When did you first get interested in idents?

The title says it all- how old were you when you first got interested in idents and presentation and why? I think I was about 5 or 6 but I can never remember. Despite having clear memories of the COW and the TWO, I can never remember the channel 4 ident with its original Music.

1996-97 with the BBC Idents and the SKY 1996 idents

When I was about four or five years old, around 1981, in the era of BBC1's blue and yellow mirror globe. But I don't think there was ever a particular point when I got interested in idents, or a particular reason why - I just always have been.

And until 1999 when I got the internet and found MHP and then all the other ident sites, I thought I was the only one!!

Well I've always enjoyed TV themes etc., but I became interested in the properly in about October 2000, when I first visited TV Home. I can honestly say it was TV Home which made me develop an interest. Thanks Asa!

I became interested a couple of years ago when I was trying to remember the BBC 1 ident before the Balloon and I did an internet search and found MHP then TVHome and a lot of other related sites.
I must have been 14/15 years at the time

I've only made a point of being an ident fanatic (if that makes sense to anyone) since I got the net. It was weird to find such sites as UK Television/TV Home, The TV Room, Jim Edwards whatever it's called, Meldrum etc. etc. - as Robert #1 says, I thought I was the only one!

I've always had an interest though. For instance, I would always notice if there were changes to on-screen presentation or something. No-one else in my family could care less. I think my mum's quite surprised that I haven't said anything about the new BBC TWO presentation...

I'd say when I was very young as I was intrested in what other regions logo's looked like.

The furthest I can remember is the COW BBC1, TWO, the 1990 Granada and Channel4 before the new music in the early '90's.
For some reason we got a good Wales reception so I remember that after TV-am I always wanted to put HTV on. So that was when I was 3 or 4 I guess.

I'm interested in idents for about 12 years. And I became interested in idents when I saw the famous '2s'. And almost a year ago I found TV Home on the Internet and from that day I'm also a BBC News fan.

Last year,when I got the internet and found sites like Sub-TV and the MHP and UK Television-those sites got me interested in idents (And a year later the TV Room got me interested in regional news!)

I think I've always had some sort of fascination with them, and especially since the Twos went really creative, getting a little character of its own. It's quite a good lottery, as I always like to guess which 2 will be next. I'd love to design a group of 2s of my own someday!

I guess my first fascination with TV idents began in 1997 when BBC One launched the balloon in October '97 - it brought out a whole new side to the word 'Ident' - well in my opinion it did! Through the summer of 1998 I recorded lots of different of the BBC One Balloon onto video, before finally ending it in February 1999...and recording over it! I had recorded 37 minutes worth!

June/July 1999 and the obsession with the Balloon came alive once again, after the recent release of idents with people actually in them. It was then that once I had full Internet access at home, I started looking for pictures of of the Balloon, and came across The Ident Zone. A year later and mid-July 2000 saw the obsession suddenly switch to the presentation of BBC News 24.

Grabbing a video from TV Ark was my first 'piece' of BBC News 24 off the web - once we upgraded to Sky Digital in September 2000 I explored furthur on the Internet to look for more material of News 24. It was then that I discovered the BBC News 24 section of TV Home - by November 2000 I was exploring the whole of TV Home!

The fascination with idents grew more and more thanks to TV Home, and I started to take an interest in more idents, such as UK Style and UK Gold. Throughout the first quarter of 2001 I found more material of BBC News 24. With the launch of the forum in March this year, it also helped me find even more websites dedicated to TV idents.

In July 2001, I became a little hooked onto the idents of BBC World, whilst on holiday. This is the latest chapter in my life of idents.

It is from all this that the presentation of TV idents is now part of my everyday life - and I thank Asa for TV Home ever being born!



(Edited by Ryan at 7:33 pm on Dec. 11, 2001)

Did anyone see that item a few years ago on a programme called How Do They Do That? They had an item about how the first generation 2 idents were made - it was really interesting.