Bars, Tone, and Countdown

[Tom Matthies]

You wouldn’t think it would be necessary to add bars and tone when transferring a file, but you never know what the station does with the file once they receive it. There may be some reason they prefer it done that way. I’d just call them and ask what the best way would be to send the file. Maybe they have old information listed for their requirements.

Not my monkeys. Not my circus.

[Greg Janza]

there’s multiple ways to deliver to a broadcast facility but when I was delivering tv shows our timecode started at 59:00:00, bars and tone were put at 59:00:00-59:30:00, slate 59:40:00-59:50:00, countdown 59:50:00-59:58:00. Two secs of black and then the show at 1:00:00:00.

I Hate Television. I Hate It As Much As Peanuts. But I Can’t Stop Eating Peanuts.
– Orson Welles

[Mark Suszko]

Greg’s description is pretty much the standard. There might be variations regarding stereo and surround audio tracks that could complicate matters but personally I think it’s been years since we were asked to do this on a deliverable, since they are played off servers now. In fact, on the last round of broadcast spots for handling by the client’s network, strict requirements for our spots that there was to be only 2 frames of black before the first actual frame, and only ten frames of black after.

But it always defaults to whatever the station specifically wants. They may need to be able to see it in pre-roll to help cue a live take to air. Or its the only way they can calibrate. That someone still DOES calibrate anything for playback in this business warms my heart.