Children In Need 1993 and Election 93). It was a relief however when the new studio opened making it far easier to make programmes.

He was voted in as Production Director again at the start of the 1994-95 university year. During this time he can take significant credit for converting a large proportion of new recruits in to regular members. He achieved this by preparing a set of programme formats (such as Week by Week, Soapwatch, SU, Lies and Videotape) which would run in week 1 on different nights. This allowed new members to find a programme to work on which would fit in with their busy life as a fresher. Weekly production meetings took place to discuss up-coming filming and I’m sure many people have fond memories of these, especially the ones where Mark actually turned up!

Mark also organised the filming of 3-to-1 a comedy drama he had written in the 1994 summer holiday. However Mark struggled to find enough time to fulfill the role of Production Director due to his final year studies and Sally Gray was voted in as his replacement in 1995.

On leaving University Mark had an interview at Framestore ([1]) in London but failed to get the job and despite sending out lots of applications this is where his dream of working in media ended. He got a ‘proper’ job as a programmer in August 1995 and hasn’t picked up a video camera since his days at YSTV (although photography remains one of his hobbies). He married Collette in 2005 and had a baby boy, Oliver, in January 2007.