ITV production/presentation slides

Production means they actually made the show, Presentation means it was produced by someone else.

I think Programme was just an alternative to Production some regions used?

Yes, sorry, I meant the difference between presentation and programme. I think some regions used all three, although I think Anglia only used programme iirc.

You would often see “presentation” slides after imports or films - for a long time Thames’s version was “From Thames in Colour” rather than stating the word “presentation”. I believe that when Thames lost the franchise and YTV took over “presentation” of The Bill, there were two end-cap slides shown at the end of episodes. The first said “A Thames Television Production for Yorkshire Television”, then the next “A Yorkshire Television Presentation for ITV”. Quite cumbersome but, as stated, that was the rules of the era.

EDIT: That may have been later as the example here shows Carlton presenting The Bill to the network in 1993. Two slides at the end:

Would random bits and pieces just be ‘presented’ by the region you were watching it on

For example, if YTV showed a five minute cartoon as a filler, it’d be “A Yorkshire Television Presentation for ITV”

Back in the day I used to think it was quite odd how Looney Tunes or something had a link to Yorkshire TV, but in reality it’d be your own region in each region?

I think Home and Away used to end with ”A Yorkshire Television Presentation for ITV” as well.

Yes, that’s basically it. Cartoons, imports (including Home and Away), films etc in the YTV region would end with a Yorkshire Television caption. Until 1989, I believe the caption just said “Yorkshire Television” - with the 1989 rebrand the “presentation” slide arrived, but fulfilled the same purpose.

If you had been watching in the North West, you would have seen a Granada slide instead, and so on. Not all regions did this - some just played out these types of shows without any caption at the end. But the only link in this case to the region was that they were screening the programme - in the case of Home and Away and many films, they weren’t even playing it out. But it was a way of branding the station and letting you know what channel you were watching, and that they had chosen to screen that particular programme for you!

I remember YTV showing “Yorkshire Television Presentation(or Production)” locally, the national versions also had A Yorkshire Television Programme for ITV it was rare though I think, if the ITV production company had some involvement but was produced by an indie it became a “programme”, in the Tyne tees region there was no such local end board iirc, but they had the quirk of local productions also having the national endboard ie it always said A Tyne Tees Production for ITV at the end of programmes such as Northern Life.

We are going way off topic, so maybe a thread split is in order!

So:

“Production” implies the programme was solely(?) produced by the ITV company concerned?

“Presentation” implies the company had no involvement other than to showcase/play out/screen the programme/film/cartoon etc

“Programme” implies they had some involvement along with an indie who produced the programme?

Or was it really that straightforward? I seem to remember several series that were produced by companies like Zenith, Husson Films, Action Time, etc that still had a Tyne Tees/Central/Thames Production” slide. I don’t know what the legal status of such companies were, but if a production company (such as Cosgrove Hall) was fully owned by an ITV company, then would their productions qualify as a “Thames Production”, for example?

Something else I remember from the late 70s/early 80s was that Tyne Tees and Yorkshire programmes were credited as a Tyne Tees or Yorkshire Production, but the copyright text underneath was always (c) Trident Television, who owned both franchises.

(deleted, mostly already said)

AIUI Action Time shows were unusual in that the Action Time element often refers just to the format, not the actual execution of the production - so ITV regional companies could license the format from Action Time, and possibly incorporate a level of production input, but production would still largely be handled by the ITV company.

The nuances of Euston Films, Zenith, Cosgrove Hall etc. where the prod co was owned by the ITV regional contractor may have created a difference - particularly in the pre-1993 era when fully independent productions commissioned by an ITV franchise/licensee for Network ITV was still relatively unusual, but still the only way for Indie originations (as opposed to acquisitions) to hit ITV screens ?

Fair enough, though I didn't expect to end up as the nominal thread starter, the post before mine belongs here too - I've added it as a quote in the first post.

Indeed, there are examples on YouTube of Home and Away ending on Granada with a Granda Presentation endcap (actually, they would shrink the picture at the end, like an ECP). In fact for imports like this, shown nationwide, there would be a specific ITV region who would be responsible for compliance, editing and so on, and I believe in Home and Away's case that was Yorkshire, although they were never credited as such. You'll recall on Neighbours there was an extra credit for "BBC Television Presentation" which was the same thing.

A lot of the terms in the credits were all pretty interchangable depending on the whims of the specific broadcaster. Funnily enough on the Beeb there was a "Presentation" credit, which would be used instead of the Producer credit on programmes which involved just stringing clips together, presumably the role in that case was not considered enough to be billed as Producer. You can see that on some of the episodes of Top of the Pops that were just videos and repeats due to strikes and the like, and I remember Rolf Harris Cartoon Time and the like having that credit instead of Producer as well.

It reminds me also that in the early Warner Bros cartoons, the directors were billed as "Supervision" as Warner Bros didn't think what they were doing classed as directing, although after a few years they gave in and credited them as Directors instead.

On HTV all imports (Home and Away, A Country Practice, Prisoner, Sons and Daughers etc) and films had a HTV presentation caption afterwards. I understand some regions did not do this however. Not sure if it was simply a choice whether the region did this or there was some requirement in some regions but not others.

it was never a presentation for ITV however - it was simply ' A HTV Cymru Wales Presentation' or 'A HTV West Presentation'. From 1993 onwards it was just HTV, no difference between Wales and West.