The ITV Colour Strike | Black & White's Last Stand | An AMTV Documentary

[@kirstin1000]

Not only is this fascinating, but also clarifying! I live in the US and it's very difficult to find older British dramas. I managed to find the original Upstairs Downstairs to watch through unofficial channels--but a few episodes in, everything suddenly became black and white. I rationalized this as the uploader editing the episodes to avoid copyright strikes and I regretfully stopped watching the show because I wanted the original versions. All this time, it turns out that *was* the original version! Thank you so much for making and uploading this video! Now I can finally go back to watching that show with peace of mind✌😂

[@CastorQuinn]

It was arguably the perfect strike: large, looming impact on the company, minimal impact on the people. The '79 action was far more unpopular with consumers.

[@jojodelacroix]

Sadly, you usually have to end up making a big enough rile to upset consumers that then complain to the main company to make progress. Of course, it's hard to thread that needle, increasingly so in the 21st century as companies have become larger and larger and more adept at branding and messaging (and also lobbying to weaken unions).

[@stickytapenrust6869]

4:20 - NOT 4 lenses. The EMI 2001 and Marconi Mk7 had 1 lens, 4 pickup tubes. The Philips cameras, EMI 2005 and Marconi Mk8 had 3 tubes and 1 lens.

[@barryobrien7935]

Thank you! I can’t believe the narrative was so misinformed. 4 lenses? Wouldn’t there be a convergence issue? Ha ha. Comment from Oakland California.

[@cpm1003]

Glad to see this comment, so I don't have to post it myself! The cameras must have had a luminance output though, for the strikers to use.

[@stickytapenrust6869]

@@cpm1003 4-tube cameras had a dedicated luminance tube, 3-tube ones didn’t so they just switched off the 4.43MHz PAL colour carrier to make those b/w.

[@eddiewillers1]

Thank-you for commenting on that - it bugged me that a lens turret (from the days before the powered zoom lens) could be mistaken for the pickup devices.

[@jennyd255]

As an ex BBC engineer thank you for saving me from having to painstakingly explain all this... In reality the only thing that changed was that the colour burst signal was removed from sync pulses. (and in fact in some cases it wasn't removed very well leading to the intriguing possibility of using a colour recovery process on these recordings as was done for some of the lost colour Dr who shows from BBC).

[@martinusher1]

I aquired a colour set around 1974 -- it was smashed when the person stealing it from a nightclub was discovered and threw it (a 26" console model) down a flight of stairs. I was given the carcass and repaired it. There was no way I could have afforded to buy one. These early sets were not just colour but also dual standard -- 625/405 line models capable of receiving both the colour UHF transmissions and the older VHF b&w service. The complexity this introduced into the set design had to be seen to be believed, it was essentially two sets in one with a huge solenoid driven switch reconfiguring the set for each system. The set used a mixture of valves and transistors -- all discrete components. I don't like to think how much it had cost new, but obviously it was so expensive that a thief was prepared to tuck the equivalent of a small chest of drawers under his arm and try to climb a set of stairs with it.

[@marcse7en]

The information in this video is confused! The cameras with a turret of several lenses were used to provide various shots, for example, wide angle and close up (before zoom lenses). The lens turret would rotate, to select the required lens. Separate lenses were NOT used for each of the primary colours. Inside the camera, the image coming from the selected lens, was split and focussed on three camera tubes (red, green, and blue, and some cameras had four tubes). In the case of the colour strike, a colour signal could be converted to Black & White, by removing the colour information. A bit like turning the colour down on your old CRT TV!

[@stepheng8779]

Most fancy colour TV's were rented back in the 70's and were taken away at the flick of a switch, usually with a puff of smoke too 😉😂

[@jdb47games]

Yes, if you rented a colour telly in the period 1967-75, the repairman virtually lived at your house! Also, you scarcely needed a heater in the living room! It would always take up to a minute to come on, and would generate tons of static on the screen.

[@TepacheLoco]

We rented in the 90s! TVs only really started to become an affordable consumer item in the late 90s

[@video99couk]

A Decca Bradford breaking down? Never! Oh yes, actually, quite a lot.

[@steviebboy69]

@@jdb47games We didnt get a colour tv until around 1977 and the set was a Kreisler Colourama or something like that. Down under didn't get colour until around 76 or so. The B&W we had was a PYE, and before that a valve PYE set.

[@lisapinfold506]

I had a horrible coin ooerated one in my first place. Cost a fortune.

[@BlaiddLlwyd]

There's an interesting effect of the colour strike on ATV's Timeslip as two episodes were recorded in monochrome during the strike. The original colour tapes were wiped or possibly were too degraded to broadcast, and aside from one colour episode all we have to watch now are monochrome telerecordings. Most of these have an ITC frontcap and endcap but with the ATV In Colour Zoom music playing over the frontcap. There are two episodes where you can hear the alternative ATV Not-In-Colour Zoom music. So it's easy to tell which episodes were made during the strike even though 25 of 26 are monochrome only these days.

[@radiotracks7865]

I understand The Year of the Burn Up was made in colour but originally shown in B&W. It was repeated in 1974 in colour. It looked really good in colour I recall. It was probably the first and only time as the tapes were later wiped, but B&W film recordings thankfully survive. I remember the Day of the Clone episodes made in B&W shown with the B&W version of the ATV ident.

[@MOMGEN1]

Our first colour TV was a Radio Rentals set that arrived in Feb 1979. The day it arrived was one of the most exciting of my childhood.

[@j0hnf_uk]

As mentioned, the irony was that the majority of those watching at home still only had black and white TV sets, anyway, so this strike would prove to be largely ineffectual in forcing the TV companies to submit to their demands. Most people weren't able to buy their own sets, by the way, but instead rented them from such companies as Rent-a-set, Radio Rentals, etc.

[@ukeleleEric]

ALSO, there was no mention of the fact that owning or renting a colour TV meant you had to pay a lot more for the TV licence required as well. We still have the silly distinction between B&W and colour licences...

[@edwardnowill4408]

@@ukeleleEric B/w licence is currently £52.00 per year,if I remember right.Colour is £149?This matters in some households-although only about 8000 b/w licences currently issued,I understand.

[@edwardnowill4408]

B/w licences held by a diverse group of people-declining all the time.A few years back the figure was about 85,000,this suggests that many are held by elderly people

[@michaelf.2449]

@@edwardnowill4408 TV license always confused me why would I ever pay that? I only stream to my TV and don't even have cable here in the USA so it's just odd to hear

[@edwardnowill4408]

@@michaelf.2449 many people don't pay it.sanctions under uk criminal law for non payment [heavy fines] were severe-now downgraded to a civil offence & thus non payment not so frightening.As you indicate Tv licences make little sense in today's world,& most people see little chance of tv licences lasting into the longer term future.

[@ohmydinosare]

I've recently been rewatching Upstairs Downstairs, so this has been on my mind lately. Did you know they filmed two endings to the first episode, when they reshot it, one which matched the black and white version's ending, and led into the black and white episodes, and one where Sarah does not stay, that leads into the first of the colour episodes. If someone just wanted to broadcast the colour ones they'd use that alternate ending.

[@tinahardman9805]

Yes, I have seen both endings. Confusing unless you know the story behind it.

[@ohmydinosare]

@@tinahardman9805 it's quite an interesting bit of TV history, though. My mum has the dvd set of S1, and it has all the B&W episodes, so the version where sarah stays is the default, but the other version is included.

[@CoolTastrophe]

@@tinahardman9805 And speaking of Upstairs Downstairs, Adam said that there were 68 episodes, six in monochrome and 63 in colour. 6+63=69, so it’s either there were actually only 62 in colour, or there’s actually 69 episodes.

[@bletheringfool]

With technology having moved on in leaps and bounds, colourising 5 EPs of Upstairs, Downstairs for DVD/Bluray is not beyond reach. I do remember watching repeats of On The Buses and did wonder why it jumped from colour to black and white and back again

[@stickytapenrust6869]

8:35 - the colour equipment didn’t go unused for months, it was being used but either with the 4.43MHz PAL colour carrier from the camera CCUs being switched off (on 3-tube cameras) or with the colour tubes removed (on 4-tube ones).

[@bettyswunghole3310]

The quality of the colour images of President Eisenhower from 1958 is amazing...

[@TheTux]

The reason for the slow uptake of colour TV's in Britain, at least in my experience, was not down to the cost of the TV's as they were just a one off payment that you could by on credit or rent quite cheaply, it was the cost of a colour TV licence that put a lot of people off because it was a yearly charge and quite expensive comapred to a momchrome licence, about four times more expensive. We never went colour in my house until 1988 due to that very reason. It was me who eventually got a colour TV in when I left school and started working.

[@borandolph1267]

I was looking for this comment!

[@SoiBuakhaoRoutemasterbus]

I remember not having a colour telly in my house until 1974. My Mum & I didn't want colour and told my Dad we would switch it to B&W only (which you could on those early sets, the colour was adustable from zero to massively over-coloured!) to watch our favorite shows...... although of course we didn't and watched things in colour from then on.... apart from all the B&W made repeats of course.... lol

[@bobsoldrecords1503]

Where has this channel been all my life? Great content, well produced. My marathon rabbit hole is set for this week

[@ianz9916]

My Uncle was an early adopter. I remember us all piling round to his place in 1970 to watch the F.A. Cup final in colour. It was so annoying that Leeds were in the final as they played in all white kit. I know one of my favourite series of the time, Timeslip, was affected by the strike but this has been compounded by the fact even the episodes that were shot in colour have gone missing. The entire series is available but only one episode survives in colour.

[@petermainwaringsx]

I rented a colour TV in the late sixties, when only BBC2 was available in colour, but I'd forgotten about the ITV colour strike.

[@areasquirrel]

I hadn't heard of this strike. Ulster going colour afterwards meant it probably went unnoticed in NI, especially since we were turning into a war zone by then, which would affect broadcasting in other ways. An interesting story, seeing a strike which was basically invisible to viewers, compared to other bigger ones, such as the much more famous one in '79.

[@johnking5174]

In the Republic of Ireland, RTE Television took a long time to expand their colour service, nearly all down to money problems, as RTE was always one of the most poorest national broadcasters in Europe until around the late 1980s. RTE colour imported programming started in 1969, with proper colour service launching in 1971 with the Eurovision Song Contest in Dublin the starting point.

[@skellertons113]

I know the BBC broadcast experimental colour transmissions in the fifties when Crystal Palace transmitter opened, but were not satisfied with the NTSC system. It was when the PAL system came along that the BBC and ITA agreed that this was the one to use. As a kid,(on holidays), I used to watch all those BBC2 Trade Test Colour Films shown during the day, but in BW, as the likes of us did not have colour sets. "Giuseppina", "The Home Made Car", Coupe des Alpes", Beauty in Trust", "The Cattle Carters", and many other titles, mainly made by Shell and BP. For normal tv viewing, our family used to turn the turret tuner knob on the telly to channels 1 for BBC 1, or 9 for ITA,(VHF 405 lines) as it gave a clearer picture.We had three aerials, a Band I for BBC, a Band III for ITA, picking up from Beulah Hill, South Norwood, and a crude Group A aerial for BBC 2.

[@tsr207]

I still look out for "grey scale tracking" in TV pictures (from the trade film the colour television receiver) !

[@SihirbazTsar55]

6:13 My guess is that PBS, despite a huge number of US viewers who still had monochrome TV sets at the time, thought that broadcasting black and white TV shows would hit their prestige and their standing with Congress; those who wanted to defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting would have pointed to those episodes and claimed that PBS was lagging behind, even with government support. Black and white television was seen as obsolete in the 70s and no major programming was being produced in that format. The success of Nick at Nite, a block on Nickelodeon that aired older (including black and white) television shows, in 1985 and the 50s and 60s nostalgia that occurred in the late 80s led PBS to buy those black and white episodes.

[@stephenhall6595]

My Parents did not get a Colour set until 1974. We had a push button 625 Line Monocrome set between 71 and 74. One of the first shows we saw in Colour was Upstairs Downstairs.

[@56independent]

My grandmother used to visit her neighbours because of their colour TV. She was taken aback by how immersive and cool it was.

[@-abacchus]

Just stumbled upon your channel, and already loving the information and production/editing quality! I remember my Mum telling me about when _her_ Mum bought their first colour TV; My Mum would get headaches from watching it because her Mum *insisted* on having the colour set to MAXIMUM _(as if to make it obvious to any visitors that _*_she had a colour TV_*_ )_

[@michaelbond7652]

I'm British and this is amazing. The info, the opening, the AMTV Productions logo, all perfect. And don't forget you found the oldest colour recording found in the US! The dedication is amazing and I wish you made even more. So far, you made 2 more documentaries and they are BOTH superb.

[@AdamMartyn]

Thank you Michael! They do take time to make, but i will make more 😊

[@wmbrown6]

Three "Benny Hill Shows" were produced during the "colour strike." Two routines wound up in different places - the period sketch "Love Will Find A Way" made it to both "The Best of Benny Hill" movie and into U.S. half-hour syndication; and part of the "Uplift" sketch - where Lesley Goldie as "Joanna Bakewell-Tart" was interviewing Benny as malaprop-prone East End poet St. John Bossom - was featured on the "Words" side of his LP "Benny Hill: Words And Music." It was from the first of those three shows that he first performed "Ernie (The Fastest Milkman In The West)," a year before released as a single. The sketches on those shows were head and shoulders above the later remakes from the '80's whereby he and his cast began mailing in their performances. Incidentally, it was because of the colour strike that Benny that year turned out five specials - after the strike was over, he finished the 1970-71 series back where he started - in colour.

[@jackstrawful]

I'm just glad the workers got their pay raise. Striking for 5% and getting 4% is pretty successful, good on 'em.

[@davidmatthewvinotjr8396]

Would like to see the 1967-1968, 1980 and 1991 ITV Franchise Rounds put into separate documentaries.

[@netking66]

Heard a story on radio years ago about a child who wanted parents to buy a colour set but parents would not budge. Child poured glass of water down back of B&W TV to force the issue. 'The man' was called to fix TV and repaired TV quite easily but noted to mum there was water in the back. I cannot remember what happened next.

[@Benzona]

I believe the child was killed

[@slyseal2091]

@@Benzona its true, I was the child

[@james68908]

I bet the child was grounded for that.

[@lbsiuk]

Just discovered this channel and have no clue how it doesn't have over a million subs! Awesome video.

[@AdamMartyn]

Thats very kind of you! Maybe one day we'll crack a million! 😁

[@michalkwecka725]

That "Oh" in the into just cracked me up.

[@sarahhardcastle2433]

My family was the last in the street to get colour tv, we didn’t get it till 1979!

[@psprog]

Fascinating - I'd never heard of this. I was born in 1970 but was in the Border TV region so my parents wouldn't have noticed (my dad was an early colour TV adopter, but later on he backed the wrong horse with Video 2000 ;- ). Great stuff!

[@Crusader1089]

Video 2000 was a great recording device and a bloody awful movie watching device

[@imgoingtocountdownfromthir4580]

My parents didn't rent a colour TV until 1983 anyway, we actually had a video recorder before we had a colour TV!

[@Turnbull50]

I remember renting a colour set in 1971 for a few quid a month

[@johnking5174]

£2/2s/2d per week was how much my grandparents rented their colour TV set from the summer of 1969 from Granada Television rental firm.

[@macra_]

Another great documentary Adam, super interesting hearing about the transition to colour TV and some of it's issues! I'd be interested in seeing a documentary on the technician disputes of the 70s (the ones that affected Shada)

[@CulturePhilter]

I’d never heard of this strike before. Interesting stuff

[@Borusa1976]

Watched this one on holiday while in Turkey. Always enjoyed Adam's work as one - he is so researched - two - his voice makes a good storyteller and - three - he approached it with a sense of humour but knows to tell the story and make people come back for more. Keep it up Adam 8-)

[@pablobratcat]

As a former broadcast engineer, I appreciate your work

[@digitalmediafan]

Brilliantly done. I always wondered why certain episodes of on the buses were in high quality b&w...now I know ! Perhaps you might do a video on the gradual switch to nicam stereo. That was quite a slow process to get all channels and eventually all shows made in stereo

[@vylbird8014]

I really like how the Wizard of Oz's iconic scene was shot, incorporating both color and black and white together so seemlessly. You'd think it was done with some visual effects work - perhaps shoot it twice, once with B+W film and once with the color, then use a traveling matte to combine them. But the technical issues for that were a major challenge - the precision needed to match camera movements. How about shooting it in color, then transfering the color on to B+W to get a color mix, and feeding that into the matte? That would work, but it would need so much delicate work manually making an absolutely perfect matte. No, they found a simpler way. It's all color. They just painted the set interior side in grey! Then they doused Dorothy's stunt double in grey dye as well. During the instant when she steps out of frame, the Dorothy wearing the grey-painted dress steps aside and a new Dorothy in a colorful outfit steps forward in her place.

[@yellowbelly06]

Sorry to be pedantic but colour TV cameras did not have four lenses, they had one - a varifocal lens. This distinguished them from the monochrome turret cameras which had several lenses and required the operator to change between lenses to obtain whichever shot was needed (although some of the last monochrome cameras did have varifocal lenses). What colour cameras had were four tubes, the devices which converted the image into an electronic signal. Three were luminance (for colour - one each for the red, green and blue signal) and one was chrominance (for black and white). These would merge the picture seen by the camera and allowed the viewer to see a programme whatever the status of their receiver. It was the three colour tubes that were switched off meaning the colour camera could only use the chrominance tube to record an image.

[@doppler2009]

Thanks for this! Australia didn't get colour TV until 1975!

[@meikahidenori]

Yup and the first show to get it was the Auntie Jack show. Infact they messed around with it so the entire show went colour and auntie jack stayed in black and white!

[@williampamblanco]

Superb documentary! Interesting topic and very well made.

[@AdamMartyn]

Thank you William! 😁

[@kabelsalad8380]

Great documentary, but a small technical point - cameras only ever had one lens. The group of four seen on earlier cameras is a lens turret, which was how they changed focal lengths before zoom lenses were introduced at around the same time as colour cameras (you can actually see it moving in an earlier clip) and has nothing to do with colour reproduction. Cameras had multiple *sensors* for different colours, which would have been vidicon or plumbicon tubes at the time. Three tube cameras mixed the outputs of these tubes in a certain proportion (roughly 59% green, 11% blue and 30% red) to produce a black and white picture, four tube cameras worked as described in the video. Fortunately analogue television is designed to treat colour as a sort of optional extra, so they could simply disable the colour subcarrier part of the signal and carry on working as normal. Incidentally, this three-sensor design is still in use, right up to the latest 8K broadcast cameras.

[@robmortimer4150]

This is great. I’d love to see your take on the many eras of school broadcasting - an area I enjoy looking at

[@wisteela]

Another excellent video. I was hoping you'd cover this after the you did the ITV strikes, and mentioned that then. Another great example of a programme affected was On the Buses.

[@stefangherman8408]

A fun fact about B&W television is that in Romania, Dallas was aired in monochrome, because the colour system was not yet adopted and still was a very popular show.

[@jamesrobinson814]

Very interesting. I have never heard about this before. I was born at the end of 2970 and we still had black and white until around 1974. The first image I ever saw on a colour television at home was the Granada symbol. But despite having a UHF black and white set prior to thus, we would never have known about the colour strike. I do remember the 2979 itv strike but despite following television technology all of my life I had never heard about this at any point, even when talking yo people who do share the same interest. You learn something every day.

[@jbtv7955]

Cool video Adam I can remember in the itv colour strike 1970 Coronation Street Xmas episode was showed in monochrome

[@Dukes-nt1er]

Hello again Adam , i have just watched this again.............Beautifully Narrated....filled with FACTS.........which makes a change............you have my utmost respect for all your work so far..............

[@stickytapenrust6869]

10:20 - the BBC didn’t have a full colour service until the late 70s. Many regional news programmes were in black and white until 1975/76. Some children’s programmes like Blue Peter and Zokko remained in b&w for a while.

[@martinhughes2549]

BBC Bangor converted to Colour in 1978. Blue Peter was made in Colour from late 1970 I understand.

[@jdb47games]

@@martinhughes2549 Our family got a colour telly in the autumn of 1971. The first episode or two of Blue Peter that I saw on the colour set was still in b&w, so the move to colour might have been a year later.

[@aspectcarl]

Fascinating! I wonder how many colour TV owners were slapping the side of the telly to try and get colour back? 😅

[@rofidel178]

My country Argentina didn't had color until the year '78 so we were way waay behind. Interesting video.

[@lewisakkas3253]

Been looking for a video on the colour strike for a while. Thanks for covering it!

[@AdamMartyn]

No problem Lewis! Hope you found it informative and enjoyable! 😁

[@michaelturner4457]

Our family rented a colour TV in 1970. But only kept it for a short time, because the thing was so unreliable, and having to call the Radio Rentals engineer out every few weeks. Then we went back to a black and white TV until 1974.

[@Dukes-nt1er]

yes. Many itv shows were affected by this, Coronation street, On the Buses, and many other comedy and drama shows dvd box sets on the reverse, give the reason why colour series had some black and white episodes.........!!!!! Another quality effort Adam, your videos stand up to repeat viewing.......that is really the main point......WELL DONE AGAIN, i , like you am a stickler for detail, and things being thorough, And in order.

[@dogsbark5750]

My uncle had a color RCA in the late 50s. Amazing that the UK was so behind.

[@r5img]

I think one of the reasons why Europe tv stations lagged behind the US and Japan when adopting colour was because those two countries used the NTSC (National Television Standards Committee) standard, which was apparently rushed to market by adapting (IIRC) a technology originally designed for colour closed-circuit tv. The system wasn't particularly well suited for over-the-air transmission, leading to distortions in colour hues, such that the standard was given the unfortunate nickname Never The Same Colour. The BBC and other European broadcasters got together to come up with a proper colour tv standard that actually worked, and like all committees (particularly those comprising of groups speaking multiple languages) the discussions dragged on for a while. An early French proposed standard called SECAM (Sequential Colour and Memory) fixed the American hue distortions and allowed for more stable signals over longer distances. But the BBC and many countries finally adopted a variation of the SECAM system called PAL (Phase Alternating Line, nickname: People Aren't Lavender) that adopted SECAM's colour fixing techniques, but wasn't quite as radical when it came to the signal structure apparently.

[@MadScientist750]

Pal is not sequential, it's differential: it first sends an image line straight to the tv, then sends the next one "inverted" so the color error gets to Zero by itself. It stores the next line while drawing the actual one. It uses AM signal for sending the image, it actually sends a grayscale image and the values of red and blue to the TV to make the substraction and decode the colours (blue minus white and red minus white equals green). Pal is an enhanced NTSC, not a Secam derivative and it has been created in Germany by AEG-Telefunken. Secam has NOTHING to do with Pal. First of all, it uses FM to send first (white minus blue) and then (white minus red) piecing them together in the screen, in "sequence". Other color system it has been developed but used by no country is DSC from Philips, i believe it used 2 subcarriers to send simultaneously all the luminance and chrominance information but i know little about it.

[@r5img]

@@MadScientist750 In terms of the way the signals were transmitted over the air, PAL is indeed closer to NTSC, but in terms of the way the signal is encoded the systems are very different. PAL uses a wider channel bandwidth and different resolution. Both SECAM and PAL were ways of addressing the colour problem with NTSC, and although SECAM uses sequential colour, the PAL and SECAM share the same wider bandwidth and have compatible resolutions. The upshot is that, for devices like VCRs, games consoles, and home computers, creating a device that can handle both PAL and SECAM is relatively simple, but getting a device that can handle both PAL and NTSC requires a lot of work. (This is why dual standard PAL/SECAM VCRs were commonplace from the early 80s on, but it wasn't until the 90s that we got cheap devices that could handle both PAL and NTSC competently.) Although the PAL standard was indeed developed in Germany, it was done so as part of the European Broadcasting Union in close collaboration with groups like the BBC, and indeed the BBC was the first broadcaster to ever broadcast using it.

[@MadScientist750]

@@r5img It is actually correct what you say, both systems tried to resolve what NTSC was uncapable of.

[@sanders2378]

I knew nothing of the colour strike until I watched Upstairs Downstairs and discovered the b/w episodes. We never had a colour tv till the mid-1980s so the strike completely passed us by!

[@markdavidson9100]

Fantastic video, I love how tv has developed over the years, also tv idents are pretty iconic

[@jeremypreece870]

Interesting. I lived through this period and wasn't even aware of this strike. But, there again, we had black and white until the mid 1970's.

[@stevenoliver1326]

Border was still transmitting local output in black and white until the mid-seventies. Its first network series of Mr & Mrs was made at Tyne Tees, as a co-production, to comply with an edict from the IBA that no black and white output was to air in daytime.

[@hunchanchoc8418]

I used to love watching that Colour TV Engineers Guide cartoon. I remember the engineer waggling his degaussing ring in front of the screen. Happy days.

[@Calzaki]

It still sounds weird to me to hear anyone describe red, blue and GREEN as "primary colours". I understand it from a technical perspective and how the RBG system works but i've always remembered red, blue and yellow as the primary colours and any child capable of finger painting knows green is what you get if you mix blue and yellow but now days its seemed to switch around and yellow is the mix of red and green. Just weird how science works or ideas change

[@TheFokker03]

my dad had the first tv set in his village way back when.but we never swapped to colour until 1980!

[@dakrontu]

In 1979 I bought a Sony Trinitron colour TV, about 14 inch, for, as I recall, £300. Imagine that in today's money. £3,000? I must have been mad.

[@chriswinwood6501]

Upstaris Downstairs had to rewrite the storylone to write out Pauline Collins's character and then bring her back again, because of the continuity problems involved in the B&W episodes not being transmitted overseas. Personally I can't bear the character and wish she had stayed gone. Corrie celebrated colour with a coach crash: the location scenes are in B&W while the studio scenes are in retina-scorching colour, all within the same episode. Thank you for this docco. Really enjoyed it, and I have subscribed. :)

[@JoeyXSmith]

I remember that my mom got a licence for black and white TV, even though she had a colour TV. Just because it was cheaper than a colour licence. She had it for years until the 90s, when TV goons came round to check.

[@supersmallchibiwolf872]

The oldest tv I remember using growing up was a CRT tv playing PlayStation 1. In many different modern camera's and phones the black and white or grey color is used only as a filter so It still has some fans out there. Cool video. ^_^

[@b8nnytez]

Well, you learn something new every day!

[@catgirl_works]

My phone has a "bedtime mode" that will switch the screen to monochrome late at night. It kicked in while I was watching this video and it took me several minutes to realize, which I thought was hilariously on point.

[@lulugamer8082]

0:05 *the ident fades to monochrome color* Adam: oh

[@parasatc8183]

It's rather foreign to us these days to think that technological progress in television would be a center of contention. Israel also has a similarly interesting history for their introduction of color television, although the objections came straight from the government and not from technicians as the expense of color TV was apparently making Israeli society more unequal. Italy was behind the rest of Europe in color television adoption thanks to political turmoil from the Years of Lead as well as from economic problems brought about by the 1973 oil crisis, with its introduction being a point of debate for the Italian parliament in the 70s, only being able to carry on with partial color transmissions in 1977 - the poorer Yugoslavia already had channels broadcasting in color in 1971.

[@AL5520]

As an Israeli I was just thinking of that. Television was considered by the government as an unwanted element that will corrupt the minds of the citizens and objected to any kind of TV broadcast. The first broadcast was in 1966 but only for educational purpose on special programs for schools and actual general broadcasts only began in 1968. They used old second hand black ans white equipment but purchased programs were in colour but since the government did not want people to buy expensive colour TV's they instructed the newly formed Israeli broadcast authority to remove the colourburst signal from the outgoing transition. this signal carries the colour sync information and without it the TV reverted to monochrome. This lasted until 1983 but long before that an electrical engineer called Shmuel Eden (later became a high ranking vice president in Intel) developed a device that added this sync info to the received signal that,in most cases, brought the colour back (it was not completely accurate but you could manually adjust it). In the Israeli case, since the colour was only "erased" from the transition signal colour is available today in programs that were recorded with colour equipment.

[@paulne9]

I remember when ITV went on strike I can vaguely remember the colour strike as they wanted more money to film in colour even the sound engineers wanted more money. I can remember when we first got a colour tv in 1969 it was rented from DER, they delivered it on a friday evening when we were watching Its a Knockout and what a change to go from black and white to colour. They were massive cabinets made from wood and so heavy. In the days when tv programs were worth watching :-)

[@JoeyTheBeastHD]

Another Great documentary Adam. Can't wait for the next one.

[@AdamMartyn]

Thanks Joey! Hopefully the next one won't be too far away!

[@crazymolemusic]

“This is AMTV in color. Oh.( goes to black and white again)”😂😂😂 0:00

[@royjudson4380]

We got our 1st colour tv in 1972, as a 12 year old watching top of the pops and Spiderman in colour was very exciting.

[@t.p.mckenna]

In Nationwide I can recall that some of the filmed reports would be in black & white. Colour stock would have been a good bit more expensive, so they were happy to stay with a mix.

[@bigaspidistra]

Some BBC studios were in monochrome well into the 1970s, such as Bangor and Nottingham

[@richardmattocks]

Great documentary. I’d heard about this but good to have a deep dive 👍

[@johnking5174]

Colour television was a headache for Channel TV in the Channel Islands. Their problem was that they were so far away from a mainland transmitter to receive a perfect off air signal to relay, that colour was take longer to arrive. Black and white VHF 405 line signal relay was actually fine, from North Hessary Tor or Rowridge transmitters, however it was hell to get a perfect 625 line colour signal.

[@LyndonSoulGroove]

So true i recall this of TV in as a boy growing up in 70's & 80's & following 90's tv History programmes , for many years many people had B & W tv, and many 60's Tv programmes shot on Colour film had to wait years to see be transmitted to mass audiences ( Good examples : Thunderbirds , The Champions , The Avangers, Star Treck...) For many years after ,colour TV licenses were expensive too, and the 405 Line monocrome lower definition service for BBC 1 ITV Only still broadcast till 1985 ! Enjoyed this thanks for valuable details

[@plunder1956]

I do remember this period and the shows concerned. In this period most people were still renting Televisions because of the Up Front costs. We did watch Upstairs Downstairs, but I was a lot more interested in science programs like Horizon. Later I worked in Video Production (at that time B&W was utterly dead) including a small amount of Broadcast. So I remember the atmosphere over union related disputes.

[@tetchuma]

“Are you being served?”, went into series, as a result of the BBC cutting the feed of the 1972 Munich Massacre. The hostage takers were made aware of the snipers locations, via the numerous TV reporters live broadcasts. BBC cut their feed, and quickly ran to the vault to throw anything on to keep from showing the test pattern. The first film can that was within reach was, Are you being served?, which had started as a TV Playhouse episode, where pilots were tested for network consumption. It gained such positive reviews, that it was decided to make it a series. I’m glad that the shows original title wasn’t “Grace Brothers”, or it wouldn’t have been on the first rack of the vault.

[@meikahidenori]

Interesting, as some shows in the UK were filmed in colour in the early 60s, way eariler than you mention in the video. Shows like Stingray were not only the first show in the UK to be filmed in colour, but broadcasted in it too. Colour tvs cost a fortune but it didn't mean they didn't air the show. Inact the first episode starts off black and white before going into full colour and is still amazing how they cut to colour from the black and white. Also you used footage from ABC in Australia for like a short clip there... 😅 we also had a show that messed around when colour tv was introduced, called the Auntie Jack Show. In it the episode slowly changed into colour but Aunite Jack flat out refused so she remained in black and white. It was a golden moment in television.

[@kaynwells6936]

I had a black and white tv in my room when I was younger. I got the old one when my family got a colour tv downstairs

[@johnking5174]

Talking Pictures TV started a full repeat run on Sunday nights of Upstairs Downstairs in 2021, and they aired all of series one, including the black and white editions, with a little note on screen before transmission explaining why they were produced in black and white.

[@BluetheFortune2006]

As I really knew that since the Christmas episode, almost all the episodes of the 4th series of LWT's On The Buses was filmed during the colour strike. (With the exceptions of the first episode of the series "Nowhere to Go" until the fourth episode "The Other Woman" was filmed in colour while airing it in B&W when the strike began.)

[@jimbo573]

Colour TV has such a hold on the British psyche as an item of luxury that the tabloids were still outraged that some UK prisoners had colour TVs in their cells decades after you could even buy a monochrome one.

[@Epsilonsama]

1967? Color TV came to the UK later than I imagine. How quant.

[@arthurvasey]

We had black and white tellies in our house up until about 1973, when dad finally decided to “wise up and fork out” (to quote a Transdiffusion article on the subject) and rent a colour set - for decades after that, we were still seeing old black and white films, usually on Mondays and, when there was no midweek racing coverage, Fridays - yes - in those days, you rented sets - the only advantage being that, if it broke down, it would be fixed for no charge - the firm we rented ours from - a company called Birkbeck’s - if their regular repairman, a guy called Jack (not sure of his surname), came over, he could usually fix it in situ - all he had to do was reverse the polarity of the neutron flow with his sonic screwdriver - mo - wait - that was Dr Who - but, if they got the work experience lads in from Redcar, we wouldn’t see it for weeks - they left us a crappy black and white one - one we had, we couldn’t change channels on it without it going ga-ga! Just had a thought - could some of these programmes be re-colourised?

[@prbsnoop1974]

Coronation Street planned to have the trip to Lake Windermerein colour with Elsie Tanner on an ornate bridge surrounded by flowers but it was transmitted in Black & White and the next episode was the first in colour in the green hospital indoor set

[@DBIVUK]

Splendid documentary. One thing to pick up on is that Upstairs Downstairs was not a prestige production. LWT actually thought it was a dud (possibly because of the b/w episodes) and delayed transmission of the first series for nearly a year, only to find it was a smash hit with viewers.

[@johnking5174]

I think he meant the programme was considered prestige in its later life. Upstairs Downstairs actually had a lot of money poured into it by London Weekend Television in 1970 when it was filmed. It was not a cheap first series to make. The programme finished filming in late April and early May 1971, with first transmission placed in October 1971, so actually in modern era terms, a four month wait before airing is not too long to wait. The networking of the show was interesting. The "Big 5" regions of LWT, Thames, Granada, Yorkshire and ATV were the ones who made the decision of where to place key network programming. LWT wanted it to air in prime time 8pm, however the other four chose to place it within the Sunday Night Theatre strand of 10.15pm on Sundays, as they felt under the theatre branding would be more suitable than in the heart of Sunday prime time. That changed with series two of course.

[@goodiesguy]

I didn't know about the Colour Strike until I watched the original Benny Hill Show's in order years ago. I was confused as to why, after the first five Thames specials, he was suddenly in black and white again for three.

[@babyboomertwerkteam5662]

Gosh, Americans got colour in the 50s, UK in 60s... us here in Australia didn't get it until 1975!!

[@johnking5174]

Think of Ireland, 1976 they got full colour service.

[@jesseblack5812]

brilliant documentary! i've subscribed :)

[@bobacrey1068]

I have the DVD box set of Budgie and the early episodes made during the Colour Strike are in monochrome

[@aldo4319]

Thames technically started with the others but were 2 days late as they didn't broadcast on Saturdays or Sundays

[@sanders2378]

As well as the cost of buying or renting the sets, there was also the cost of the tv licence, which was much higher than the b/w one.