[Halfabee]

Hi John,

What you may be remembering is on air 'TARIFing' of film material, particularly news film. Studio cameras were generally set up under controlled conditions, and one was always able to preview and tweak the shot before it was cut to air (hopefully).
Not so news film, it was delivered to telecine right to the wire, so no time for a preview. It was also shot on reversal stock, often 'tail ends' of mixed manufacture and rushed through the developing baths.
The end result was usually an item with sometimes extreme colour errors between shots, usually along the green/magenta axis!
It took a skilled and calm telecine engineer to ride the film live and produce acceptable results, a moments distraction and it was easy to tweak the colours in the wrong direction.
No one mourned the demise of news reversal film when ENG arrived in the early eighties!
I guess the only reliable off air reference for home repair engineers at the time was the BBC2 test card... the only source where the burst and pulses weren't mucked about with.
I didn't join the TV industry until 1977, so tales of the early days of colour make for great reading... keep them coming.

All the best
Eric.