Love the retro feel of it - nice to see some real change with a revamp, rather than tweaking the edges. Only two things I'm not sure on is the astons and the intro voiceover - should be much snappier IMO. (Note at Lunchtime they just introduced it as ITV News, not ITV News at 1.30). Also would it be too much to ask that the brief shots of Big Ben in the titles show the relevant time?
Love the touch of reintroducing the newscaster term too, and also feel this shows some commitment from ITV to continuing to provide a news service for a few years yet. Content wise it felt very much more about the news too,with gimmicks kept to a minimum.
The set doesn't look bad, but it does look
fake
. It's a shame the desk and platform aren't real - that would go a long way to help it feel more realistic and surely wouldn't break the bank. It's quite noticeable on the close-up shots.
I don't think it matters at all. If it was a "real set" with pretty much the same design, but painted onto a set, it wouldn't benefit the broadcast at all - and look a lot worse. Only tweak I'd make is in the wideshots perhaps have the newsroom or skyline in the background on the far right.
Only real complaints are it looks like News at Ten branding will be dropped completely (this look could easily be doctored to use the News at Ten logo on the titles and astons), and such a shame it hasn't yet extended to the regional news. Hopefully that will happen sooner rather than later, but I guess it'll be New Year as the earliest.
