VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them!!!

[AirlineGuy]

Hi all,

Is it just me, or does anyone else here think it's time VA refreshed those pre-recorded announcements/safety demo they've been playing now for the last couple of years?

I now find the females voice extremely irritating and very fake and forced, and I cringe every time it comes on. Not even QF would keep running the same safety demo for such a long time.

I also find it very robotic and lacking the human interaction factor from the CS by not even making a manual boarding PA.

Also VA, what is with the announcement selling Velocity every descent. It's played at a time when people are resting/sleeping and then this announcement with the hard sell comes on loud in the cabin announcing rubbish and velocity. Not great on the early morning/late evening flights for a nice cabin ambience.

I still think this is one of the most professional and best pre-recorded safety demos from the past, and I think a similar male voice for VA would suit it well. Freesound.org - "Qantas Safety Announcement.mp3" by digifishmusic :idea:

And the boarding music also!! Have we not been listening to the same stuff for the last year??? Come on Virgin, keep things fresh especially for your frequent flyers!

 

[Boris spatsky]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

It's there to meet CASA requirements, not to entertain the travelling public but i agree it is annoying now.

 

[anat0l]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Who was it now that said that the female voice who did those VA announcements was Charli Robinson?

Automated taped safety announcements are fairly standard, but as for automated taped announcements for boarding and cabin prep for descent, that's an unusual one for me in a country where English is the first language. (I do know some other airlines from English-speaking countries have taped announcements in languages other than English where there aren't any FAs who speak the language of the other country).

One thing about the automated taped announcements is that I suppose on FA just has to push a few buttons, then they go back to whatever cabin service they need to take care of. On other airlines, the FA has to occupy about two minutes at the PA system making the announcement, and then go back to what they were trying to do.

 

[eastwest101]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Hi all,
... when people are resting/sleeping and then this announcement with the hard sell comes on loud in the cabin announcing rubbish and velocity. Not great on the early morning/late evening flights for a nice cabin ambience.

Agree that it is very proffesionally produced but also extremely intrusive, robotic and impersonal.

Also not the first time that the association between Velocity and rubbish has been made by someone of AFF!

 

[Boris spatsky]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

I do wonder why the announcements are always about 30 decibels too loud. Can't they test and adjust prior to flight?

 

[DGW]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Who was it now that said that the female voice who did those VA announcements was Charli Robinson?

My money's on Zoe Sheridan: http://www.rmk.com.au/zoe_sheridan/

Bloody sick of that voice..

 

[erkpod]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

And the boarding music also!! Have we not been listening to the same stuff for the last year??? Come on Virgin, keep things fresh especially for your frequent flyers!

*sings*

Wonderful ..... it's marvellous ....

Thankfully it's not on loop in the lounge.

Virgin Australia - The romance is back - YouTube

 

[LiamR]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Who was it now that said that the female voice who did those VA announcements was Charli Robinson?

Me.

My thoughts on the recorded announcements (1:33):

[video=youtube_share;7FQESCVkXnU]http://youtu.be/7FQESCVkXnU?t=1m33s[/video]

 

[oliverd]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

By comparison, Virgin America has a really clever and engaging safety announcement: Virgin America Safety Video - YouTube

It's surprising how boring and "off-brand" the local announcement is - but perhaps CASA is less lenient with the format and tone of the announcements?

 

[erkpod]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

I remember my first few DJ flights where the safety demo warned you not to mess up your hair when putting the life jacket on & also that if you want to smoke, there's plenty of room on the wings.


Apart from the ANZ one, the most interesting one to me was the English/Japanese one that I saw on QF a couple of years ago. The English version had live action & the Japanese one had drawings. In the Japanese section, there would be a lot of Japanese speaking (as you'd expect) but the English subtitles were a one or two word summary. I'll always remember the section for the oxygen masks. The English subtitle was merely "Oxygen".

 

[notzac]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Still one of my favourite safety demos:

funny Airplane Safety Video // never seen before - YouTube

 

[notzac]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Or for the utterly bizarre: Delta Safety Video Parody - YouTube

 

[drewbles]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Or for the utterly bizarre: Delta Safety Video Parody - YouTube

That is spectacular

 

[Ausbt]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Not even QF would keep running the same safety demo for such a long time.

For the pain inflicted by the Big Q Roo over their 'good-morning-captain-good-morning-captain' woeful cricketers safety video they deserve no credit here. And of course that followed on from the Travolta debacle. How about VA have a chat with Shane Watson about upcoming possibilities? I hear he may soon have some time on his hands.

 

[carwashhair]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

How about VA have a chat with Shane Watson about upcoming possibilities? I hear he may soon have some time on his hands.

And have a bitter reminder of another Ashes loss for 4 years? Urgh, it's enough to make me think about flying qantas!

 

[Bugalugz]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

To me they seem tacky and I don't like them one bit it reminds me of flying in Europe where the main lagunage was spoken and English was recorded which was fine but here it's just tacky and cheap and very LCC.

To me theres no personalisation from the flight crew of the announcements, personally I like the boarding announcements as that helps me gauge what sort of crew is onboard and from that I learn what to expect from the crew whether they are fun, miserable or don't want to be there!

Please bring back human announcements, it's just more professional

 

[Intra]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Was reading this thread afew days ago, and I find it interesting that on tonight's flight MKY to BNE (VA 616), the safety demo was done by one of the FAs (Actually had to look up to check it was actually happening from my seat in 3D), as was the pre-landing speech, done by a human - No Velocity message either, which was a nice change

I usually find myself deeply reading my magazine or just don't pay attention to notice any of the pre-recorded messages to take any note anymore - But tonight was a nice change, better I will agree!!

Someone is taking notes it seems (*hint**hint* VFF )

 

[drewbles]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Was reading this thread afew days ago, and I find it interesting that on tonight's flight MKY to BNE (VA 616), the safety demo was done by one of the FAs (Actually had to look up to check it was actually happening from my seat in 3D), as was the pre-landing speech, done by a human - No Velocity message either, which was a nice change

I usually find myself deeply reading my magazine or just don't pay attention to notice any of the pre-recorded messages to take any note anymore - But tonight was a nice change, better I will agree!!

Someone is taking notes it seems (*hint**hint* VFF )

More likely it was broken. I've had a few flights where the crew have mentioned the recording wasn't working for whatever reason and they've reverted to manual demos.

 

[Intra]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

More likely it was broken. I've had a few flights where the crew have mentioned the recording wasn't working for whatever reason and they've reverted to manual demos.

In that case, I wish it was broken more often....

 

[Sprucegoose]

Re: VA's Pre-Recorded Announcements/Safety Demo & Cabin Ambience - Please change them

Any prerecorded announcements are robotic laziness. Safety I can understand.

Alot of developing world airlines employ this technique. Doesn't build confidence I am afraid