Beyond the buffers - Hornby Podcast

[Johan DC]

For those interested, there is a new youtube-podcast series by Hornby 

 

 This first episode is mostly about the Class 91 and '70' Queen Elizabeth II.

 

 

 

 

 

[Hroth]

Just saw the email. 

I see that all the usual suspects are involved. I'm supposing its targetted between The Engine Shed and The Signal Box, but why? Podcasts are a bit old fashioned, not exactly the zeitgeist...

[Miss Prism]

24 minutes ago, Hroth said:

Podcasts are a bit old fashioned, not exactly the zeitgeist...

 

In the mainstream broadcasting world (background narrative: no one is watching TV these days), podcasts are extremely fashionable, but the vast majority are audio only (which ties in with the anti-TV narrative). A visual 'podcast', like Hornby's, is a comparative rarity. But maybe they have chosen the wrong term. I'm listening to it at the moment, but I don't think I'm missing anything without the visuals. Yet. Only 15 minutes in, so my opinion is subject to change.

 

[Phil Parker]

4 minutes ago, Miss Prism said:

background narrative: no one is watching TV these days

 

Hello Miss Hyperbole. 

[Harlequin]

Podcasts are huge at the moment because they can be accessed anywhere, anytime on your Smartphone - and almost anyone can make them.

 

It's like a fragmented form of the old broadcast model and, for example, every BBC radio programme is effectively a podcast on BBC Sounds.

 

And conversely, the BBC radio stations now pick up and broadcast a lot of podcasts.

 

Edited May 11, 2022 by Harlequin

[Johan DC]

55 minutes ago, Miss Prism said:

 

 A visual 'podcast', like Hornby's, is a comparative rarity. But maybe they have chosen the wrong term. 

 

It's also on Spotify if I'm not mistaken. Haven't checked that nor YT music yet, but I think it's meant to be mostly audio. I think they also use YT because they already have a well known and used channel there. 

[Miss Prism]

I suppose it was nice to put some names to SVR faces, but that really didn't need to be on YT, but maybe Hornby is keeping it as a flexible media avenue for future editions.

 

Interesting snippet at the end of the pod where Kohler promises it (the purple thing) "won't be the last loco Hornby does with the SVR".

 

[HExpressD]

Listened to the whole thing and found it pretty interesting, nice to see some exposure from the designer, someone who I don't recall seeing before other than on the UKTV doc. Hopefully we'll see some more people that we wouldn't normally and hear their views - which I hope are not too strongly guided. 

 

Follow up to some of the above, having had a flick back after listening there really isn't anything to gain from actually watching as opposed to listening after you've put a face to a name. 

[No Decorum]

I quite enjoyed it, even if it was a big long. Better than the Signal Box anyway. At one point, Simon Kohler said that you can paint a diesel any colour you like and no-one complains. He obviously isn’t following the debate about the Accurascale purple Deltic! 😄

[Johan DC]

1 hour ago, No Decorum said:

I quite enjoyed it, even if it was a big long. Better than the Signal Box anyway. 

I did as well. Wondering what the locomotive Phil is currently working on might be? Over 800, all different... 🤔😀

[woodenhead]

It's just simply too long, doesn't help that I cannot gel with any of the Hornby marketing team, there is something about the style of the presentation that I find makes me want to switch off.

[Johan DC]

I'm not a fan of the marketing team either, but listening to Phil, the designer, is not too bad. A tad on the long side? Maybe, but I only listened to the first part.

[The Stationmaster]

I'm not into podcasts so thanks to Phil ('Harlequin') in particular for letting me know a bit more about them.  But I must admit to be slightly puzzled by the purpose of this approach in some respects as I'm wondering just how many people will sit and listen to this sort of thing for over an hour ?  Maybe I've got that wrong but  I would have expected the main target audience to have a shorter attention span.

 

Overall, especially for something of this nature coming from Hornby, I was impressed by the quality.  Maybe they could raise 'The Engine Shed' to this sort of quality level in production terms (apart from getting some of the old pizzazz back  into the content) ?  Incidentally one thing really impressed me - Montana seems to have a better understanding of the market than her boss in terms of how many units to order.  Maybe she ought to be in charge of that task all the time for her brand because if she can always get it that right (or near enough) then we could maybe forget tiers.

[Harlequin]

I think it's good to see a bit more depth behind Hornby's usual PR and marketing hype.

 

A step in the right direction, IMHO.

 

It could probably have been shorter, and I'm sure Hornby will learn and adapt as they make more, but length isn't necessarily off-putting because I think podcast consumers are happy to drop in and out and skip over bits as time and interest allows. It's a modern way of consuming media that I must admit I find slightly alien, having been brought up on the strict schedule of the Radio Times and appointment-to-view telly! (Another option for us linear-media consumers would be to just set it playing while we do something else - in the railway room, perhaps.)

 

P.S. There's a trope in podcasts where two presenters casually chit-chat with each other and one of them pretends not to understand the subject. This is done to bring the listeners along with the conversation but it's very annoying because it's usually obvious that they both know exactly what they're talking about, not least because the chat is clearly scripted! Let's hope Hornby don't go down that rabbit-hole!

 

Edited May 13, 2022 by Harlequin

[Steamport Southport]

3 hours ago, Johan DC said:

I did as well. Wondering what the locomotive Phil is currently working on might be? Over 800, all different... 🤔😀

 

At the SVR?

 

Well it's not 813 unfortunately. But there is the biggest open goal left for a newly retooled Hornby model before someone else nicks it in the 8F. Even Blind Pew can see that!

 

If they haven't been quietly working on one whilst doing the Black Fives I would be very surprised.

 

 

 

Jason

[eldomtom2]

4 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

I'm not into podcasts so thanks to Phil ('Harlequin') in particular for letting me know a bit more about them.  But I must admit to be slightly puzzled by the purpose of this approach in some respects as I'm wondering just how many people will sit and listen to this sort of thing for over an hour ?  Maybe I've got that wrong but  I would have expected the main target audience to have a shorter attention span.

Podcasts are generally popular as something to listen do while doing something else.

[Guest]

8 hours ago, No Decorum said:

I quite enjoyed it, even if it was a big long. Better than the Signal Box anyway. At one point, Simon Kohler said that you can paint a diesel any colour you like and no-one complains. He obviously isn’t following the debate about the Accurascale purple Deltic! 😄

Some of us can even remember the backlash when nos: 31116 and 47803 were repainted into their experimental 'Infrastructure' colour schemes!😅

[No Decorum]

8 hours ago, Johan DC said:

I did as well. Wondering what the locomotive Phil is currently working on might be? Over 800, all different... 🤔😀

He said later that it’s the Black 5 which has already been announced. I recall a yarn that a fitter who couldn’t fit something complained that they weren’t standard. The reply was that they were cheap (a batch built by an outside locomotive builder).

[Johan DC]

6 hours ago, No Decorum said:

He said later that it’s the Black 5 which has already been announced. I recall a yarn that a fitter who couldn’t fit something complained that they weren’t standard. The reply was that they were cheap (a batch built by an outside locomotive builder).

Thank you, yes, I missed that part (my fault, shouldn't listen at work!). Listened to it again, I didn't know the Black 5 was so divers. 

As an asside, how difficult would it be to also work on a 8F or Standard Class 5 model while preparing for this?

Do they have anything useful in common?

 

 

[No Decorum]

10 minutes ago, Johan DC said:

Thank you, yes, I missed that part (my fault, shouldn't listen at work!). Listened to it again, I didn't know the Black 5 was so divers. 

As an asside, how difficult would it be to also work on a 8F or Standard Class 5 model while preparing for this?

Do they have anything useful in common?

 

 

As a generalisation, I think it could be said that the Jubilee, Black 5 and 8F share the same design approach, even to the point where all three progressed from domeless boilers to domed boilers with high superheat. However, for modelling purposes, I think that each would require a new tooling. Details such as buffers and safety valves might be shared but that wouldn’t help costs much.

[The Stationmaster]

13 hours ago, eldomtom2 said:

Podcasts are generally popular as something to listen do while doing something else.

Ah, at last then - Radio 4 when you want to listen to it.  Do they do 'The Archers' I wonder ? 

[Harlequin]

37 minutes ago, The Stationmaster said:

Ah, at last then - Radio 4 when you want to listen to it.  Do they do 'The Archers' I wonder ? 

Here you are: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/b006qpgr

 

😀

 

[Corbs]

One of the main reasons for having a visual version of the podcast is because if you stick it on YT with little to no movement on screen, it will be detected as a static image-based video and will not be pushed to potential audiences as much. When doing the RM Pod I have found that all my audio-format pods perform about the same but on YT the ones with 'something moving' on screen perform far better.

[Covkid]

Just watched the programme and enjoyed it.  It was a little and maybe should have been two or even three programmes. The chat with Phil was particularly interesting because it was a real chat rather than that japish series on the telly which were actually quite bring. Was I only only left wondering if Phil is a real live model railway enthusiast, or is it "just" his day job ? Difficult to work out, but he came over very well.

 

"Over 800 and all different, and one was really different".

Did he mean 44767 the Stephensons valve gear loco ?  Or did he mean one of those bloody awful looking Caprotti ones with the ugly steam pipes, which I thought were built as pairs ?  I was under the impression that 44767 was reasonably standard apart from the valve gear, but I know there were different wheelbases, fireboxes, smokeboxes, cabs etc etc.  did they all have Stanier spoked wheels though.  44766 which carried a double chimney and roller bearings.  

 

The Severn valley railway interview was good, and I enjoyed that too, but as I said - that on it's own would be a suitable length. I agree with Mike that Montana seemed quite switched on. I wonder if she has an RMweb account.  She could certainly take some nuggets back to Margate from here !!!

 

Thanks for posting the link to "Beyond the buffers" 

 

[Johan DC]

The next episode is now online: