This week we were introduced to the program which we are going to be using throughout the module OpenCV. While using this program we were advised to be aware that when operating within the more familiar RGB colour space this program preferred to mix things up a little for reasons best known to itself and operate within a BGR colour space. Which offers no significant problem until you decide to output into a program which uses RGB and then some kind of conversion process is required.

This reminded me of my youth as an intern working briefly at the BBC. I noticed one day that they were also very fond of this particular arrangement of these three components, which I would usually notice after I had hurriedly wired video monitoring equipment incorrectly, much to the annoyance of the chief engineer.

I asked him one day why they preferred using a BGR labelling scheme when everybody else seemed to prefer using RGB. He looked at me quizzically, slowly put down his cup of tea, took a long drag from his cigarette and replied “Because we’re the f**king BBC, that’s why’.