[Humphrey Hacker]

The generic ITV logo was pretty poor. The idea that every ident would slot into the "v" was ridiculous and If I may say shows ignorance from the head honchos at the time of local sensibilities. Granted some logos such as Yorkshire would have fitted but Tyne-Tees would have looked a shrunken mess.

[Gary McEwan]

I can't fathom out though why Grampian kept on using the ident music for the best part of a decade.

I'm sure they used their own ITV ident well into the mid 90s as well.

[Neil Jones]

I can't fathom out though why Grampian kept on using the ident music for the best part of a decade.

I'm sure they used their own ITV ident well into the mid 90s as well.

www.tvforum.co.uk  might be of interest. Suggests they were still using in-vision continuity until around the time Grampian was bought by Scottish, who had themselves dumped in-vision continuity years ago. So the ident wasn't on air that often, so because they weren't using it there was probably no need to change it.

30th Anniversary of ITV 1989 presentation: GET READY>>>> - Page 3 - …
TV Forum Light Dark System Default Homepage TV Home The Newsroom Media & Tec…
  Source: www.tvforum.co.uk

[Milkshake]

I have seen alot of Grampian clips and I have never seen "practice of running IVC *and* idents at a lot of breaks" It was either one or the other until Summer of 1998. Can you please explain what you mean?

On top of that Grampian were also know not to use any ident or IVC and instead
* Menu
* A slide for Shinty or Highland League results
* A slide for The time the place or We the Jury etc
before heading into the next programme

Grampian were that Sparing. A new promo and slide package come in around March 1994? and that only lasted a year before it replaced with another new package which was shared with Border Television.

Of course that Promo and slide package was replaced again in 1997 with it's last look with the St Andrews cross.

Interesting fact: The last Ident Grampian used from Autumn 98 until 2000 was actually made by Grampian before STV come along.

[JAS84]

I can't fathom out though why Grampian kept on using the ident music for the best part of a decade. 

I'm sure they used their own ITV ident well into the mid 90s as well.

They only ditched it when forced to by the corporate logo change.

Ah yes, of course this was the first version…



But it seems like an anomaly in that almost the entire logo is featured, unchanged other than squashed a bit, and it’s heavily detailed. Whilst it helps in terms of fit that it’s a triangle, so (pretty much) are YTV’s chevron and Scottish’s Bertie Bassett and yet Thames’ logo doesn’t get the ‘heraldic’ interpretation.

I could see them having initially presented Thames with just the blue waves (TVS style) or a corner of Tower Bridge in the triangle and had it rejected.

I wonder if this was itself a redone version, hence why it doesn't seem to match the rest - and they'd originally designed one based on the 1970s ident (which they were still using in 1988)? When the anniversary logo was created, the designers just quickly pasted in the new logo?

[Rdd]

I can't fathom out though why Grampian kept on using the ident music for the best part of a decade. 

I'm sure they used their own ITV ident well into the mid 90s as well.

The ident music of course (which though unusual, was very nice) was kept on by a number of regions - aside from Grampian, LWT, Tyne Tees, and Border used either the original version or rearrangements well into the 1990s.

The ITV National Weather also used it, first the original version, and then a series of weather themed rearrangements (the so called “Weathergens” because Powergen were the sponsor at the time) that continued well into the 1990s till they were replaced with a second set of Weathergens with different music.

Edit: the name “Weathergens” may have strictly speaking referred only to the second set, that didn’t feature the 1989 music. Powergen was the sponsor throughout this time though.

[Former Member 443]

I can't fathom out though why Grampian kept on using the ident music for the best part of a decade. 

I'm sure they used their own ITV ident well into the mid 90s as well.

The ident music of course (which though unusual, was very nice) was kept on by a number of regions - aside from Grampian, LWT, Tyne Tees, and Border used either the original version or rearrangements well into the 1990s.

The ITV National Weather also used it, first the original version, and then a series of weather themed rearrangements (the so called “Weathergens” because Powergen were the sponsor at the time) that continued well into the 1990s till they were replaced with a second set of Weathergens with different music.

Edit: the name “Weathergens” may have strictly speaking referred only to the second set, that didn’t feature the 1989 music. Powergen was the sponsor throughout this time though.

I wouldn't say "well into" in TT's case, the replacement ident that reused the jingle ran for less than 18 months and was gone in 1992, at which point five ITV companies were still using the original version (or a minor variation thereof). 

I believe in TT's case, the decision to reuse the music was pragmatic in any case - the 1991 ident apparently was a rejected package from the late 1980s (note how close it is to the 1988 Northern Life intro) which happened to (almost) match the ITV jingle (it is in fact about half a second out of sync with the final form-up) that allowed them to rebrand on the cheap - they were actually the first company who had taken on the 1989 package in full, to drop it, again after around 18 months. Management were never keen and just wanted it gone.

People often forget in this that YTV did use what amounted to the original package until 1994.

[JAS84]

If management was never keen, why use it in the first place? They'd only rebranded the previous year.

[harshy]

YTV didn’t make a very good edit you could see the original triangle part of the it\v, and the font wasn’t quite right and it was too far down.

I wasn’t a fan of the work YTV did after they took on tyne tees, the trailers looked Amaterish between 1994-1996, wasn’t till the channel 3 branding did some design come back into it.

[Former Member 443]

If management was never keen, why use it in the first place? They'd only rebranded the previous year.

Because their rebrand itself was weak. It had always been a soft launch (with various parts of it brought in at different times, taking over a month just to change the colour scheme on bits like programme menus and clocks), and I get the impression they weren't enamoured with what they had either. I think it was brought in more out of a sense of having to do something with the 1979 ident - look at the way they treated it on The Roxy, they knew it wasn't aging gracefully. By the end of 1988 the static version of the new ident looked nothing like the animated version, and had gone through a few changes during Sep-Dec '88. It was a mess, basically, but once you've committed, well it is what it is.

TTTV's weak spot had always been presentation going right back to day one. Then ITV come along with an effectively free package that they'd spent a fortune on...