BBC News - Presentation Identity

The ongoing discussions over in the Breakfast thread got me thinking.

Whilst we all agree that commonality and consistency is - by and large - a good thing, when you look at CNN and BBC World output, there are only a handful of hours per day when the “ generic house theme” is used. Otherwise, special identity programming appears throughout the day with their own unique graphics and music (eg Newsday, The Briefing, GMT, Impact, Biz Live, Talking Business, Global, Beyond 100, Outside Source, World News America, etc........)

Back in domestic, the 1, 6, 10 and weekends all have the same musical and graphical feel.

I’d like to see the 10 stand out a bit differently from the others, signaling its flagship status. I’d like to have a full orchestral version of the theme music used for the 10, same music but orchestral.

One wonders if BBC News has ever considered such an option for the 10. It would be simple to do and wouldn’t cost a great deal, if anything at all. Same base music.

Just a thought........

It should be the six that stands out more, that was alway the flagship programme from the bbc.

I can understand why the bbc did it back in 1993 but as you say nothing really stands out.

Even in the 1993-99 era each bulletin had a slightly different variation on the theme.

You could argue Newsroom Live and Afternoon Live on the NC have special identity, although to me nothing really stands out on the former apart from the music.

Newsroom Live should live up to its name and do some stuff like this...

I'd like a Franceinfo style revamp to the NC, even their back half-hour filler is more interesting and more importantly topically relevant compared to The Travel Show and Witness for example.

I’d run the Victoria Derbyshire format all day.

*runs for cover*

Not the format but it is virtually the only show on the news channel which has presentation which doesn't seem dated.

I've been thinking for a little while now that the whole presentation of BBC News needs refreshing, and even in some cases, some major updating, but the way the current studios are set up, with the dolly tracks cutting down the available space to minimal levels, really doesn't help that, and the set elements are limited by having those tracks there, which means keeping it fresh is very difficult.

I'm starting to think that the only way to properly do this, is to completely change the set in E, remove the dolly tracks and have robot cameras that are more like the ones that were in the 1993 studio setup back in Television Centre.

This isn't something that could happen over a weekend though, you'd have to decamp the channel for a significant period, weeks at a time, and that's more difficult now because of the studio arrangement in NBH. You could probably decamp the channel to D, but you'd then have to move London out, possibly to A, but its less than ideal.

The other possibility is to decamp the channel to C, and have World News move to D, but you'd force London to A, and you're moving more pieces there, so perhaps that's worse.

Whatever happens, they do need to change some things, and refresh the look, and honestly, maybe the easiest things to refresh right now, are the titles and the graphics, but they do need to do more than that.

I know this is a presentational forum but I don't see why there's any need to dramatically change the presentation.

The current branding is very well-recognised - if you ask the general public the first thing that comes to mind with BBC News it'd be the beeps and the colour red. The graphics too and style of studio are easy to replicate across the various channels - whether it be BBC World News, local news or Newsnight and the studios 5 years on still look pretty fresh especially compared to N6/TC7.

That's not to say things can't or shouldn't be changed or that the look wasn't better in the past but to change such a well-recognised brand dramatically for the sake of change would be unnecessary. Especially as One-ness has shown change can be for the worst not necessarily the better.

I do think the Six and Ten presentation does seem to lack energy and authority at times - it looks exactly the same as any other other newshour and the headlines seem to go on for minutes on end. I much preferred the original 'beeps' look and music.

See the video below. Short, snappy headline sequences (can you imagine them being that short these days) and what in my opinion was the best version of the BBC News theme and a similar but sufficiently different appearance to the News 24 look at the time. I still love the red and cream look too from that era - it just looks incredibly classy. The whole look back then felt authoritative and like it was the flagship bulletin in a way that the current News At 6/10 branding makes it feel like just another bulletin



And that's without getting into BBC World. It has various different versions of the theme these days and different looks for different shows but like many I loved the look at the start of the millenium - simple, classy and gorgeous to look at. It says all when even something as minor as the 'markets update' from that era makes me nostalgic.

It's already pretty orchestral as it is


In fact David Lowe has already done a remix taking out most of the synthesised stuff and leaving just the orchestra

It is recognisable, but it is now stale, so stale that it actually needs signifcant change now to freshen it up and make it look good again. Everything is so samey now, compared to when the look was at its best in the early 2000s, and the current BBC News globe has been around since 2008, and it is beyond stale now. You're right, that the look lacks energy, not just the 6 and 10, but the whole BBC News style now lacks energy, and it needs that energy back, in order to keep it relevant and attract younger audiences again.

I also think although it is a massive undertaking and the BBC struggle to change a light bulb in a single day, never mind an entire look, that like in 1999 the presentational elements it needs a complete rethink, not just another evolution of the David Lowe music and Lambie Nairn look. Obviously in 1999 the overhaul took a good 18 months or more to be rolled out across the network, news channel, World News and regions, and ideally it wouldn't take that long this time, but I think the core elements (theme and look and main studio) could be changed relatively quickly with the rest refreshed through changes in lighting rather than structure. I'd also ban the red sofa!