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Granada Colour Production - when was this caption last used?

(May 2010)

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MA
Matt_1979
I have noticed on various websites that Granada still had their logo reading "colour production" as late as the early 80's. I can remember seeing schools programmes in the mid-80s (that were probably repeats) that had "colour production" at the end. I seem to remember reading a few years ago that it was 1985 before Granada scrapped the "colour production" - is this right?

It is surprising to think how Granada carried on stating that their programmes were in colour long after the other companies had finished doing so.
GL
Glenn
As far as I can remember, Thames continued to use their skyline "Colour Production" end board until the switchover to the "...for ITV" boards in late 1989. I don't think they had different end boards for their 21st celebrations. I think once the ITV endboards came in that ended the remnants of any "colour production" boards.
JJ
jjne
Granada definitely had the odd programme with "Colour Production" still attached in 1989. Certainly repeats generally were left this way.

Tyne Tees continued with the "COLOUR" legend on farming programmes that were part-networked as late as 1988. Even though the ident had dropped the legend in 1979, farming programmes had a special green endcap, which had not been updated since the mid-1970s.

Not sure if there were any others, unless there were some remnants of Anglia's presentation that survived through to 1988.
SC
Si-Co
I believe it was 1986 when Granada stopped using their 'colour production' frontcap/endcap, replacing it with the rather bland 'Granada' slide. LWT used the 'colour production' endcap until their Autumn 1986 rebrand, I seem to recall.

As stated above though, the Granada colour caption was still shown on repeats - in particular of schools programmes, and this continued well into the 90s!
BH
BillyH Founding member
I have a whole night of Thames on tape from February 1989 - still with the skyline ident - and 'Colour Production' is everywhere, as is the old mechanical clock. It would have all disappeared a few months later though when the new idents launched.
NW
nwtv2003
I have a whole night of Thames on tape from February 1989 - still with the skyline ident - and 'Colour Production' is everywhere, as is the old mechanical clock. It would have all disappeared a few months later though when the new idents launched.


I've got a nagging feeling that the mechnical clock did see through to the ITV generic look, there's only a couple of clips online (I think TV Ark has them) , it's not the same classic one, but it's definitely mechinical, as opposed to the generic clock that Yorkshire used, and what LWT used briefly.
ST
Stuart
You would've thought that they'd have changed them in 1982 when the new franchisees (Central/TVS/TSW) began. None of their endcaps ever mentioned 'Colour Production' (AFAIK).

I'm sure it made the older companies look somewhat dated against the simple 'Production' endboards of the new companies.

Before someone slaps my wrist, I appreciate that Central wasn't really a newcomer in the true sense, but all their on-screen identity was new. Wink
JJ
jjne
Yes -- Thames did use a mechanical clock superimposed on a blank ITV/Thames branded holding slide for a while. I can't think of any reason why they would have put together a new one, therefore it must have been a reworking of the old one.

Part of the ITV generic package was a clock design and associated software, but only a couple of stations used it.

I know that Tyne Tees had played around with the same idea as Thames, and indeed had remodelled their clock for the purpose, but I didn't see it air. However a couple of people have told me that it did air a few times in September 1989. I'd have liked to have seen it. In the end TTTV scrapped the clock from their presentation set altogether. AIUI they had horrendous problems keeping the image stable on-screen with the dated tech they had, so rather than invest they chose to scrap.
MA
Matt_1979
Cheers for the replies - I thought it was either 1986 or 1985 when Granada ditched their "colour production" caption. I can remember that until the generic ITV idents in 89, the Granada ident, while looking slightly more modern with a white background and "GRANADA" in silver, still had they company's name in the same old-style lettering as all previous idents from the late 60s onwards.

I was never a fan of the corporate ITV look - it spoiled the individuality and identity of each region and as a kid in the late 80s I used to like seeing all the different companies' names at the end. Two I hardly ever saw were UTV (or Ulster as it was still known back then) and Channel. I don't think hardly any of their programmes were networked.
SP
Spencer
jjne posted:
Part of the ITV generic package was a clock design and associated software, but only a couple of stations used it.


It wouldn't have been a simple case of just providing software, but dedicated hardware was needed to generate clocks in those days. A big solid-state box, the size of a large brief-case would have provided an on-air clock.

Perhaps some regions decided the cost and/or faff of installing it wasn't worth it.
GS
Gavin Scott Founding member
jjne posted:
Part of the ITV generic package was a clock design and associated software, but only a couple of stations used it.


It wouldn't have been a simple case of just providing software, but dedicated hardware was needed to generate clocks in those days. A big solid-state box, the size of a large brief-case would have provided an on-air clock.

Perhaps some regions decided the cost and/or faff of installing it wasn't worth it.


You're not kidding. I saw STV's clock and was told it was several thousands of pounds worth of rack mountable electronics.

Software it was not.
JJ
jjne
jjne posted:
Part of the ITV generic package was a clock design and associated software, but only a couple of stations used it.


It wouldn't have been a simple case of just providing software, but dedicated hardware was needed to generate clocks in those days. A big solid-state box, the size of a large brief-case would have provided an on-air clock.


I think by that point, systems that were capable, among other things of providing on-screen clocks and the like were available off-the-shelf. This is what Tyne Tees told me as they were, at one point thinking of buying such a system in. They mentioned that the clock design was loaded into this, but I have no idea what the hardware was supposed to be.

Quote:
Perhaps some regions decided the cost and/or faff of installing it wasn't worth it.


Yeah I don't think it was cheap; I think the rationale was that this one system could provide on-screen captions, gave a more flexible alternative to the traditional image store for holding slides and so on (TTTV's system consisted of numerous rather old and discrete pieces of kit). I believe Granada had a similar setup installed. But in the end cost took over, and the decision was made at Newcastle (once they realised they couldn't get away with re-using the old kit) to ditch the clock altogether and make do with what they had (they'd only just completed an upgrade about nine months' previously which probably played a part in the decision).

And yes, I saw the old TTTV clock. A huge wooden box with a camera sticking out one end, linked to a basic lumakey/colour injector thing. It was totally Heath-Robinson, had clearly been upgraded several times and was held together with gaffer tape. Thinking back, the very idea that they could have eeked any more life out of the thing was ridiculous!

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