On-screen graphics bloopers

[Stanislav]

What are some of the funniest bloopers you have witnessed or heard of involving on-screen graphics? You know: unfortunate misspellings, freudian slips, names or captions popping up at inappropriate times?

One of the most notorious happened a few years ago on MSNBC (I witnessed this one live). A gentleman was called upon to comment on some issue -- an African-American man with the uncomfortable oh-so-close first name of "Niger" (like the country in Africa). Yeah, you're way ahead of me on this one -- someone either by nefarious design or utterly mortifying unconscious finger-slip added in an extra "g" there on-screen. I'm sure somebody's head rolled over that one. (The victim, to his credit, graciously laughed it off and indicated that it was far from the first time the slip had been made with his unusual name...)

In 2007, when Tony Blair of the U.K. announced his intention to resign as both Labour Party leader and Prime Minister, CNN International intended to put the headline "BLAIR TO RESIGN" in the cacophony of info at the bottom of the screen. Someone, perhaps a Democrat unconsciously indulging in wishful thinking, typoed that as "BUSH TO RESIGN."

Many years ago, in Jacksonville (I think this was on WJXT), during a local newscast, a graphic intended for use in an upcoming story was accidentally keyed over the main anchor for some seconds. It identified the poor newman as "[NAME], Convicted Murderer."

Any others to add that caused a gasp or chuckle?

 

[therealjm12]

I was watching CBS Sunday morning a couple weeks ago and had the closed captioning on. They were running a piece about Woodstock and the Allman Brothers were identified as the Almond Brothers. Guess we a have a generation gap.

 

[w9wi]

I was watching CBS Sunday morning a couple weeks ago and had the closed captioning on. They were running a piece about Woodstock and the Allman Brothers were identified as the Almond Brothers. Guess we a have a generation gap.

(grin!)

Seriously, I would imagine there are quite a few caption "weirdnesses" over time.

Live captioners use stenography machines -- the same thing court reporters use. If you've ever seen the machine up close, you realize there aren't 26 keys. Given combinations of keystrokes represent certain words. They have a dictionary -- a file on disk -- that cross-references these keystrokes to the words.

If the captioner knows in advance a certain unusual word/name is going to be used on the air, they can enter it in their dictionary in advance. (I would imagine pretty much everyone has an entry for "Obama" by now!) If a new word shows up and they *don't* know about it in advance, they have certain phonetic keystrokes -- they key it in phonetically. (the court reporter has the advantage of being able to fix these after the fact. A TV live captioner is, well, *live*.)

I think if Mr. Smercomish shows up on a local TV station unexpectedly, the captioner simply panics and writes nothing ;D

I would imagine the CBS captioner didn't have "Allman" in their dictionary. (if (s)he is younger than 40 or so, they've probably never heard of the Allman Brothers!) "Almond" is probably the best phonetic match.

_________________________________________________

Don't have any real good tales here. Best one I recall was two occasions in which a station got their own call letters wrong in the copyright notice at the end of the show.

 

[mleach]

I guess this could somewhat count.......

About 10 years ago, Hagerstown, Maryland's WJAL-TV channel 68 back in their WB days was airing a local high school basketball game with the play by play done by two guys who also did mornings at a local radio station. The two guys were both on the "fat' side and one of them sported a ZZ Top style beard.

Anyway everytime the camera came to those two, somebody back at master control flashed on the bottom the screen such words as "..oh play me some mountain music".."..a bear and his hairy cub".."daddy bear wants it".."WOOF !!" and "Oh Baby..hot stuff !! ". Considering that WJAL had never had much of audience to begin with, my guess is that this was a classic case of the master control people having their fun.

However the play by play guys did NOT think the words were funny as they both not only had the master control folks ( all females BTW ) fired but I believe that was the last time WJAL ever did a local high school game. There was even a rumor at the time were one of those guys had filed a defamation of character lawsuit between the former master control operators & WJAL by claiming that the use of most of the words had implied that he was gay but that "lawsuit" turned out to be just a rumor.

 

[Stanislav]

I was watching CBS Sunday morning a couple weeks ago and had the closed captioning on. They were running a piece about Woodstock and the Allman Brothers were identified as the Almond Brothers. Guess we a have a generation gap.

I could envision someone who grew up with Romper Room, but never got into rock music committing a similar gaffe with the "Do-Bee Brothers."

Anyway, it could have been worse. They might have shown Woodstock footage of that famous performance of the National Anthem -- you know, the one by "Jimmy Hendricks."

 

[firepoint525]

I was in a restaurant watching the Weather Channel a few years back, when the closed captioning referred to Jeanetta Jones as "Judge Netta Jones." ;D I had to marvel at that; I thought everyone had heard of her!

 

[radiorob2.0]

When A.B. "Happy" Chandler passed away, WLEX Lexington was in the mist of putting together a retrospective. The person adding CG asked about the title of a woman, she had the name. A production person said, "That's Happy's Woman" meaning the widow. That's exactly how she typed the CG:

Mildred Chandler​

Happy's Woman​

The ultimate classic happened a few year back on News 14 Carolina. It seems they had an automatic system to add cancellations and yes it was abused. The screen caps were posted on the net but I can't find them right now. They were hilarious. Every double ententra you can think of was highlighted. Yes, Mike Hunt was included.

 

[radiorob2.0]

What are some of the funniest bloopers you have witnessed or heard of involving on-screen graphics? You know: unfortunate misspellings, freudian slips, names or captions popping up at inappropriate times?

One of the most notorious happened a few years ago on MSNBC (I witnessed this one live). A gentleman was called upon to comment on some issue -- an African-American man with the uncomfortable oh-so-close first name of "Niger" (like the country in Africa). Yeah, you're way ahead of me on this one -- someone either by nefarious design or utterly mortifying unconscious finger-slip added in an extra "g" there on-screen. I'm sure somebody's head rolled over that one. (The victim, to his credit, graciously laughed it off and indicated that it was far from the first time the slip had been made with his unusual name...)


Any others to add that caused a gasp or chuckle?

That would be Niger Innis, son of Roy Innis. Both have headed CORE, Congress of Racial Equality. His dad claim to fame was starting two fights on television. He was the one who took on the Nazis on the "chair throwing" Geraldo episode. Roy Innis other come to blows was on Morton Downey Jr. when he took on Al Sharpton.

 

[azumanga]

The ultimate classic happened a few year back on News 14 Carolina. It seems they had an automatic system to add cancellations and yes it was abused. The screen caps were posted on the net but I can't find them right now. They were hilarious. Every double ententra you can think of was highlighted. Yes, Mike Hunt was included.

Here are some:

http://www.billwilson.us/twc.htm
http://www.gadgetmadness.com/archives/20040312-news_14_carolina_fake_school_closings.php

And a forum thread that started it all:
http://brentroad.com/message_topic.aspx?topic=180137

There used to be a site that had listings for most of these fake closings, but apparently, it no longer exists.

 

[Tim L]

On YouTube is WAKR-TV 23 Akron, Ohio's "Newsday 23" from September 22, 1981..There are 2 glitches..at the beginning, The voiceover says its the Early Report while the graphics say its the Late Report..Then after the Weather, a Graphical sports tease leading to a commercial..

SPORTSWORD:BUCKEYS CLOSE PRACTICES

This newscast is in 4 parts..Includes some WKYC News footage from the same day on part 4..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXlHknzNwMQ

 

[radiorob2.0]

The ultimate classic happened a few year back on News 14 Carolina. It seems they had an automatic system to add cancellations and yes it was abused. The screen caps were posted on the net but I can't find them right now. They were hilarious. Every double ententra you can think of was highlighted. Yes, Mike Hunt was included.

Here are some:

http://www.billwilson.us/twc.htm
http://www.gadgetmadness.com/archives/20040312-news_14_carolina_fake_school_closings.php

And a forum thread that started it all:
http://brentroad.com/message_topic.aspx?topic=180137

There used to be a site that had listings for most of these fake closings, but apparently, it no longer exists.

Thanks!

Here's another classic....an Augusta, GA TV station pulled a Krispy Kreme Donut image of the net with looking at the fine print...

http://crookedtimber.org/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/wheat2.jpg

 

[radioman148]

The ultimate classic happened a few year back on News 14 Carolina. It seems they had an automatic system to add cancellations and yes it was abused. The screen caps were posted on the net but I can't find them right now. They were hilarious. Every double ententra you can think of was highlighted. Yes, Mike Hunt was included.

Here are some:

http://www.billwilson.us/twc.htm
http://www.gadgetmadness.com/archives/20040312-news_14_carolina_fake_school_closings.php

And a forum thread that started it all:
http://brentroad.com/message_topic.aspx?topic=180137

There used to be a site that had listings for most of these fake closings, but apparently, it no longer exists.

Great stuff--thanks for the link.

 

[notalkallstatic]

Anyway everytime the camera came to those two, somebody back at master control flashed on the bottom the screen such words as "..oh play me some mountain music".."..a bear and his hairy cub".."daddy bear wants it".."WOOF !!" and "Oh Baby..hot stuff !! ". Considering that WJAL had never had much of audience to begin with, my guess is that this was a classic case of the master control people having their fun.

However the play by play guys did NOT think the words were funny as they both not only had the master control folks ( all females BTW ) fired but I believe that was the last time WJAL ever did a local high school game. There was even a rumor at the time were one of those guys had filed a defamation of character lawsuit between the former master control operators & WJAL by claiming that the use of most of the words had implied that he was gay but that "lawsuit" turned out to be just a rumor.

It was actually production control, not master control. Production control are responsible for doing camera switching, graphics, and audio during news and live events (ie sporting events.) Master Control are responsible for program/commercial playback, switching between sources (tape machine/server/networks,) satellite feeds, and disaster recovery when something goes wrong on air (with either the network/server/tape machine)

Here is a graphics goof from WXVT, the incorrect graphic appears for 8 seconds:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWCeriGsFkA