Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

As you probably know, we produce a few of our own shows. Some of these local productions are aired on other public broadcasting stations and some are national productions, distributed through PBS or American Public Television. NORTH CAROLINA BOOKWATCH was a local series that ran for 23 seasons on our airwaves and featured conversations with such authors as Clyde Edgerton, Lee Smith, Pat Conroy, John Grisham and Nicholas Sparks. Here’s the set that was used for the series circa 2017. It was located in Studio B of our RTP facilities in the Joseph and Kathleen Bryan Communications Center.

NOTE: If you see the sign “Working Set” that means the set has been constructed for a production that is ongoing and will be used again so any manipulation (moving furniture or set dressing) could impact future recordings. Please do not disturb.

Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

This is the rundown sheet for a taping of FRONT ROW. The former Friday night public affairs staple was recorded live in our studios on Fridays (sometimes earlier if it was a holiday), mere hours before it was broadcast. To keep things topical, of course. I spied this rundown attached to the cameras the night before one of the tapings and snapped this pic.

We stopped airing FRONT ROW in early 2023, replacing it with our own STATE LINES.

Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

One of the reasons I started this blog is to share some of the behind-the-scenes of what we do at PBS NC. Public broadcasting may seem mysterious but it’s a business, like any other, and people are employed who work for that business. These people work in offices and clock in and out like so many others. And while on the job they may do things to occupy their time that serve very little purpose than to entertain themselves and co-workers because, sometimes, work is just work, y’know, and you have to amuse yourself or go mad.

So that’s why I share this pic with you. I saw it in a room where the production crew hang out and assemble. As you might imagine, a TV production crew has a lot of downtime. And when creative people have downtime, they do things like this. Which I think is very cool.

Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

Another snap from the set of SCI NC…

Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

Some weeks back, I shared a photo of one of our control rooms as it underwent renovation. Now the work is complete (or near as) and it looks like we have a spanking new(ish) control room.

This is the room where the director and assorted crew sit while recording many of our local in-studio programs. I can’t possibly tell you what all the buttons do because it’s been ages since I worked in production but I can say that on the surface it all looks very cool and technical. And that’s broadcasting in a nutshell, I think.

Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

I saw this posted inside the doors to one of our studios. Not exactly sure what it says but it’s obviously meant to inform engineering and production crews on certain technical specs regarding shows we record for broadcast. BIF stands for BLACK ISSUES FORUM and the others (SCI NC, BOOKWATCH, FOCUS ON) you may recognize from our schedule.

Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

If you’ve ever toured a television station, you may have been dazzled by all the equipment and monitors used to record and broadcast your favorite shows. But that’s only the surface. Here’s a shot of one of our control rooms currently undergoing renovation. As you can see, the floor is elevated, allowing the subfloor to be utilized for storing wires and cables. This keeps the area (when completed) free of all those nasty tripping hazards. I often wonder how many wires and cables are used to allow a broadcast facility like PBS North Carolina to function. I’m also constantly amazed and what percentage of those are hidden away beneath the surface. Hats off to our engineering and tech staff who make all this happen and keep us running!

Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

Many of us at PBS North Carolina worked from home for several years (some still do) thanks to the pandemic. Now that I’ve returned to work at our facility in RTP, I am constantly reminded of the overabundance of wildlife in the vicinity. Deer and geese are a regular sight and, over the years, I’ve spotted wild turkeys, foxes, groundhogs and more. Here’s a shot of a goose, one of a breeding pair, enjoying a puddle near the loading dock in the rear of our station. You can see the reflection of one of our production trucks in the water (the old UNC-TV logo, since we haven’t gotten the new brand on them yet).

Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

Here’s a sign that you might see in a television station. In fact, you do see it, you can see it because I snapped this picture outside one of our studios. Of course, microphones will pick up any extraneous noise so that’s why you want people outside the studio to keep it down.

Hey, It’s Photo Friday!

A few weeks back, I mentioned that our station had recently played host to a teaching conference. As such, we welcomed quite a few educators into our hallways and studios. This was the set up in our Studio A where tables were set out for attendees to congregate. I really dig the Rootle/PBS Kids tablecloths.