BBC News: English Regions Titles circa 2003

Given the regional titles were overhauled to 'reflect' BBC London's then monochrome look around 2003. How come from looking at all of the title sequences in the following YouTube clip were some images used in more than one region? Was it to create a 'feel' of the region within the then BBC News look and who exactly made the title sequences, was it the region itself (In my case BBC North West Today) or a more 'central' department. Just wondering.

https://youtu.be/NDo8KZXgr_I?t=11m25s

I think the titles were made with input from both the regional centres and Lambie-Nairn (who I think were still assisting BBC News with their on-screen look at that point)

I think most of the duplicated clips are shared between adjoining regions, as they have relevance to both, such as the Lincolnshire vegetable pickers from Look North (EY&L) and East Midlands Today, and also the kids paddling in a Cumbrian lake on both North West Tonight and Look North (NE&C).

There's also the kids playing with a ball on a new-build estate on both Midlands Today and South Today. Maybe it's somewhere in the Cotswolds?

Are there any shared between non-adjoining regions? I have trouble memorising them all and which region they come from.

I remember those titles, if only for the description on TV Ark after they were replaced:

"Out went the two old blokes in their greenhouse at Jodrell Bank (their tomatoes must have ripened by now) The large lady in Liverpool has long since been to weight watchers and now resembles Twiggy plus the old dears now only visit Blackpool with walking sticks. "

I found those titles rather boring. In fact, the only generic BBC regional news titles I've ever really liked were the first ones in 2000. Any others tend to be either for Scotland or Wales, or an English region that's felt brave enough to go its own way.

The hideous and obvious extended audio edit fudge towards the end of the titles grated with me.

Trying to emulate the excellent BBC LDN was always going to end in tears mind.

Yes those regional titles were quite dire and could never live up to those fantastic BBC LDN titles.

I wasn't a big fan of the 2000 generic look though - it's true they said absolutely nothing about the region, and particularly for those without a noticeable coastline came across as a just a bit of paper waving about with some place names.

Wasn't BBC LDN actually pronounced as 'BBC London', which they eventually renamed it to anyway? Even the web address on those titles is 'bbc.co.uk/london'.

Both the tv and radio station were pronounced BBC London during the LDN era.

The URL on the original version was bbc.co.uk/london but then a few weeks in they were remade to include the 'www'. At the time BBC URL's didn't work without the www - they just took you to the homepage. IIRC if you looked carefully at the LDN branding 'Southwark' was spelt wrong too


The change to 'BBC London' and their new set took place on the same day that ITN took over London Tonight

The whole 'LDN' business has to be the daftest branding decision made by the BBC this century. It all goes back to 2000 when BBC launched the first two elements of its tri-media project for London - the launch of a local website and the relaunching of GLR, both under the 'London Live' brand. The regional news was also to have been titled London Live, but just 18 months later, they decided it would be really trendy to brand it all instead as 'BBC LDN'. However 'LDN' was always just the logo - the radio station was now called 'BBC London' (I think the 94.9 bit followed a bit later) and the regional news launched under the title 'BBC London News'. Those were the names that were printed in Radio Times, never 'LDN'.

(BBC London News also thought it would be really trendy to have the presenter standing up and have no real set to speak of, but that's another story).

Then after four years, having confused everyone into thinking the news programme and radio station were both called 'LDN' when they weren't, they finally changed the logo to something more sensible, i.e. 'BBC LONDON'. Unfortunately at the same time they launched new opening titles that were far inferior.

Since then the whole tri-media project has broken down somewhat - the website now falls under the bigger 'BBC News' brand, and earlier this month the radio station sensibly reverted to its original title of BBC Radio London. Which just leaves the television news, where the branding still doesn't reflect the full name of the programme - so I wonder if next time they change the titles, they will finally add the word 'NEWS' to the logo?

Considering the editorial area of BBC London (News) is larger than the GLA area, isn't it time they used a generic 'Newsline' type brand as used in NI? Spotlight works well in the South West where the region covers Devon, Cornwall, parts of Dorset and the Channel Islands (except for the opt out).

Newsroom South East pre the split of the region worked well.