[James2001]

On a related note, it's frustrating that the issue with newly acquired BBC content on UKTV Channels (especially Drama) is still going out filmised, and has been since the start of the year. It's affecting an increasing amount of content now, and whenever anyone's contacted UKTV about it, they're insistent there isn't an issue, so trying to get it sorted is proving near on impossible.

It seems to only be affecting BBC content (and I think only SD content, not HD), not UKTV's own or content from elsewhere, so possibly the issue's originating with the BBC rather than UKTV (though it's not affecting BBC content on other channels like That's TV). Either way, I really can't see how it's gone on for so long without being picked up on and fixed regardless of where the issue originates, as it's a very obvious issue when you're techically aware and know what the programmes in question are supposed to look like, so the fact this has been going on for 8 or 9 months with an increasing amount of their programming affected really speaks volumes for the technical and quality control standards.

Just looked at their new repeats of The Upper Hand, which are also going out with this problem- that makes it the first non-BBC programme I've seen, which does suggest the problem lies with UKTV themselves, not the BBC, which is what I'd assumed before.

I had assumed it was only affecting BBC content, because other non-BBC shows are going out fine (though that's because they were all HD, and it's clear now it's only SD content affected) and so are their repeats of The Bill despite being new copies, but I guess it's possible that these copies of The Bill were acquired and loaded into the systems a while back, likely when they acquired the pre-1998 episodes for UKTV Play in 2020 and 2021. Apart from The Bill, The Upper Hand may be the first non-BBC SD acqusition since this problem started, which is likely why it's not appeared on any non-BBC shows until now.

So, it does seem like it's an issue that's affecting newly acquired SD content, not just BBC content, which means the issue could be down to how UKTV are handling SD (presumably it's upscaled when loading it on their systems, and the upscaler is de-interlacing?). I'm struggling to understand how they don't seem to be noticing this is happening though, especially as it's been going on for so long.

UKTV have been denying there's an issue when anyone's tried to contact them about this, so it's like trying to bang your head against a brick wall hoping it will get fixed.