The Price is Right: The Barker Era on Pluto TV

[Spmahn]

That's exactly what happened.

Still no idea why that show didn't get aired, though.

It’s possible the original film of that episode got damaged in the time period between when GSN had possession of it when they converted them, and now. Or maybe there was just an issue digitizing it and they had to send it back to whatever studio to process it again.

[thatvhstapeguy]

It’s possible the original film of that episode got damaged in the time period between when GSN had possession of it when they converted them, and now.

I believe in '82 it'd still be a 2" Quad videotape. After all, they were still using the Norelco tube cameras. 2" is a very high quality format, but very temperamental, and the machines are getting harder to find. I don't know if sticky-shed syndrome comes into play with 2" often, but I have seen reference to the foam backing in 2" reels degrading and the adhesive gumming up the tape itself. It could have also been "eaten" by a misaligned machine. There are any number of possibilities, 2" has a number of interesting failure modes.

[gsn93]

The 2" tapes were already transferred over to Digibeta back in the '90s. I did noticed some minor Betacam errors on a few episodes so far. The one with Bill Cullen's cameo had issues during the opening before the first item up for bids. Stuff just happens.

[Spmahn]

The 2" tapes were already transferred over to Digibeta back in the '90s. I did noticed some minor Betacam errors on a few episodes so far. The one with Bill Cullen's cameo had issues during the opening before the first item up for bids. Stuff just happens.

I believe they were transferred by GSN who did not supply Freemantle with their copy of the episodes they converted to Digibeta, so Freemantle is stuck back at square one with the quad reels

[NickintheATL]

I believe they were transferred by GSN who did not supply Freemantle with their copy of the episodes they converted to Digibeta, so Freemantle is stuck back at square one with the quad reels

No. That's not correct. CBS Television City transferred the tapes in the early 1990s. Per the J-Shea site:

A particularly interesting place in TV City's basement is its so-called "Jurassic Park" videotape center. In the early 1990s, several old quad VTRs were acquired and brought back to proper specifications to enable the dubbing of programs on two-inch tape to Digital Betacam. Mark Goodson Productions was the first major customer. Twenty-four hours a day and seven days a week for months, CBS handled the archiving of the Goodson-Todman videotape library. Thousands of tapes were processed. Two Digital Betacam dubs were made of each two-inch master; one went to Goodson and the other to Sony for use on its cable Game Show Network. I'm told that the output of one of the dubbing stations was placed on a closed-circuit channel inside Television City. The vintage shows were quite a hit with employees in the building.

[thatvhstapeguy]

You know, it would make sense that they are working off of the DigiBeta tapes... the Buzzr channel has uploaded some slates (from PYL, Match Game, and Password Plus), and they said "not every episode we have access to still has the slate." I don't think they would have trashed the Quad masters, but they're probably in a location that's a hassle to access, like that vault in an old salt mine in Hutchinson, KS.

[Chelsea]

The relationship between GSN and Buzzr/Fremantle is...interesting, and at least marginally symbiotic.

At least /some/ footage from the Buzzr broadcast library (for example, Bill Cullen's Price run) very definitely come from GSN (and not just from the same transfer; literally a dub of GSN's copy AFTER edits).  At least a couple of eps of it have literally aired with GSN's plug cover contact promos from the 90s.  Others do not and were clearly transferred from other sources.

The recent switch-off of a cluster of Youtube uploads from the GSN days through ContentID* makes it hard for me to compare the eps as broadcast on GSN vs. how Pluto is airing them, but I don't recall seeing that blurred/black strip at the bottom.  Not sure if GSN cropped that out or if it's a newer defect.

[Chelsea]

The recent switch-off of a cluster of Youtube uploads from the GSN days through ContentID*

This also serves as the first clue as to what episodes are currently in the Pluto rotation.  Except for low quality rips that have gone through the wash, clips, and a handful of seemingly random escapees, Buzzr recently switched pretty much every episode from September 1982 to the end of April '83 from "Monetized" to "Blocked", at least in the US.

Fremantle does ContentID matching on almost all of their shows on Youtube and monetizes them - videos stay up, Fremantle gets ad revenue, everyone wins, so suddenly cutting off that very specific block of episodes (at least for now) and revenue source feels very revealing, but that's mostly speculation on my part. There's zero reason for it to be that specific, otherwise, though.

[Chelsea]

Thing I've noticed in the episodes from after the Summer '82 taping break:

The lighting was absolutely re-done during the tape break.  Don't know if 33 just got a new lighting grid (haven't scrutinized the episodes that hard - yet) or if they made more deliberate creative changes, but the lighting on nearly every shot has changed (less of a whitewash with fill lighting, more darkness and shadow and darker tones).

[pricefan18]

Thing I've noticed in the episodes from after the Summer '82 taping break:

The lighting was absolutely re-done during the tape break.  Don't know if 33 just got a new lighting grid (haven't scrutinized the episodes that hard - yet) or if they made more deliberate creative changes, but the lighting on nearly every shot has changed (less of a whitewash with fill lighting, more darkness and shadow and darker tones).

Speaking about lighting, in the 1 episode I've seen so far from this current set that had a DOB, it was interesting to see a shot of a darkened contestant's row just as the show went off the air. That was quite different and unique.

What also was to me, related to staging, was seeing them set up Range Game while having Bob and the contestant center stage. That wasn't done otherwise in this era was it? It threw me offguard to see it.

[SeaBreeze341]

Mr. Breslow certainly had a lot of interesting shots during his tenure. 


Speaking of which, I totally miss this blue "spyhole" circles that were done during One Bid.  I'm not sure what the official name or the best way to describe it; I'm sorry.  Just one of several things that were done away with when Paul Alter took over from Marc

[TVC]

I believe they were transferred by GSN who did not supply Freemantle with their copy of the episodes they converted to Digibeta, so Freemantle is stuck back at square one with the quad reels

The Goodson-Todman videotape transfers were performed at CBS Television City in the early 1990s. The master tapes (2” and 1”) were transferred to the Digital Betacam format. CBS obtained 10 two-inch quadruplex VTRs, which even then were considered antiques, and brought technicians out of retirement to perform the enormous undertaking.

I understand that two Digital Betacam copies were made of each episode. One copy went to Goodson and the other to Sony for its Game Show Network. Back when GSN aired Price Is Right episodes, the content aired from the Digital Betacam videotapes. To run on the Pluto TV Internet channel, however, these tapes need to be converted to computer files. The Digital Betacam recordings are already digital, so this process involves transcoding versus digitizing.

I have noticed that some of the episodes running on Pluto TV have what appears to be a tracking error (seen as a shimmering) at the bottom of the screen, which might be an issue with the Digital Betacam tape or the deck that played it. It looks like a partial crop was applied to the bottom of the picture to cover most of this error.

[Chelsea]

To run on the Pluto TV Internet channel, however, these tapes need to be converted to computer files.

And just to add further info, this isn't even a Pluto-specific thing; although some legacy broadcasters do keep tape decks on hand in a pinch, in general no one (particularly outside of small local markets) takes tapes straight to air anymore.  Any network who wants anything on the air - be it GSN, ESPN, your local affiliate, Buzzr, or the Price Pluto channel - is having to do the same conversion to a digital file. 

[Teddy]

The best thing about it is, whenever Drew's show is preempted (as it is here in Charlotte), you can tune in and pretend that Bob's still hosting.

[mellongraig]

Looking at these episodes especially from 4671D-4674D it's kind of odd to see the new turntable set yet the showcase podiums still have the red and green asterisks. This probably meant that this was the first week of shows taped with the new purple-red-orange turntable set minus the back side of the spinning panel.

Seems like they also gave away a lot of money in the Showcase Showdown that week with a $6,000 win and $11,000 win, both with the dings, clangs, and whoops all going off at once.