Director / Camera Operator knowledge

[Guinness]

As sure as night follows day, once again we are subjected to woeful tv footage.
Robertson, as he often does once the frame is won, indulged himself in a couple of exhibition shots including the final pink which involved extreme side applied to the white to gain position on the black.
Guess what....director, as usual, cuts to pocket view of pink disappearing off the table.
Same with the black.
Great for live audience. Great for commentators. Crap for tv viewers.
Davis, Parrott, Doherty and the like should invest some time with the director to ensure that he has at very least a basic grasp of the game.
Even when playing for snookers, and although it is obvious that a player is not aiming to pot, still he cuts to a camera that assumes he is.
Red button view of whole table, please God !

[thelongbomber]

Available here

[timcunnell]

Lol - I am glad to hear I am not the only one who finds the coverage annoying. I actually emailed a complaint to the BBC on this last year (really I need to get out more!). One thing's for sure, the commentary on BBC is infinitely better than Eurosport! BUT the camera choices are dreadful, and its clear that the person in charge of this doesn't really get snooker.
This only started in recent years - never used to be a problem. The biggest annoyance for me is that when a player misses a pot they always cut to a close-up of the player's face to show their reaction, whilst meanwhile the balls are flying round the table, and all you really want to see is whether the player has left anything on! (at least, that's all I want to see!).
I know it's only a small thing, but seriously it really does boil my beetroot!!

[Byrom]

I agree I think the camera shot selection are very much second best to ITV now who covered the Champions Cup recently.

More down to the producers and editors - I get the feeling especially with the schedule these days that they see snooker as a filler rather than a proper sport any longer and I find that appalling.

[timcunnell]

Great point about ITV - their coverage has been a real breath of fresh air. I think that if it was on a primetime channel at a primetime....time?...it would go a long way towards bringing snooker back to the masses. You're right, I think BBC sport do see snooker as a bit of a filler, or B-list sport. Some of the other crap they show when the Masters is on and you've gotta watch on the red button, or online is unbelievable!
It seems like three times a year they wheel out Hazel, Steve Davis, Virgo, Thorne, Hendry Taylor et al, and think that'll do. Don't get me wrong, I think that team are brilliant, and you only need about 30 seconds of Joe Johnson to appreciate how good the BBC commentary is. But the camera work, or at least the choice of cameras/views, really lets it down for me.