Television Industries

Since the birth of television in the United Kingdom there has always been a connection with the United States so most of the ownership and funding will be intertwined between both countries.

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

The British Broadcasting Corporation which is usually referred to as the BBC was the first television company to be set up in Britain. It was first founded in 1922 by a group of radio manufacturers, headed by John Reith who had thought of the idea of having a public broadcasting service within the British Isles, he became managing director of both the BBC and the Scottish alternate version. When they first set it up they made it to be a private company which dealt with radio as the company hadn’t had resources in other areas yet. One of the main issues that faced the company being limited to only radio was that in Britain, advertising on radio was banned; this meant that there was a low source of income to the company. The only way that the company had found funding before this point was through newspapers companies paying the channel to broadcast their stories.

In 1927 the government intervened and took over the company as a way to control the media, by doing this the government helped the service as it meant that they had a new source of funding through the government and it was set out in the Royal Charter that if you were a listener of BBC Radio you would have to pay a Group Purchasing Organization (GPO) fee which would pay for the wireless waves. This was promoted through flyers; an example of which can be seen on the right. The government also took over the company in order to stop the chaos which they had seen within the ownership of the film industry. The BBC didn’t launch as a television service until November 1936. This was most likely due to how new the technology was and it took a lengthy period to make sure that it would work properly. Before it changed to being a television service the main media format that they worked with was with Radio and this would have been their main focus until November 1936.

When television began in this country there wasn’t much interest into the new technology due to the cost of the television and the issues with the signal. It was shown that in 1929 to 1930 after television had been brought in that the amount of television viewers had risen by over 375,000.

Although the BBC began regular programming in 1936 it was soon halted in 1939 due to the second World War, where the company focused on radio, this was because at that time people were put on rations and were unwilling to buy new technology. Also through the war blackouts happened across the country in an effort to fool the attackers and televisions created light so the company focused on keeping people up to date with the war efforts. It wasn’t until the summer of 1946 that the television area of the BBC had resumed.

In 1940 John Reith, the head of the BBC, then became the minister of Information within the government, this meant that he had control over what information was put into any media, he then lead on to be minister of transport and then commissioning of work. Through his work in parliament he was then honoured Baron Reith of Stonehaven in 1950.

In 1955, the BBC finally had competition for viewers of television with the creation of Independent Television (ITV). Although ITV had decided not to go down the medium of Radio, this meant that BBC still had control of this form and this continued until the 1970’s.

The television industry the competition has become more heated with the new additions of both Channel 4 and Channel 5. BBC1 gains a weekly reach of 48,147, a 21% share of the audience on BBC1 and 36,714 on BBC2 a 6.3% of the total amount of viewers at any one time. This doesn’t include the new digital channels which have been made over the years.  These figures can be shown in the chart below. As you can see from the results BBC 1, by over 5%, has the highest proportion of the audience, apart from other viewing which contains digital channels and repeat channels which contains over 800 channels, so through this it shows that BBC by far is the most watched channel within Britain.

Funding

The BBC is funded through many ways. The main income the BBC get is the Television license fee, this is given to the BBC from the government who make anyone who has a television pay a yearly tax of £145.50. This gives the BBC funding of £3.65Billion to spend on the programming of the channel but this is conditional on the channel filling the Royal Charter, BBC Trust and rules which affect the way they create television, the channel must not stereotype and must create all shows so they are none offensive and appeal to all viewers.

Other forms of funding that BBC get it through either selling a programme or a layout of a programme, an example of BBC selling a programme is to the digital channel Dave in which they sell comedian panel shows such as Have I got news for you , QI and Would I lie to you?. BBC do this as a way to fund the other channels and as a way to get more funding as they can’t have premium phone call ins as this would be seen as becoming a commercial company, but sometimes BBC1 will have television shows such as the Voice and Strictly come dancing which usually give a percentage of the money to charities and the costs of the competition are of landline prices which means it isn’t as expensive for viewers as premium ones.

The BBC provides many services with the BBC License Fee to entertain, inform and educate the public through many different mediums. Below is a pie chart showing the percentages of money they put into each industry the BBC work in. Television takes in the largest amount and this is because in the United Kingdom this is the most used form of entertainment with Online becoming more dominant in the future. Television also gives more money to the television aspects as it is also the area in which BBC are most well known for. Other costs are the costs of collecting the license fee, and the set up for the country going digital. Online costs cover the running of the website and BBC Iplayer.

Independent Television (ITV)

ITV was the second of the Television channels to be made and made its first airing in 1955 following the Television act of 1954 which made advertising on television possible. Before this point BBC had never been able to advertise anything other than their own shows and still don’t to this day. This is because as a public broadcasting provider they must provide television which is suited for all and is in the public. But as ITV was an independent company and didn’t have much financial help from the government, the need for advertising was more than that of the BBC. ITV have often combatted this in press statements talking about the inequality of channels as quoted by Michael Grade, executive chairman of ITV “There is a £3.6billion of public intervention in the broadcasting market of this country, called the BBC. Channel 4 has a hidden subsidiary. It has no cost of capital; it has no shareholders to pay; so there is a hidden subsidiary. It is the job of the public sector to meet these objectives not the private sector who cannot afford to do it.” This was in response to the House of Commons debate on funding for the British Television Industry when talking about quotas and this would affect all broadcasters not just public service providers.

When the channel was first established following the Television Act 1954 the Independent Television Authority was established, this was a measure the government took so that the British television industry wasn’t as out of control as in America. The ITA would help independent companies be seen in the British Television Industry but they would also regulate the advertising that would be allowed to show, an example of when they would interfere would be if an alcohol advert came on whilst a children’s cartoon was on a break.

ITV was set up by five major companies and 9 smaller companies who all put shares in. The main fiver companies were Carlton, Granada, United News and Media, Ulster TV and the Scottish Media Group. These Five looked after the different regions of the United Kingdom. Although ITV first aired a programme in 1955 it wasn’t until 1962 until all of the companies had been put in place across the country and had aired their first programme. The first airing was shown by Arkansas Television or ATV, one of the smaller companies but they had control of the London area which was often where shows would first premier as can be reflected today in the film industries distribution.

The Big Five

Within the ITV network there were 15 companies including Meridian, Carlton and it was found that 5 companies became the strongest within the merger. The five companies are Carlton, Granada, Ulster TV, Scottish Television Group and United News and Media.  On the right is the map of the ITV network as it stood in 1962.

Carlton

The company was incorporated in 1939 but it wasn’t until 1983 as part of the ITV Company that it was listed under the London Stock Exchange. The company played a huge role in the making of the ITV Company and is now a partner with Granada who merged to create ITV PLC in 2004, the shares were then re distributed and Carlton gained 32% of the company. The company have also integrated vertically in 1988 where Carlton took shares in Technicolor and later in Zenith Productions which made advances in colour on television with ITV quicker than it would have been without that connection.

Originally Carlton Communications looked after the Central region which covered the London area. This was the first of all the companies to air, this was due to the normal way channels release, like films they are first tested in the centre of London and then it gets dispersed across the country. Therefore Carlton having the London area made them a more dominant company in the merge with the other 15 companies.

Granada

Granada Television began broadcasting in 1956 and was one of the companies in the ITV venture. The company with Carlton Communications stood out to be the top two companies within the major five which dominated the merger. This was later shown by the merger between the two companies to create the ITV plc which meant that Granada shares in the company grew to 68% against Carlton’s 32%, it shows that Granada has a much stronger part in the business.

Originally Granada looked after the Manchester region, which apart from London is the biggest outlet for the Media industry. This was the second place to broadcast and brought in a completely different demographic of audience, this gave ITV an advantage as now they could have each region with its own advertisements.

Ulster TV                                                                                            

In 1954 the Television Act was devised and from this the Independent Television Authority was founded as a way to supervise the new independent television such as ITV. In 1958 the ITA set up a tender for another company to join ITV and through this Ulster TV won the place and took the Ireland region for the company.

Scottish Television Group

Joined in the ITV venture in August of 1957 the STV Group took on the region of Scotland and still plays a large part in the ITV plc. The company is publicly funded in Scotland and is the main competition against BBC Scotland. As with UTV, by having the home based companies doing the regional news it allowed for the presenters to have the accent of the area and this meant that ITV found that they were getting high viewing figures which can be seen in Figure 1 (Page 2).

United News and Media

Established in 1918, United Media and News (known as UBM) started off as a Newspapers company and made many acquisitions, the most predominant one was the Yorkshire Post Acquisition in 1969. The company now has revenue worth £972.3 million and plays a large part in the print industry in the UK. UBM then acquisitioned control of ITN and from that point UBM now has control over news which is shown nationally on ITV and makes them a large part within the ITV Company.

Funding

ITV was the first private company broadcaster on terrestrial television and funding was found through investments by the companies who got involved within the venture of the channel, once the channel was up and running the primary source of funding was through commercial television and premium rate phone quiz games, when ITV first aired, another source of funding which ITV got was through having nightly shopping channels and gambling shows which again would have premium phone call ins which also brought money in.

Channel 4

After the creation of the Annan Board the government had given the board a chance to either give BBC a third channel, ITV a second channel or to allow a new company to take the spot. After consideration the group realized that BBC was already too big to have more channels and that ITV was monopolizing the advertising market, so the decision was to bring in another channel. Channel 4 who had won the tender. This was as a way to combat the television services which were already available. When the government allowed Channel 4 to own the terrestrial channel they were given ultimatums and by achieving these goals the company would get public services funding.

The rules were that the company had to not be vertically integrated in the beginning, so rather than the television company owning the production teams they would have to buy in shows made by other companies, this would give the chance for independent companies to create pieces and have them aired.

The second rule was around advertising. Although the channel would be mainly funded through advertising, all adverts had to be picked out and conducted by ITV and all profits would return to Channel 4. This was quickly abolished as it meant that ITV could monopoly the market and could have made Channel 4 sink, but as Channel 4 was put in place to pick up the minorities which other channels didn’t cater to.

The last rule which had to be followed was that it was obliged by statute to be innovative and to cater for tastes and interests which are not usually met, experimentation and minority programming was therefore wrote into the channel and this is still the ethos of channel 4.

In terms of funding Channel 4 was a hybrid to BBC and ITV, it had parts of funding which were from the government who subsidised costs of the channel and had a commercial side. To gain the funding from the government the rules as shown above had to followed and this is the reason why Michael Grade (See ITV section) said there was hidden subsidiary’s. Channel 4 was made as a way to cater for the minorities.

Another way that Channel 4 gets money is through events and merchandise, as the channel mainly aims at students aged 16 – 24 they host events where young people can go to and listen to upcoming music and this funds more programming for the channels and they also sign artists, by doing this Channel 4 reach more of their audience and expand away from the television industry.

Channel 5

The last of the Terrestrial channels, Channel 5 was first aired in the March of 1997. The channel was then taken over and owned by the RTL Group in 2005 who are the largest conglomerate company in Europe owning companies in both mediums of radio and television. The RTL Company is a subsidiary of the Bertelsmann Company which was first set up in 1835 and operates in 63 countries and has a high standing within the television industry with this backing Channel 5 was able to expand and in October 2006 Channel 5 released a second channel called Five Life.

The new channel originally called Five Life. This was released as a digital channel as once RTL had taken over Digital Television was advancing within the market and it was easier to open a digital channel that terrestrial. With the second channel it allowed Channel 5 to further their target audience specifications and found there was a hole for 24 hour day female targeted channelling and hoped that Five Life would combat this with repeats of talk shows and weekly omnibus’. The channel brought in an average of 39,000 viewers on a regular prime time evening and this meant that they caught 0.21% of the whole UK television Audience as reported by Digital Spy. This showed a slow start for the new channel.

Channel 5 was established as a for profit organization, this meant that the channel would be completely commercial. The company is owned by the RTL Company who fund the channel but other sources of funding come through have a 20% share in Top up TV, who are a digital television company who gave Channel 5 additional channels which raises the profile and allows for more choice and variation on target audiences for the different channels.

Job Roles within the Television Industry

All television shows have different needs depending on the style of the show whether it is a news programme which a needs green screen technicians or a drama which needs location managers. Here are some of the many jobs within the television industry, their salary and the description of the job. I have split the roles into managerial, creative and technical. In the television industry most roles will cross over and this is stated where appropriate within the descriptions.

Although all the jobs have an estimated salary attached with industries like the television industry other forms of wages are given such as free-lance where the employee will work as required, or project based where the employee will get paid for the project and then the contract will end. For this chart of roles I have stuck with the salary scheme as it allows an easy comparison of roles and wages. £21,000 is equivalent to minimum wage and is often roles which will be given to new members of the sets leading to the Director/ Head of Production who can get a number of amounts but £50,000 is a usual guideline for this role.

All the job wages are estimated and this is mainly because of the way the television industry works. Someone who has years of experience could earn much more than a new worker especially in the technical fields and television programmes never have the same budget meaning that depending on the size of production, depends on the wage a person can get.

Creative		In this role you will be expected to have a creative mind and be good with ideas for the shows look and image. These are usually pre-production roles where ideas are created and drawn up.
Job Role	Wage	Description
Production Designer	£37,500	The production designer is in charge of the look of the film, directed by the director’s vision and the story board; the production designer must ensure her team of designers know who and what they are working on throughout the series.
Offline Editor	£34,000	The offline editor is the creative person within the editing process who edits the individual scenes together to create a final show. In this role you will be expected to work in response to what the director wants.
Story Editor	£25,000 - £30,000	The story editor is a member of the team who looks after the arc of the show, it is their role to make sure that any insights which happen through the different episode doesn’t affect the series storyline, in this role the person must be creative to think of ways to resolve issues and change the story if needed. The person in this role must be organized and able to see the end point of the film in order to keep track of all the storylines.
Series Producer	£28,000	A series producer will look after the project over the duration of that series, in this role the person would be looking after the production budget and making sure the look of the film was correct.
Costume Designer	£21,000	The costume department will work under the Production Designer both prior to the tv show being filmed to create costumes and then throughout the filming to make sure costumes are kept continuous as it will not be filmed in the correct order in most cases.
Costume Supervisor	£23,000	Sometimes referred to as a wardrobe supervisor, this role is often only given when the project is of a large scale, this is because this is the role between the Costume Designer and Head of production and only needed if there are a large quantity of costume needing making and the production designer needs to delegate the costume department.
Hair and Make-up Designer	£21,000	The hair and make-up designers are always a team of people who usually specialize in either hair or make-up. The team will split into different groups who work on the same actors throughout the television shows as this is a way to keep continuity the same. The team will work under the direction of the production designer.
Hair and Make-up Supervisor	£23,000	The costume designer will work under the direction of the production designer to create and maintain the costumes throughout filming as they aren’t filmed in chronological order, some replicas may have to be made   during filming.
Managerial		These are roles where the main skills you will need is being able to manage a team of people or project or academic work such as accountancy. These roles usually are paid more as you are looking after a department
Job Role	Wage	Description
Director of Photography	£37,000	The director of photography is in charge of how the film looks through the lens through the different camera angles through to the editing process. As a director of photography the person must have the knowledge of the technical skills required, but also the managerial skills to look after the team of camera operators, sparks, best boys and gaffers.
Head of Production/ Director	£50,000	In this role the person will oversee the entire project making sure that it sticks to the pitch idea and that it keeps to the target audience originally proposed. This role is often seen as the equal to a director of the show, in this role the person must have all three skills creative, managerial and technical as this role is watching over the whole project on all sides.
Assistant Producer	£25,000 - £30,000	As an assistant producer the person will be expected to help find funding for a project and do ground work throughout the whole project. In this role the person usually has a managerial role.
Executive Producer	£60,000	In this role you be expected to look after every aspect of the film and are the highest of all the producer on a television show.
Series Script Editor	£25,000	In skills in creativity this role there are many roles such as finding new script writers, develop script ideas and check continuity on the project, the roll means the person has to have skills in creativity and management. This role will also mean having to watch the running time of the programme and make sure it stays within the limits outlined by the funders.
Production Accountant	£40,000	The production accountant will work in close contact with the producer and will look after the overall budget of their television show; this includes the pay slips for all workers and the cost of equipment and royalties.
Production Manager	£24,000	In this role the person will ensure the production is cost effective, and will have a role in planning, co-ordination and control of manufacturing processes.
Casting Director	£21,000	As a casting director, the person will have to organize all the casting auditions, and the marketing of the audition, the casting director will then work close with the director to decide on the actors who fit the script and target audience of the television show.
First Assistant Director	£40,000	The first assistant director is the right hand person to the director on set; their role is to make sure the filming is on schedule and call sheets are given to the crew and actors beforehand. This role is completely managerial and will require a high level of organization skills.
Technical		These roles are ones where the person who takes on the job must have a good knowledge of the equipment and know the necessary technical requirements; these are often crew roles such as sound, camera and lighting.
Job Role	Wage	Description
Technical Manager	£45,000	As A technical manager it is vital that the person have high technical skills in all areas of tech within a television set. This role is similar to Production Designer they will watch over the set from a technical, health and safety and hazardous way to check the crew are safe. They will also work under the director of photography telling the teams of crew what to do.
Sound Supervisor	£45,000	In this role the person will be in charge of collecting sound effects and making sure that the score of the show is kept the same throughout the programme.
Editor	£25,000	An editor is responsible for the assembly of the pieces in the post production of the project under the direction of the director of photography, the post production supervisor and director, the editor will have the essential skills to edit together the final product these three people want.
Boom Operator	£40,000	A boom operator is someone who is highly technical with the boom and ale to keep the boom close to the scene whilst keeping out of shot, this role requires being stable with the boom pole.
Gaffer	£25,000	In this role a person is under the leadership of the director of photography. They must work closely with the key grip and make sure that the lighting and equipment are ready for filming, if any matters arise they will be expected to sort them whether it be pens, battery etc.
Best Boy	£15,000	Works underneath the Gaffer and generally acts as a runner doing any errands that need running.
Special Effects Co-Ordinator	£35,000	This role requires a high technical ability of special effects training, currently the most wanted special effects software are AVID and Adobe After Effects.
Vision Mixer	£30,000	The vision mixer is usually used on live shows and multi camera shoots, this is becoming a more popular choice of film style as it allows companies to film the piece “as live” and makes the project cheaper as less time is needed with the crews.
Steadicam Operator	£45,000	A steadicam operator is a more specified camera operator in this role it means that you are able to use equipment which is more technical and harder to use but by using the steadicam it allows for smoother moves within scenes and combats camera shake this is often used in large television sets.
Sparks	£24,000	In this role the person will work underneath the director of photography and will be looking after the lighting rigs.
Camera Operator	£40,000	A camera operator is the person who uses the camera who has a broad knowledge of lighting, sound and camera who follows the instruction of the director of photography whilst throwing in their own ideas. In this role it is their job to make sure that the shots are usable and that they flow with the actors to make a sturdy interactive piece. Camera Operators must know the script and be able to keep up with what the audience and the cast are feeling as this will allow for a more moving piece.

All jobs within the television have various wages as it is a flexible to work in, depending on the funding, the company, the contract and your assets to the set decides on the wage you will obtain, these are guideline wages which were found using job hunting websites such as http://www.prospects.ac.uk/location_manager_salary.htm.

Legal and Ethical within the Television Industry

Government Intervention

The government played a huge part in the organization of the Television industry implementing new laws like the Broadcasting Act of 1990 and the Communications Act 2003. Through these laws they were able to create news channel for example when the Broadcasting act was implemented in 1990 it brought in the creation of Channel 5 and the regulatory body.

The Royal Charter

In 1927 the Royal Charter and transformed the BBC extensively with new rules of the way the company could work as the charter now classified the BBC as a completely non-commercial entity meaning that the company had to work in a way that it doesn’t market or try to be commercial. The charter also made the ethos of the BBC, stating what the BBC should do for the public see below clip from the amendments made in 2006.

These and other rules must be kept up with at all times or the funding of the BBC would be scrapped. The charter is still in operation over the BBC and has been amended both in 1996 and 2006. This is to keep up with the technological advancements and make sure BBC is serving the British Public in all mediums.

The Television Act 1954

The television act of 1954 had many reasons behind its creation but one of the most concerning for the government was the monopoly which was forming with the BBC and the way the government tackled this was through bringing in a competitor, this is where ITV stepped in. Although in the act the company was to be stated as “independent” there were many loopholes put in place so that quotas were fulfilled so that ITV fit with what the government wanted people to see. 

The Broadcasting Act 1990

In 1990 the government brought in the Broadcasting Act 1990 which would cover the broadcasting of television and radio within the United Kingdom. The new act brought in new aspects of regulation, restrictions and bringing in new regulatory bodies to watch over the broadcasting in the country to make sure it is suitable with the increasing technological advancements, this included the revising of the powers which the Broadcasting Standards Council could have, the BSC who was to look after the regulations which are outlined throughout the Broadcasting Act mainly making sure that the programmes in both the television and radio industries was of a certain standard of quality that was deemed worthy to be shown regionally or nationally, examples of this included the bringing in of the watershed, the BSC would be the regulator of watershed programmes were shown at the correct time, an example of when the BSC took action over the watershed regulatory contract was with Emmerdale and it was then in the daily mail that the amount of complaints which have been received by Ofcom have raised by 20% to 25% for BBC channels and 12% to 14% this year due to the watershed lines becoming more blurred in an attempt to gain a larger audience.

The Broadcasting Act as well as renewing powers of regulatory bodies brought in more bodies in an attempt to keep the industry strict on certain issues. The Broadcasting Complaints Commission (BCC) who are there as a body to take in complaints by the general public about the fairness, objectivity and impartiality within news programmes in the television and radio industries, although they mainly work within the radio industry due to Ofcom and other regulatory bodies roles they work on television issues when required.

The Independent Television Commission (ITC) was another body which was established in 2003 as part of the broadcasting act 1990, the group were given the powers regulate commercialised television as a replacement to the original regulatory body the Independent Broadcasting Authority 1954.

Public License Fee

The government have brought in two public license fees since the television industries beginning, in in 1990 implemented a Public License Fee which is rated at £145.50 a year for any owner of a colour television. This brings in £3.56 billion a year for the BBC and is the main financial provider for the BBC, although not as much as what the BBC gets ITV and Channel 4 and Channel 5 also get a share of the money although this is much smaller. All of these services due to getting money through this avenue are in some way classed as a Public Broadcasting Service and that means that they have to abide by some codes of conduct when creating television shows to be aired on their channel.

Communication Act 2003

The Communication Act was brought into legislation in 2003 to bring in regulation to the Television, Radio and communication networks like internet and phone. The television part of the act mainly looked at the new forms of media which were coming into play such as on demand television and internet television such as Iplayer. The new legislation had the action plan of bringing in Ofcom, a regulatory body who would look after issues of misconduct on television, product placement, scams, watershed timing.

The communications act gave Ofcom lots of powers within the television industry in terms of laws they could use to keep the industry in line, Ofcom were given the rights to act on the following laws; The Wireless Telegraphy Act 1949, The Independent Television Commission, The Broadcasting Act 1990, The Telecommunications Act 1984 and the Wireless Telegraphy Act revised 1998.

Ofcom

The new regulatory body was brought in as a result to the creation of the act around communications in 2003. All television channels must have licences with Ofcom in order to be broadcasted within the United Kingdom, once having a license with Ofcom the television channel must also have a license with the European Commission body who deal with many legal regulations which includes laws around television which is shown across the EU and
the United Kingdom. Ofcom regulate many areas of television including product placement (also tackled by the European Commission). An example of Ofcom intervening in a product placement case is with the show X Factor where judge Tulisa Costavlos revealed a tattoo which is on her right forearm showing the name “The Female Boss” of her new brand of perfume with a logo next to it. Tulisa was well known for her popular hand gesture where she exposes her right arm as seen in the image on the right. Ofcom intervened in an attempt to see whether it was product placement and what could be done to resolve the issue, as it was a tattoo and the trade mark arm gesture had been done before the tattoo emerge the case got dismissed. These cases emerge often and keep the television industry tight around the rules which Ofcom regulate. 

European Commission

The European commission regulates the areas of the media industry in the EU and sometimes such as in Competition cases they will investigate cases within the United Kingdom, the European Commission also deal in cases where they see that a channel is intentional being abusive to a certain demographic. A section of the European Commission is called the Audio Visual Media Services Group.

Audio Visual Media Services (AVMS)

The AVMS looks after all types of television including on demand and traditional television styles. They have jurisdictions if the piece is filmed within an EU country. The regulations that the AVMS look after are the quality standards of television, product placement, the advertising of unhealthy food to children and the watershed on programmes to make sure that the pieces shown on television are suitable for people who would be awake at the time of showing.

Technical Developments within the Television Industries

Terrestrial

The first type of television terrestrial was the beginning of film and was where signal points like Emily Moor would send signal across the United Kingdom. This type of television doesn’t involve using sky satellites but uses the radio waves; this was first used in the UK in 1929 when BBC aired their first programme. The downfalls of this form of television were that areas of the country couldn’t get the coverage as the radio waves needed to be able to travel in straight lines, so this meant that the market of viewers for terrestrial television was low.  

Terrestrial television was the first step in technology within televisual public broadcasting. It proved to be a success across the country and was the only form of broadcasting within the UK until the 1950’s when Cable Television was brought in.

Colour Television

Colour Television was a big leap for the television industry in the realistic area of the programme; all leaps in the industry have been to make the film seem more realistic as can be shown in the progression from colour to high definition to three dimensional. Colour television was first aired in 1967 on BBC2 with coverage of Wimbledon that year, it was than later launched by BBC2 in December. BBC1 and ITV didn’t begin showing colour television regularly until 1969. Some television programmes were made in colour before 1967 in the UK but this was the official launch of colour within the country as colour took time to get through as the war effort meant that funding for the different industries were cut drastically and the public were less interested in looking at new technologies.

Cable Television

Rolled into the United Kingdom in 1936 cable was a new way for people who couldn’t get the radio waves through air to get television, this was then cut in 1939 which meant that this roll out wasn’t known to most and didn’t have the impact predicted, it was then re launched in 1946 and throughout the 1950’s it strived across the country through the use of cables allowing people to get the terrestrial channels who couldn’t previously. By the late 1970’s cable households had risen to 2,500,000. Until 1982 the cable companies were able to show any channels they wanted and these could be paid for through subscriptions but then the Cable and Broadcasting Act was being negotiated and was enforced in 1984 meaning that the Cable companies could only show public broadcasting channels which meant that the amount of users of cable users decreased heavily.

Digital Television

The next form of British Broadcasting after cable was digital, this style of broadcasting was launched within the UK in the autumn of 1998, this new system which would be sent through aerials which could be bought by providers and could look after radio, television and internet which made this much more popular as a choice for people to have as their broadcasting style.

The most common set up is via a set up box which is linked to an aerial with a coaxial cable which are used in the cable system but once reaching the aerial it then changes to finding radio frequencies with a satellite. This combines both the previous methods and has made it possible for more variety.

This was launched fully over the duration of 2010 until 2012 where the country was switched off terrestrially area by area and switched over to digital.

On Demand Television

A new form of television which is taking over the majority of the British public market is On Demand television. This new technology allows people the freedom to watch their shows when they want and what they want when the television industry began in the United Kingdom there were certain programmes on at certain times and meant that people formed their lives around television, an example is when coronation street was first on people’s screens, families would send their children to bed by the sound of the opening titles and daily tasks would be blended in with the viewing television.

In the new age of television with On Demand it allows a viewer to watch when they want so they can go to work all day and come in after it has been shown and watch the programme without missing work. In the modern day the public want things now and this is shown in technological advancement across the electric industry with phones which can acess the internet for quick access to social networking sites and news and eating on the go having constantly becoming more part of the British culture. The television have followed in this. An example of this taking place is if you were to levy virgin media on demand or BskyB for 1% it would produce over £70 million.

High Definition

Another form of advancement in the development of realistic television is High Definition. Throughout the history of the moving picture industry, it has been a goal to make television feel as real as possible because "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away" and this is the key to film making you want the audience to keep involved with the piece and keep the realism because it won’t leave them, they will remember it. High Definition was a real step in the quality of image within the industry allowing people to see the amount of detail which could be taken in naturally, now on screen.

High Definition was first tried in the early 1990’s although this wasn’t broadcasting it was a way for camera operator to familiar themselves with the new quality levels. It hit the television market in 1998 but it wasn’t until 2006 first tried High Definition on the event Wimbledon, although this was never broadcasted through HD, they tried both forms and stuck with standard definition. It wasn’t until the May that HD began to be used commercially. In May BBC began airing some shows in HD on satellite and cable to see how the audience would react to the new advancement in technology. Immediately after BBC began broadcasting Sky began a brand new subscription to users which covered the new HD services that the companies would provide. All this happened in a few months and that summer the cricket ashes was the sport which was both recorded and broadcasted in full HD.

By the end of 2006 all of the terrestrial channels, ITV, Channel 4, and Five had caught up with HD. By advancing filming techniques makes the programme clearer, less hazy and covered in dust from the exposure in the dark room and in the camera. It has been proven by camera buffs worldwide that the image is over 5 times better by being HD and by unlocking how to make the image better with HD they can further that in the future and that the feel of the films is much more realistic and this allows as quoted by Charles De Lint “Like legend and myth, magic fades when it is unused”. This applies to film as people begin to not believe in the film the magic behind the screen fades and this is what sells films to people, the idea of escapism.

3D Television

The newest released advancement in television is third dimension television. 3D television has been one of the most challenging technological advancements in the television industry. The design of 3D viewing was created by Wilhelm Rollmann, a German inventor, this system used the colours cyan and red to pick out the pieces that need brought back in cyan and in red the things that needed bringing forward. The idea of 3D had potential, but the rest of the aspect of film and television hadn’t been grounded fully to support the advancement, the audience were not happy with the film The Great Train Robbery bringing in negative reviews as it just looked like a blob coming towards the audience, this meant the demise of 3D in that generation.

It wasn’t until Stephen Gibson, a film maker used the technique of the cyan and red in an R rated film in the 1970’s. This began to bring 3D back into reach for the television industry. Over the 1980’s the 3D became a fad for college students across the country and the first show to be aired in 3D on television was a magazine science show called The Real World, this continued to get a larger amount of television channels filming in 3D, over the 90’s sitcoms like 3^rd Rock from the Sun and Sabrina started to use 3D in a few selected episodes. At the beginning of the new millennium 3D wasn’t far from the television industry at all, but the general public were still hesitant against it with the use of red and cyan glasses being very off putting, over the last 10 years the 3D system has changed to be polaroid, which meant no more coloured glasses just dark tinted ones, and this has increased the market for the way of film making in an even more realistic way.

In January 2010 Sky showcased a football match between Manchester United and Arsenal and the Grammy Award Ceremony this made the demand for 3D television even greater as these prestigious events and matches showed just how it had developed. In October 2011 the result in December 2011 was claimed to be over 140,000 3D television had been sold within the UK and this shows how the demand has raised in the past few years.