Learning on Screen - The British Universities Film & Video Council (BUFVC) is a representative body promoting the production, study and use of
moving image
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...
, sound and related media for learning and research. It is a company limited by guarantee, with charity status, serving
schools
A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes compulsor ...
,
colleges and post
compulsory education interests in the UK.
History
Founded in 1948 as the ''British Universities Film Council'', the ''BUFC'' was established by a group of academic staff from various subject disciplines across the arts,
humanities
Humanities are academic disciplines that study aspects of human society and culture. In the Renaissance, the term contrasted with divinity and referred to what is now called classics, the main area of secular study in universities at the t ...
and
science
Science is a systematic endeavor that Scientific method, builds and organizes knowledge in the form of Testability, testable explanations and predictions about the universe.
Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earli ...
s. In the 1960s the ''BUFC'' was allocated core funding from government as a
grant-in-aid
A grant-in-aid is money coming from a central government for a specific project. Such funding is usually used when the government and the legislature decide that the recipient should be publicly funded but operate with reasonable independence ...
body of the
British Film Institute
The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery (United Kingdom), National Lot ...
(BFI). In 1982 the ''Council'' left the BFI with the remit to engage with UK
higher education
Higher education is tertiary education leading to award of an academic degree. Higher education, also called post-secondary education, third-level or tertiary education, is an optional final stage of formal learning that occurs after comple ...
, changed its title to British Universities Film ''& Video'' Council and obtained recurrent core grant direct from the Department for Education and Science. In the early 1990s, with the re-organisation of UK higher education funding, the BUFVC's PES line was moved to the
Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) and was paid over via
The Open University
The Open University (OU) is a British public research university and the largest university in the United Kingdom by number of students. The majority of the OU's undergraduate students are based in the United Kingdom and principally study o ...
. Since 2015, the BUFVC became known as Learning on Screen.
Governance
Learning on Screen is governed by a board of Trustees who are, largely, elected from the membership.
Learning on Screen has a small staff team and is based in offices in central London. A not-for-profit independent organisation, Learning on Screen is mainly funded by membership fees and subscriptions.
Learning on Screen's Services and Databases
Learning on Screen offers a range of specialist services and aims to know more about moving image and sound content, its meaning, context and scholarly value, than any other UK-based educational body. Some of Learning on Screen's services are delivered online worldwide without charge, whereas other services are only offered under authenticated access to users in the UK or to staff in Learning on Screen member institutions.
At the heart of Learning on Screen is a specialist Information Service. This is the source of much of Learning on Screen's information which is published online. Learning on Screen's termly magazine ''ViewFinder'' is described at http://learningonscreen.ac.uk/viewfinder/
The main online databases/online resources currently delivered by Learning on Screen are:
TRILT–Television and Radio Index for Learning and Teaching which offers the best online information describing broadcast content received from over 500 channels of
radio
Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmi ...
and
television
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...
and delivered in the UK since 1923. The service currently carries some 36 million records and accumulates data at a rate of 1.3 million records per year. Data is delivered 10 days in advance of transmission and TRILT offers a customisable alert service for users. Users from UK licensed educational establishments which are Learning on Screen members, may also order copies of programmes on DVD or CD post-transmission. See http://bufvc.ac.uk/tvandradio/trilt (under authenticated access only). You may also try the Demonstration version, which is in open access.
The Researcher’s Guide to Screen Heritage is an online directory to UK archives and collections of artefacts relating to the history of moving image and sound. This resource is delivered in open access (see http://bufvc.ac.uk/archives).
News On Screen contains the world’s leading resource for the study of newsreels and cinemagazines. The ''British Universities Newsreel Database'' (BUND) carries information on more than 180,000 cinema
newsreel
A newsreel is a form of short documentary film, containing news stories and items of topical interest, that was prevalent between the 1910s and the mid 1970s. Typically presented in a cinema, newsreels were a source of current affairs, inform ...
stories released into British cinemas between 1911 and 1979. This resource is delivered in open access (see http://bufvc.ac.uk/newsonscreen).
Three large-scale online resources, which are archive collections of
Independent Local Radio
Independent Local Radio is the collective name given to commercial radio stations in the United Kingdom. As a result of the buyouts and mergers permitted by the Broadcasting Act 1990, and deregulation resulting from the Communications Act 2003, ...
recordings, are delivered to bona fide users in UK higher and further education in collaboration with
Bournemouth University
Bournemouth University is a public university in Bournemouth, England, with its main campus situated in neighbouring Poole. The university was founded in 1992; however, the origins of its predecessor date back to the early 1900s.
The univer ...
via http://bufvc.ac.uk/tvandradio/independent-radio
Learning on Screen Television and Radio Services
Learning on Screen Off-Air Recording Back-Up Service - Learning on Screen records and retains, under licence and
copyright
A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educatio ...
exception, some 44,000 hours per year of UK television and radio content. Nearly two decades of these recordings are held from June 1998 onwards. The channels recorded are:
BBC One
BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, ...
,
BBC Two,
BBC Three
BBC Three is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was first launched on 9 February 2003 with programmes targeting 16 to 34-year-olds, covering all genres including animation, comedy, cur ...
(up to February 2016, when it moved online, and recorded again when it returned to terrestrial in February 2022),
BBC Four,
ITV,
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a fourth television service ...
,
More4
More4 is a British free-to-air television channel, owned by Channel Four Television Corporation. The channel launched on 10 October 2005. Its programming mainly focuses on lifestyle and documentaries, as well as foreign dramas.
Content
When ...
and
Five,
Sky News and
BBC News 24
BBC News (also known as the BBC News Channel) is a British free-to-air public broadcast television news channel for BBC News. It was launched as BBC News 24 on 9 November 1997 at 5:30 pm as part of the BBC's foray into digital domestic telev ...
.
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...
and
BBC Radio 4 Extra are also now recorded and retained. Copies may only be supplied to staff in subscribing member institutions which also hold an
Educational Recording Agency (ERA) licence. See https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/off-air-service/
BoB (Box of Broadcasts) this is a shared online service for universities and colleges in the UK which also have current ERA licences. It offers staff and students the opportunity to record and retain streamed copies of programmes (and extracts from programmes) in their own personal online play-lists. It is a form of scholarly 'see it again/hear it again' service which retains programme copies as long as the users require them to be retained (unlike most broadcasters' equivalent online services which retain copies for a relatively short time only). As of July 2022 it contained over 3 million broadcasts. See https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/ondemand/
TV Times Index (TVTip) provides a unique searchable index to the London edition of the
TVTimes
''TV Times'' is a British television listings magazine published by Future plc. It was originally published by Independent Television Publications, owned by the participating ITV companies. The magazine was acquired by IPC Media in 1989, whic ...
, the listings magazine for ITV broadcasts, from September 1955 to March 1985. TVTiP allows users to search for programmes, production staff and performers. It contains approximately 250,000 records.
This Week was a leading ITV current affairs series, running from January 1956 to December 1992. From 1978-1986 it was known as ''TVEye''. The This Week database is a record of the entire production history of the series. It has been enhanced by the contributions of expert researchers and information shared with the project by FremantleMedia and used with their permission. This Week is accessed via the Learning on Screen website and is authenticated by Athens jointly with the TV Times Project database (TVTiP). It is free at point of access to all staff and students in further and higher education institutions in the United Kingdom and to Learning on Screen members.
News on Screen
Learning on Screen is responsible for the world’s leading resource for the study of newsreels and cinemagazines, at the heard of which is a central database holding over 180,000 records. Associated with these records are 80,000 downloadable documents offered as PDFs taken from original documentation (scripts, running orders,
dope sheets and
ephemera) from the original news production files. Additionally, the database can be used to access some 40,000
British Pathe
British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies.
** Britishness, the British identity and common culture
* British English, ...
newsreel
A newsreel is a form of short documentary film, containing news stories and items of topical interest, that was prevalent between the 1910s and the mid 1970s. Typically presented in a cinema, newsreels were a source of current affairs, inform ...
items online. The BUND also carries information on content delivered as
Cinemagazines - longer form single subject items included in British cinema programmes and some which were only shown to overseas audiences. This resource is delivered open access as part of the ''News On Screen'' section of the website (see http://bufvc.ac.uk/newsonscreen).
Learning on Screen has also published several books related to this area including ''Yesterday's News: The British Cinema Newsreel Reader'' (2002, ) edited by Luke Mckernan; ''Filming History: The memoirs of John Turner, newsreel cameraman'' (2001, ) and ''Projecting Britain: The Guide to British Cinemagazines'' (2008, ) edited by Emily Crosby and Linda Kaye.
Shakespeare in Film, Television, Radio and Online
One of Learning on Screen's main educational resources is its International Database of Shakespeare on Film, Television and Radio. This authoritative online database of
Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...
-related content is continually growing and is international in scope. It holds over 9,600 records dating from the 1890s to the present day (see http://bufvc.ac.uk/shakespeare/). Learning on Screen has also published two books on the subject: ''As You Like It: Audiovisual Shakespeare'' () edited by Cathy Grant (1992) and ''Shakespeare on Film, Television and Radio: The Researcher's Guide'' () edited by Olwen Terris, Eve-Marie Oesterlen and Luke McKernan (2009).
Learning on Screen Publishing
Learning on Screen publishes the termly journal ''ViewFinder' online at www.learningonscreen.ac.uk/viewfinder/
Learning on Screen Events
Annually, Learning on Screen holds the Learning on Screen Awards (see https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/awards/). Learning on Screen also organises a range of courses on need-to-know topics for university staff and researchers (see https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/courses/)
References
External links
Learning on ScreenOn DemandHEFCEJISC
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bufvc
Higher education organisations based in the United Kingdom