BBC One Ident Research

BBC One is the flagship TV channel of the BBC, which is in the UK, Isle of Man and the Channel islands. It was released on the 2^nd of November 1936 as the BBC Television service, but was renamed to BBC TV in 1960. When its sister channel BBC2 was launched in 1964, it was again changed to BBC1. BBC One is no stranger to TV idents, and has been creating TV idents since the 1950’s. Since then they have excelled in TV idents, and the work they produce now is amazing. Their current themes of TV idents are all circular and are very aesthetically pleasing.

The first second of the ident you see a man on a skateboard with another man on a skateboard alongside the first person. The first person does a flip with the skateboard, as the other keeps going. You can then catch a glimpse of another man behind him, revealing that there are 3 men on skateboards. The camera stays with the first person and then shows him jumping into the air off the skateboard, causing the skateboard to flip in the air. This part of the ident is slowed down, and I think that the use of slow motion in this ident was used at the right time, as it made the shot have impact and made the skateboard the area of focus. The man then regains control of the skateboard after touching his feet down on the skateboard, which is followed by the slow motion returning to normal speed. As soon as he hits the ground, you see the second man go up a ramp of sorts and jump onto a thin beam. While this happens, you can see how smoothly the camera transitioned from shooting the side of the skateboarders to in front of them. As the second man is about to get off the beam, the third man jumps over a large wire reel and jumps straight through the middle of it. This part also goes into slow motion, as it is where the ident wants you to focus and is the part of the frame they want you to see the most. The camera speeds back up to normal speed while he is still in the air, giving the atmosphere a very elegant feel. As he touches the ground, the three continue to ride, but this is where the ident abruptly stops. I feel they could have done a better job at finishing the ident, as it was a complete stop rather than a fade or a finish. I did like the combination of audio and video, as the sound was a piece of music played on a piano, and was part of the reason why it was elegant. I feel the music and video synced when the first two skateboarders jumped up onto their ramps, but not so much for the third. Overall it was a good and quick ident, and was a pleasant introduction to the next program.

At the beginning of this ident you see the same foot kick the same football, and has a lagging effect, where the editor replayed the same footage to give the effect that someone was kicking a football instantaneously. In the next few frames you get a blurry clip of someone doing kick-ups with a football. Already you can tell this will be a very quickly edited and fast paced ident with many different cuts and camera shots. You then see a very fast clip of a man doing a kick-up, then immediately the frame cuts to probably the same man kicking the football on his knee, then a different angle of the same thing in the same second. You then see a very strange warped effect that I have never seen in an ident before, which is almost morphing the players together in a circle shape, and is warping their bodies in a transparent way to create a very trippy effect. This is slowed down a lot, while the footage of the players in the background is repeating. The next shot is of a man heading a football, and then another shot of a man kicking a football with his knee. You then see a foot, probably the same man, ready to kick the ball, but this camera moves all the way round in a circle fashion, and this has a very strange effect on how the eye sees this. You didn’t see the same man kick do that, but because it was so quick it looks like it is one fluid motion. You then see the same trippy effect as before of the man kicking the football, and, just as before, the warp footage is slowed down hugely and the footage of the players in the background is repeated. You then see a quick shot of a man heading the football and then a different use of the warp effect. This time it looks like all the different players are morphing together, almost like some sort of energy transfer. This part is really psychotropic and gives you a very brief insight into the endless possibilities of computer imagery. You then see a group of players kicking balls, then the camera does an action shot, zooms back and moves all the way up for a birds eye view, BBC One’s favourite view, and this is when you see a circle of players all with their own football to kick. They then kick their footballs in the centre, where the balls bounce off other balls and go back to the owner, and this is repeated. The ident cuts off again rather abruptly, and I think this is because the ident was not correctly ripped, which is the reason behind this. The audio is one of the main reasons this ident is so good. All of the beats match up to whenever someone kicks a football, which is the reason for the repeating lagging footage, which adds to the glitchy style of editing the ident was going for. 

This ident begins with the camera quite low, showing you two lines of people riding bikes. The line on the right is wearing red capes, whereas the line on the left is wearing yellow. These two colours are good for creating contrast between the two and help distinguish colours. There is then a quick birds eye shot of the cyclists on a road, which helps make the scene look less forced and more relaxed, as there is a car parked on the side and a woman with an umbrella, to signify the weather, which I assume is rain. The ident then cuts to a much higher, centered bird’s eye view of the roundabout, and shows you all the cyclists. You could only see the red and yellow in the beginning of the ident, but in this shot you can see many different colours which makes the shot varied and adds much more colour to an otherwise bland pavement. To add to the yellow and red, there is also lilac, purple, dark blue, light blue and green. These cyclists are all circling the roundabout in a clockwise motion. The logo of BBC One begins to form right in the first shot, but has completely finished its animation by the time the bird’s eye view shot arrives. You then see the red circle sweep around the logo and disappear very quickly. The camera continues to move further upwards, revealing the four-way roundabout, which shows cyclists coming from each road to join to the big circle of cyclists. The audio is ruined by an echo in the announcer’s voice, but this may not have happened on the actual channel. The music in the beginning is very positive and uplifting, making the mood of the ident quite cheerful. 

BBC One’s logo has changed in a great way, as it went from harsh and serious to much more relaxed and casual. Their idents have also been pushed up a notch, and are of much higher quality and expertise. The very common element in these idents is the use of colour. BBC One’s colour scheme for their logo is red and white, and has been for a very long time. They incorporate these colours into their idents to stand out from other colours and to have a high contrast. All of these idents also seem to be using a lot of real life footage rather than any form of motion graphics, which could be seen as reflective on their channel, as they are a somewhat serious channel when they need to be. There aren't a lot of differences in their idents, as they all feature some form of sport or active exercise in the idents I have researched.  They also all have the same uplifting mood which is created by the music. They also seem to have less saturation in the background shots to really emphasise the colour on their subjects. Their target audience is older people, as their idents are relatively quick and don’t seem to have any content in their idents to appeal to children or young teens. Their use of colour in the first ident contained more red than any other noticeable colour, as the skateboarders were wearing red as well as the steel beams. This was not the case for the second ident I analysed, as that had much more white. White is usually seen very often in football, so this could be the reason why the players’ shirts were white, or it could have been the fact that red on white can be seen very clear and it is also BBC One’s colour scheme. The third incorporated many different colours in a spectacular and innovative way, as each line of cyclist was wearing a different coloured cape. These were also very clear against the darker roads and pavement in the background. The first ident was quite quick in terms of movement, and had no majorly slow footage. The second ident was very fast paced and, because the players were moving faster, it felt much quicker. The third was much slower and relaxed, which means it had more of a chilled atmosphere rather than everything happening at once. There wasn't much typography or any extra wording other than the logo text, as the idents much rather relied on the editing of the footage for a good video. I quite liked these idents, as they have a lot of consistency, unlike many other channels. The second ident was created in 2007, and the same style is still being used today. The third ident I researched was created in 2010, 5 years ago, and is still being used today. 

Comedy Central TV Ident Research

Comedy Central is an American cable and satellite television channel and was created in 1989. It was created with the sole purpose of being the first channel that was devoted to comedy-based shows. 26 years later and it is still one of the biggest comedy channels around. It carries all kinds of comedy, such as sitcoms and stand-up comedy, as well as many feature films. I chose Comedy Central as I really like their current idents as they tie in with the sleek design I am looking for.

This ident begins with a shot most likely taken from a helicopter, and is looking down on the city of London. It is moving at a moderate speed and is not too fast yet too slow, and is just at the right speed to be a smooth shot. You can see the Gherkin, the skyscraper, and a few other skyscrapers from this shot. You can slightly hear a helicopter, and after a second or two you see a helicopter come into view. The helicopter is a Boeing Chinook, and is mostly used for cargo. You can instantly see it is carrying something, and after a split second you can see the Comedy Central logo at a huge scale. It is unrealistic and movie-like for a cargo helicopter to be carrying something of that size.  At 7 seconds in, you then realise that this ident was never supposed to be realistic, as the Chinook flies over the Gherkin and the huge logo hits the Gherkin, forcing it to bend backwards. At first I thought the logo was closer to the camera, but when it hits the Gherkin you realise just how big it is. After the Gherkin gets hit, it bends backwards and wobbles back into place, almost cartoon-like. The Chinook then continues to fly with the logo and the ident ends. I really like how they get really large buildings and sculptures and present them in a comedic way. The audio in this ident is very concise and to the point. The voiceover talks about what’s coming next and says it within 5 seconds, leaving the perfect amount of time for the logo to hit the building. I thought this was a good and unique ident, as not many channel idents combine the use of 3D CGI and real footage like this. 

Instantly in this ident you can see the redesign of the logo and the atmosphere of how things work now. It is a very simple and clever design, as the main logo consists of two ‘C’s, one normal one and the other is inverted and is on the outside of the smaller c. On the sides is the channel name, which is a good addition and doesn’t leave too much negative space. It begins with a very high pitched arcade game-like noise which is bound to catch your attention. A red line comes into frame from the left to right, and is bringing a huge red square behind it. The red line snaps off and turns into a square, while the huge red square bounces back and covers the left half of the screen. As the small red square falls onto the logo, the entire shape and the red half of the screen tilt in a counteractive way. The small red square bounces on the logo in the same position twice more, creating the same tilt action, then jumps to the red half of the screen, where it changes to black as it crosses the line and creates the tilt again on the other side, then jumps back to its original place on the black half of the screen. This also has a tilt, but is a considerable larger tilt. The red square then jumps back onto the red half of the screen and instantly the screen flips around and goes into a spiral of chaos. The black square then disappears along with the black half of the screen, leaving the background red. The word ‘central’ has now been turned upside down as a result of the spiral, which is the way it is supposed to be. I really like the way they implemented physics into such a simple ident and pulled it off remarkably. This is a great effect and a perfect example of how simple motion graphics can be suitable and professional for prime-time television. The audio, however, is not as good. Unfortunately, whenever the announcer speaks over the ident on HD, the background music is lost and the voice has a slight echo to it. This doesn't happen on the standard definition channel and is only one of the few idents that has this problem. The voiceover has an echo to it, but is still relaxed and adds humour to the ident. The voice says where the next program will take place, and then asks “Why? Because that’s what it says in the schedule, okay?” I like the fourth wall break and the announcer knowing it’s a TV channel and mentioning a schedule rather than a lot of TV channels that just tell you what’s going to be on next. This makes the atmosphere less tense and makes the voice-over a little less boring. 

This program ident I chose to talk about because it is very quick and snappy, and makes use of simple motion design. The screen in the first frame is simply the word ‘now’, in a very elegant cursive font. It then switches to a black screen where a red square is in the centre of the frame. It then rotes diagonally and bounces in the air, revealing different-coloured circles each time. At the end of the 6^th circle, the red square turns into a red line and swipes to the left, presenting the word ‘Friends’, a classic sitcom, in its own font. It’s not so much the motion graphics but the audio that makes this ident so good and beautifully random. At the beginning of the ident you can hear some sort of rattling or shaking, which sounds like a box of many small things. You can then hear a heavy zip, which then goes to the black screen. As the red square jumps in the air all you can hear is the “buck” of a chicken, in sync with the bounces. At the end, when the line is showing the word Friends, there is the sound of a chicken doing a very loud buck or squeal. I really like this ident simply because it is so random and makes no sense, yet is good and does what it is made for. 

The first shot of this of this ident gives you the colour scheme for the ident, which is bright orange on dark blue. I think it works well and makes the orange stand out very well. The ident begins with the Comedy central logo coming closer to the screen and getting much blurrier, which is then followed by two shapes from the top and bottom of the screen to make the camera feel like an eye, or two eyes. It reopens and you can still see the Comedy Central logo, which is still blurry. It has a few echoes when it moves and moves further away from the camera. As it does this it becomes clearer to see. Once it gets to a certain point, it gets blurry again, followed by the same eye animation for consistency. I like this effect, as it makes the viewer feel and know that the ident is supposed to make you know that the camera is drunk and cannot concentrate on the logo and is having a hard time understanding and seeing what is going on, hence the opening and closing eyes. The logo moves backwards and forwards in very subtle variations and has an echo very close to its trail. It stays very close to the centre of the frame and this makes the ident look professional. It gets very clear for a few seconds, and then gets blurrier once again. Once this happens, the logo becomes very clear and stops moving around, staying in the centre of the frame. This is when the ident ends. The audio for this was very helpful in aiding the ident, as it had the same flow as the motion graphic. At the beginning the music starts, but you can hear the slight sound of bottles clinking, indicating beer bottles. The announcer then begins talking, and he also sounds drunk, to give the ident the full effect. This ident was probably created for ‘Drunk History’ which is what the voiceover mentions in the ident. He then says what will be on next, the logo becomes clearer and the ident ends. I think this was a very simple yet effective ident and it worked in what it was trying to achieve. I also like how it had contrast yet wasn’t too bright on the eyes, which must have taken some thought. 

The common element in all these idents is that all of them have some sort of computer imagery in them, such as the 3D logo in the air hitting the Gherkin, or the other three idents I analysed which were all probably made in Adobe After Effects. The last three were very simple yet were very good on TV, as audio was used and everything was in sync. However, the first one did use real footage, which could be seen as more interesting in some viewer’s eyes. Personally, my favourite ident out of the four was the inverting colours ident, where the bouncing square went from one half of the screen to the other. I liked the trippy effect that took place when the screen was spinning, and thought it was quite remarkable that it could be replicated in After Effects, where it was most likely created. The last one I analysed, the Blurred Vision ident, was a different colour scheme to the first two motion design colour schemes. This was to suit the scene, and worked well. The target audience for the first ident was for all ages, as it was just some splendid 3D software that made the Gherkin wobble like it was just out of a cartoon.  The next two were also for all ages, as they had no specific theme. The last one was leaning more towards the older audience, as the theme was drunkenness and not being able to see straight. All of themes were positive and cheerful, as it is a comedy-based channel and they want to spread this comedy even in their idents. I watch comedy central for only one show but even then I love seeing the variety of idents they feature along with it. Their colour in the first ident was a bit bleak for the original footage but this makes the focus on the logo stronger as its colour scheme is red, white and black, and also the fact that it is huge. They use this same colour scheme in the next ident, and I liked seeing this colour scheme in motion, as it had a good contrast and didn’t leave anything unseen. The movement in all of the idents is a bit sudden at times, and this helps regain focus on the important parts of the ident. This can be seen in all of the idents I evaluated. In the first one, the logo hitting the building was quite sudden, and the building bouncing back was much more sudden and was very fast. If it was any slower the effect would not have looked so good. The second ident speaks for itself, as it spins around very fast and keeps the viewer occupied and wondering what’s coming next. The program ident was just as impressive, as the entire ident was very fast and kept you on your toes the entire time. The last ident was also at a high speed, as the blurriness and the depth of field effect were changing constantly. The first ident did not have too much going on in the rest of the ident, leaving your eyes to concentrate on the building and the logo. The rest of the idents are all in the centre, which makes it much easier for your eyes to follow a centred object. I really like Comedy Central’s approach to idents and is one of the few channels that create motion graphics like this. 

Channel 4 Ident Research

Channel 4 is a British public service broadcaster and has been on screens since 1982. It was created to provide a fourth TV service to the UK to add to the list of the channels available at the time, which consisted of BBC’s two channels and ITV. Since then it has massively expanded and has a huge variety of shows and programs available to watch on Channel 4.

This first ident is from 2002, which is why it is not as high quality as the others. The ident begins with a blue screen with what appears to be ripples of some sort. As you go on, you see the line shake, and this leads me to believe it is a sound wave. It moved due to the sound in the background, and if you listen closely you can hear it. As soon as the ident begins you can hear the voice-over, which sounds very informative and is talking about what will be coming to the channel in the coming week as well as what will be shown now. The lines keep coming from the left and are all different sizes and widths. You can hear the slight glitch sounds that were put there so the lines wobbling would make sense. You then hear a number of beats, which are part of a song, and as soon as this is heard, the lines shake much more and instantly the Channel 4 logo glitches into the ident, which is in sync with the beat. The words underneath the logo say ‘channel4.com’ and these words form letter by letter, but at random. While the beat keeps going on, the Channel 4 logo moves from side to side, giving it an edgy glitch look. The blue in the background is constantly changing in how dark it is, and goes from very light to dark blue. This fluctuates over the course of the ident. 

This ident is from 2007 and caught my eye instantly as I was looking for idents to analyse. I was intrigued that a 30 second video looked like it took no time at all, whereas another ident was 28 seconds long and looked much longer than this. I think the camera movement changes between fast and slow movement, which is why I think it is so good. The first thing you see is a trailer hooked up to a pick-up truck and instantly you can see all these washed out colours on the screen. They are really light coloured and aren’t too saturated.  You then see a tumbleweed roll out onto the plain, where the camera then follows its movement. In the next few seconds you can see a car next to a fuel pump. The car is a muscle car, and as the place is surrounded by pick-up trucks, it is clear the producer wanted you to think of the American desert town, or something like an old style 1960’s scene. The tumbleweed keeps going through the sand, while the camera goes all the way round and loses track of the tumbleweed, then refocuses on the tumbleweed, so it is still in frame. At this point, about 14 seconds into the video, you start to see a glimpse of what’s to come. You can see things in the air held up by sticks like a billboard. They are very bright and catch your attention, as they are the brightest things there. They also have a slight glow to them, which also makes it easier to see. The camera keeps going round, goes past the tow truck and this is where you get a full look at what will be seen. You can see the diner, with its neon sign and its warm glow. You can also see the old style American cars parked out front to indicate people are in this small cosy diner. At this point the tumbleweed is still in frame, but as you progress a few seconds you can see it go towards the camera and disappear. As it does this, you look up and you can see the magnificent creation that all the separate pieces have created. At 23 seconds you can see the Channel 4 logo made out of each glowing neon sign. The camera does not stop and continues to go to the left, meaning that the whole combination of signs turning into a 4 is only visible for a second or two. The camera then continues to move away from the sign, and at this point you can see the perspective of the side view. The audio for this ident was perfect and at the beginning of the ident you can hear some wind and some other natural noises, but as the music kicks in and the ident starts coming together the whole atmosphere feels perfect. 

This ident is to promote music on 4, and is from 2015. Instantly you can see this is computer generated and is 3D motion graphics, which immerses you into the ident. You begin with many different shapes, as the camera is zooming out. The shadows and reflections have been made very well, and the centre of the shapes seems to have a purple tinge to them. The ident takes you to another shot, where either the camera or the shape moves back into itself. There are rectangular pieces within a cluster, and these seem to be growing separately. You then see a camera shot of the whole object zoomed out, and everything is still moving. An orange line which looks to be in the style of low poly flashes in from the left to right on screen and looks like it is wrapping around the object. The same thing is happening with a blue line on the other side of the object simultaneously. These two elements alone catch your attention very well due to the yellow and blue on white contrast. The camera moves again and you see a blurred out deconstructed logo in the making while the blue and yellow lines keep wrapping the camera. You can just about get a glimpse of the word ‘music’ while the blue low poly line goes past the camera. The lines remind me of fish in a bowl, as they move very fast and have the same very basic outline of a fish swimming. The creator has added a natural feel to the lines to make them look very entertaining. The camera then cuts to another shot and at the same time the deconstructed 4 logo morphs from very close to the camera to move backwards, while being swarmed by the lines. You can see the logo recreated in 3D design and looks very well made. I especially like the way the producer has made many pieces to create the 4 logo, which is essentially all their other idents. As it zooms out, the words ‘music on’ are on the left of the logo, indicating the music on 4 and is promoting this. The music for this ident has been picked very well, and it also has a voice-over. As soon as the ident begins the voice-over begins, talking about what’s to come later and what will be showing now. As the first part of the 3D object changes angle, you can really tell the music in the background, as it has a much higher pitch in that part.  The music fades in really well when the voice-over finishes. 

These idents do not really have a lot on common, which explains just how varied Channel 4 is with their idents and ideas. Two of the idents were motion design whereas the second one was pure footage, but that is not to say Channel 4 does not feature many footage-only idents. There is one consistency however; all these idents are designed in colours and ways to capture your attention as soon as it begins. The first one is very bright so your eyes will see the brightest thing on the screen and hear the voiceover. The second ident has catchy music and a great purple sky in the beginning, then when the music kicks in you can see the brightness of the signs, which is striking to the eye. The third ident begins with a voiceover but is quite bright, along with the type of music that stops and starts, which catches a viewer’s attention because usual TV programs or adverts do not use this kind of music. The target audience is for people in their teens or over, which is the reason for more urban/catchy music. The way the movement is captured is really fascinating, as it varies quite often. In the first ident the channel 4 logo moved very slightly and the lines were wavy, but in the second one the camera movement was very clean and tidy and worked in all the right places. The third one had different camera shots when there needed to be and had fluid motion movement. There weren’t many examples of typography in the first and the last ident, but in the second one there were multiple signs with different words on them each time, which put out a really futuristic effect. It wasn’t really anything to do with the channel and more to do with the context of the ident but I still think it suited well. 

Dave TV Ident Research

Dave is a television channel available in the UK and Ireland and features many popular shows. They present a number of comedy shows and informative documentaries. Their main output was comedy shows from the BBC, but now present popular-factual shows and magazine shows. They have been around for a long time and first had the name UK Gold Classics and later UK Gold 2. They were given a new identity and brand name in September 2007. The reason the channel is called Dave is because UKTV said “everyone knows a bloke called Dave”, which could be seen as usual British nature.

This ident perfectly describes the atmosphere of this channel and tells you a lot about what kind of shows you will be watching if you continue on this channel. The ident begins with some trombone music and on screen you can see woman in a blue costume walk towards a cannon, as a man welcomes her into it. The next shot you see is the woman laying comfortably in the cannon, and the whole shot is made to look like this is a magicians trick and that this whole thing will be marvellous. After this you see a group of people holding a target landing zone, which is also padded for a soft landing. They are encouraging her to do it, and are cheering. You then see her face with a look of sheer determination as you see sparks and smoke coming out of the cannon, and if you look at the back of the cannon you can see the fuse has been ignited. There is then a shot of the fuse burning out and almost instantly you see a shot of the cannon exploding and you see a woman flying through the air. I think it is supposed to look like bad green screen effects, as it looks very cheesy. You then see the group of people holding the padded target moving around to catch her, but they then realise that she has gone way past the target, as you see her smoke trail in the sky going much further than anticipated. This is a rather humourous ident and shows the viewer how they add humour into almost everything. The audio is also very useful with this ident, and also adds to the humour of the ident. After around 5 seconds, a voice comes in and makes a joke about Ray Mears, a survivalist, while introducing the next program that will be playing. He falters his line on purpose, as it adds to the humour and atmosphere of the video. The man’s voice is unlike a lot of cliché voice-overs, and instead of a deep American accent the voice is of someone who sounds very normal and approachable, which makes the viewer more interested in the channel. He then finishes off his next line and leaves the music playing. While the flying woman misses her target, you can hear the screech of the firework fly off into the distance. Overall I think this ident did very well in terms of what reaction it expected, and I think it defines the channel very well. 

This ident is very quick and is used as a very quick and snappy video in between advertisements or programs. It helps the channel stay fresh in the viewers mind and has been made quite well. This video is made up of three different quick idents that Dave could put in each advert at different times, which is why there are different colours.  For such a small area and video, there sure is a lot going on. As the ident begins, you see the leaves start to go up at the same time to the top of the shield and flourish, which is a nice sleek implementation to the ident. When the leaves reach the end point, the video ends. While this is happening, the elephant is moving one leg very slowly in front of itself, which looks like it is moving more when looking at the whole ident instead of focusing on just the elephant. The elephant is the mascot of Dave, which is the reason for its place in the video. There is also a slight sheen on the shield and wipes over it to suggest the light source is moving from left to right. This is another nice addition to the sting and works well with the overall movement of the ident. This sheen can also be seen on the helmet at the top of the shield. You can also see the two ships on either side of the shield are in combat with each other, as the ship on the right shoots a cannon first, and the one on the left shoots a split-second later. The three identical idents have one difference; the colour of the background changes. First it is blue, then brown, then green, which adds to the variety of the same sting. The pattern remains the same although I noticed it changes position from blue to brown. As for the audio of the ident, there was none, as it would ruin the ident. As it is only two seconds long there would be no music or sound that would be suitable for this. This entire 2 second sting has been made very well and looks very professional. There are shadows and 3D objects, which are all part of motion design. 

This is a usual ident and is 22 seconds long, which means it is long enough for the viewer to acknowledge and be interested in. The first thing you see is that the ident takes place in a shopping store, probably an electronics store. The camera moves very slowly and instantly you see a woman walking past, which makes the viewer want to follow her. You then realise that the camera is not featuring her, and is taking more of an interest in the clock section. You can see the clock section in the first shot, but the camera starts to move into it more as the ident goes on. As the camera goes by the clock aisle, you see an assortment of clocks, which are all of different sizes and shapes, some big and round, some small and square. On top of the clocks you see banners with words like ‘catch the sunrise’, ‘beat the snooze’ and ‘tick tock'. These are written all in lower caps, to appear very laid back and informal. You could say that you find it confusing up until 9 seconds in, which is when the camera keeps moving in the aisle to reveal a cockerel, a male chicken, on the shelf, in the same line as the clocks.

• Fun fact: Chickens are not completely flightless, and can fly just enough to get over a fence or into a small tree.

You then understand the ident, as most people know that cockerel’s crow very early in the morning, which can also serve as an alarm clock for those who live on a farm with chickens. The cockerel remains in its place and does not do anything apart from spread its wings a little. I find it funny how the words behind the chicken read out ‘good morning’ when cockerels have a reputation for being very loud and shrill in the morning, which makes this ironic. At 16 seconds into the video the chicken begins to crow, demonstrating its waking call. It does not hold back and is very loud. Underneath all the clocks are prices and information about each specific clock, whereas underneath the clock the only thing there is the Dave logo. The chicken makes this stand out, as it is the biggest thing in the area. The audio in this ident matches the ident perfectly, and works very well. At first you hear some slight music that reminds me of what you would hear in an elevator, which is then faded down so you can hear the voiceover telling you what programs are coming to the channel and what is coming next. As the voice is about to finish the signature Dave music fades in, which is just before the cockerel begins to crow. The music and the crow end at the same time, which is just before the end of the ident. This ident is amusing and witty, which makes people more entertained, which in turn gets them laughing and talking about it, which in turn makes Dave more popular. 

The common theme of these idents is humour, and this is quite clear in the idents I have researched. The second ident was just a small sting but if I had picked an ident it too would have been an amusing one. I like the comedy in these idents, such as the joke in the voice-over in the first ident or the chicken as a soothing alarm clock. They use real footage most of the time, but because it was only a 2 second clip the sting was motion design. They also like to use animals, as many people will look at the screen if there is an animal on it. The sting had the walking elephant on it, and the third ident had the alarm clock chicken. I like the use of practical things in idents, as it gives it more of a personality and the feel of the ident is more relaxed and also pushes the humour of the ident forward. I’d say the target audience for these idents would be for everyone, as they are family friendly, yet still leaning towards teens and older people. Children would find the overshooting flying woman and the chicken funny, but some of the adults would find the jokes in the voice-over funny too. Their atmosphere in these idents are very positive, humorous and are the perfect idents you would want to see before watching a comedy or magazine show. The colours they have in their logo are just plain black and white, but their idents are usually packed full of colours. The first ident I analysed was very vivid and had many colours such as blue yellow and red. The ident took place in a field which meant grass was surrounding the area, which was very bright. The colours had a lot of saturation in them, making them stand out much more and were brighter than anything else on the screen. The second one had much less colour because it was not footage and instead a motion graphic, which called for subtlety. It stands out from the background but gets your attention because of the huge elephant in the centre of the shield and because of how much detail there is on such a small thing. The last one has a lot of blue in it, as the banners on the shelves are all white text on a white background. It contrasts well with the white underneath it, which stands out.  The first ident seems like it is in some sort of slow motion, as the camera shot on the people encouraging the woman do not appear to be in real time. This explains why the camera is moving slowly; they wanted to emphasise the subjects in their shots. The movement in the second ident is also slower than normal, as too quick of a motion would not suit that particular sting. The camera shot in the last ident I analysed was moving faster than the rest, but was not too fast to make it seem tacky. The movement was fast enough to keep you occupied and left you wondering, as you did not know what you would see until it was in complete sight. As for typography in these idents, there isn't a lot, mainly because they relied on footage and actions rather than text. Overall I think these idents were very professional and it seemed Dave is more on the humour side of channel promotion rather than thinking about what their channel features. They showed a good use of both footage and motion design and made very interesting idents. 

Watch TV Ident Research

Watch is an entertainment TV channel broadcasting in the UK and Ireland, and is part of the UKTV Channel, same as the Alibi TV channel. It features many different genres of shows and puts out shows from the UK and also internationally. The reason I chose to research this was because I have watched this channel for a long time and I have watched this channel more than other leading channels, simply because of their featured shows. I also thought it would be a good idea to research a TV channel that I actually watch.

This ident is from 2008 and was part of an “Alien Invasion Week” where they featured science fiction shows and made this a theme for the week, which helped promote their channel. This ident is very family friendly and is very simple to understand. I like how they give their logo, nicknamed ‘Blinky’ a personality and give it human emotions, like fear into this ident. The ident begins with the ground shaking and rumbling and Blinky is, well, blinking around and gives you the impression that it is in fear of what’s to come. It’s also hiding behind the words ‘Watch’ to push the message further to the viewers. In the beginning Blinky quivers only a small amount, and then it slides behind the ‘a’ in ‘watch’ and this has some meaning and was not some quick decision by the editor and creator of the ident. First of all, it is hiding behind the ‘a’ to still be visible to the viewers and is not covered by lines so you can still see the inside of the eye and not be distracted by anything else. It is a modern font and is very rounded so this effect fits in nicely with the rest of the text. Something else I noticed was that Blinky, the logo, looks like it is looking through a peephole in the door, which is what someone would do if they don’t know who is knocking at the door. Similarly, the same thing is happening and the logo does not know who or what is coming, hence the peephole. Blinky then realises that the sound and everything is happening is from above and looking through a peephole is useless. The logo then jumps out of the way and instantly the screen turns very dark and is only illuminated by the green beam coming from above, which is a high indication the is an ‘alien spaceship’ and this effect has come from many movies in the past to give viewers this feeling that an abduction is taking place. As a result of so many movies using this effect it became very cliché and is the main reason why it is very noticed today. As the green beam comes down, the logo jumps around and is trying to avoid the ‘abduction beam’ at all costs. This adds to the viewer feeling that the logo has a personality, as it has very fluid movement and is showing a very human emotion, fear. As it is trying to escape it comes towards the camera, towards the viewer, and instantly gets sucked backwards to the green beam, and you can see this with the use of shadows. It looks down from left to right and is clearly trying to escape but to no avail, and gets sucked up off the screen. As soon as it gets sucked up the rest of the screen clears up and returns to white as it was before.

This ident was from 2010 and is a newer, more aesthetically pleasing ident, and is very fluid and works well. This was not part of a theme and was purely made as a standard ident. I really like this one due to the real life elements and the fact that everything looks so professional and timed perfectly. The ident begins with what seems to be a random pink cloth-like material flying in the air. The music instantly begins and eases in very well. You can instantly see the effect that is taking place and you see what is going on, yet it has been created very well. It is a reverse effect, and what has happened is that the table cloths and the cutlery and basically everything in this video has been thrown into the air, then reversed to make it look like everything is coming together really smoothly and immediately. It is quite strange to look at, as everything looks so fluid that it becomes more fluid than normal human life, which makes you doubt what is going on and makes you wonder if it is special effects or some camera trickery, when in reality all the effect is and what makes this ident so good is a simple video reverse. This is a very interesting idea for an ident as it is nice, quick and very simple. There are plates and other pieces of cutlery flying back into position, which gives an impression as if they are magnetic and it makes the whole scene orchestrated. If you look closely, you can see people in dark suits, throwing and holding objects while they are in motion, which is something I did not notice the first few times I watched this. If you play the video backwards, you can see how the actual scene played out in reality, and how the people in black suits were grabbing things at a specific time and throwing them, and when played in reverse would look like they are putting them down instead of throwing them up. It looks like the women jump up in chairs and both come into the table at the same time, but in reality they are being pulled back at the same time. This is a very strange look in a video and works really well when trying to make a video look unnatural or strange. This is also a family friendly ident and the music is also child-like, making it more approachable and less formal. I especially like when the broken plate flies back into position and becomes un-broken, which makes the reverse effect really come in on its own. This is my favourite ident out of the three, not because it is real life footage but because of the excellent use and idea of the reverse effect.

This is a Watch ident from 2012 and is closer to the current ones they use, as it is the same logo and style as today’s idents. This logo and design is really nice and in my opinion the best the logo has ever been. I like how they developed through the years to transform their logo from an eyeball to a very recognisable motion design. I think this ident was used at the very beginning of the day, right when the channel starts up in the morning. I like their colour scheme here, as the background is a very light blue and looks a lot like the sky. From the top right corner you can see ink being splashed underwater come through and there is also an audio aid to help make this look really professional. The music slows down at the same time as the ink, which is also very professional and is very suitable for this. The ink is made up of different colours, which makes the ident very vibrant and makes it more memorable. It also cuts to many shots of the ink which includes a close up, which looks very abstract and surreal, and leaves the viewer in awe. My favourite shot is at 10 seconds in, when you get a very quick but close view of the ink, which really shows the liquid and the bubble inside it, which is a good effect for a quick clip. At 15 seconds into the ident, the footage continues at real-time instead of slow motion, which is what it was doing the entire ident before this. A voice introduces the channel, which leads me to believe that this ident was used very early in the morning, when the channel begins showing content. The ident cuts to the Watch logo, which is a semi-circle with their channel name over the front. The word Watch comes in from the left and sweeps into full view to the right. While this is happening, the ink is behind the logo and looks like it is coming out of the semi-circle, which is in unison to how the name sweeps out. As soon as the name ‘Watch’ has completely finished its animation, the ink footage goes into slow motion and remains like this until the end of the ident. It also uses the same audio aid, which is a nice touch and informs the viewer of the slow motion, which again, leaves the viewer in awe of the effect. I like the simplicity of this ident and how they combine real footage and motion design into one sleek video.

Over the span of 4+ years, this channels design has really come together. The logo has developed greatly, and the idents that follow are very suitable for their appropriate theme. Over the years however, the overall atmosphere has been very positive and bright, and is good for watching with family. The target audience of these idents are for anyone, as the first one is humourous, the second is interesting and the third ident is exciting. They are always making bright and vivid idents, which make it easier to define what kind of mood they are portraying, which is upbeat and cheerful. It isn’t child-like, but can be found funny by children, especially the first one, which is good for a channel that features all kinds of entertainment. The use of colour in the first one is not as varied as some of the others, as it is simply a white background and the green beam from the top of the video. This adds to the simplicity of the ident, and doesn’t cram up the main subject of the ident. The second one is of a high contrast and uses black as the background so that colours like white, pink and blue will stand out more than they would without the black. The third one is completely filled with colour and uses really bright colours against the bright blue, such as pink, yellow and purple. These are contrasting and complimentary colours to make the most out of colour and make the ident really stand out to the viewer. The movement in all these idents are very fluid and aren’t too slow or boring, which is perfect for a channel like this. The first ident uses very subtle movement to add depth and a personality to the logo, which was executed perfectly. The second one uses movement very well, as the movement is the main focus in this ident. The camera moves back very slowly while everything in the foreground is happening, and you don’t really notice how slow the camera is going until you focus on it. Near the end of the ident it turns in an effortless way to the screen. The actual objects are moving so fast due to the reverse effect, which usually looks very well if done well, which, in this case, was done quite well. Everything is flying about and it really makes you focus on the cenre of the composition, which is the table and the two women sitting on either side of it. It does this in one take, which can make you wonder how many takes it must have taken them to get this perfected. The third ident uses many different cuts and shots to really make the effect of the ink in water pop and stand out to the viewer. The first 15 seconds is close up camera shots of the ink, and in each shot the ink fills the screen. This makes the logo stand out much more, as it is small and in the centre of the image, whereas the ink shots were large and all over the place. Typography is not used so much in these idents, as it is more about the objects rather than the type. The idents also have real life footage in them, which catches the attention of the viewer faster than typography. These idents don’t really say so much about the channel, and more about catching the viewers attention. This is because the channel has so much variation in their featuring shows. The audio in all of the idents is perfect the way it is, as in the first ident the sound is very subtle and can’t really be heard over the voice-over. The second ident’s audio is just music, and does not have a voiceover mainly because a commenting voice over this video would just not work and would ruin the atmosphere of the video. The third ident uses both background audio and a voiceover, and both work well with each other.