And to that effect the majority of TTTV (and I'm sure most other old-style in-vision annos, and probably the out-of-vision ones as well) started out, or continue to work as DJ's as well.
Certainly most of the better ones.
Having a good voice is insufficient. Charisma is just as important as the voice, if not more so. That's why I shudder when I hear people refer to 'mere' announcers, the best ones are presenters in their own right, and in many ways it's a more difficult job to get right.
IH
I Hate HTV West
Quote:
There is one announcer on HTV (wales and west) who is very whitty and worth listening to rather than the pompous and squeaky 'london' announcers.
Dunno about Wales, but the West continuety is pretty appaling IMHO ...
And, as to HTV West's In vis presenters, when they had them, they were embarressing!!
YTV (and the others) used to have a very funny announcer about 2 years ago, He used to make humerous comments over the credits of programmes, and think up exciting ways to say 'Now the news from the regions' (as they USED to do)
Sadly this is the bloke who now does all the YTV (etc) local trailers, and only does recorded continuity announcing on ITV Nightime
I firmly believe that CA's should say somewhat less at times, but they should have really clear on-screen identities.
One of the problems is that most stations nowadays either strongly discourage or positively do not allow the CA to give their name on air.
What on earth's the matter with 'Good morning, it's nine twenty-five on Thursday, the 27th of December, and this is Nick Harvey welcoming you to another days programmes from Meridian, your local ITV1 station'?
Thankfully, there are still SOME who use the odd standard line, from which you can identify them. There's little doubt who's on if you hear 'Across the three BEST days of the week, THIS is LWT' for instance.
Talking of himself, brings me to the other point. YES, there's FAR too much clutter over and around the end-credits nowadays.
Chris Tarrant and others should NOT plug the next programme at the end of their own and there should be no promotions over the end-credits ( ECP's).
Only ONE voice should talk over the end-credits, IF that's necessary at all. If there's a need for a voice-over end-credits to network, then the locals should be warned in advance, like they used to be in the old days, so the local CA can keep well clear.
A VOEC to nets should only be used for essential things like a support telephone number after a suicide in the episode, or similar.
The current idea of cramming as much information into a VOEC to nets is stupid. I was talking to 'himself' on the phone during Corrie on Sunday evening, when the PC was telling him that he had 9 seconds between the ECP and the sponsors anno to throw as much information at the viewer as he could. Bloomin' daft, in my opinion.
Bring back Michael St John, I say. 'It's now a few twinges past midnight'.
FL
flowerpotman
I would agree with most comments on providing a 'witty' and informative intro into a programme, but I know an announcer and more often than not he's allocated only 5 or 6 seconds to introduce a programme over the ident, so you tell me how he could cram it in, after saying 'Now on......it's Coronation Street' your times up.
I say allow more time for ident's and cut back on all the recorded promotions.
FPM
FL
flowerpotman
I would agree with most comments on providing a 'witty' and informative intro into a programme, but I know an announcer and more often than not he's allocated only 5 or 6 seconds to introduce a programme over the ident, so you tell me how he could cram it in, after saying 'Now on......it's Coronation Street' your times up.
I say allow more time for ident's and cut back on all the recorded promotions.
Oh yes, for certain flowerpotman, a major problem is the rigid scheduling of continuity now.
I honestly don't understand what's wrong with allowing the announcer, either in- or out-of-vision, to have a 30-second piece to himself at the start of each evening's programmes to allow a rapport with the viewer to build up. Announcements then over the course of the night can be shorter, then another longer one to hand over to the generic through-the-night type stuff.
You could even do this with a Leeds-type setup. Who says the announcer has to mention the station name? The longer an announcement is the easier it is to be generic! It's the 'attract-and-inform' mantra that seems to have disappeared.
Otherwise, if you're not going to do it that way, I see little point in having an announcer at all. Just stick a short ident on and be done with it, just go straight into the programme. It seems a waste of money to me to have a person on-site for 15 hours a day just to say 'now Corrie' 3 seconds before Corrie starts -- especially as most ITV companies now don't make their own trailers.
>I think continuity announcements are out-dated - nowhere else >in the world is this done.
What are you basing that on? From watching a handful of German channels on Analogue Astra and American news channels on SkyDigital? They do not constitute everywhere else in the world.
I regularly watch a Swedish channel called TV4 (it's broadcast on Thor II) because they show a lot of british output (still with original frontcaps and endcaps on 70's ITV stuff) and don't dub over it with Swedish (they use subtitles instead).
There is ALWAYS continuity on that channel. Sadly, much of it is recorded, but it's still there. They even have IVC in prime time (I've never understand the Central/Tyne Tees/TVS type view that you should have IVC everywhere but prime time, surely prime time is exactly where you should use the strongest type of continuity you have).
ECP's, talking over credits and scandalously short continuity into programmes do nothing to keep viewers.
TSW rarely if ever spoke over the credits of anything. When they did it was interesting (Ian Stirling's comments on Coronation Street for instance) it wasn't to plug some programme that was on 5 hours later. Once the credits were finished, a next caption explained what was on next. Trailers were used, but not nearly as much as they are now. Most plugging of programmes was done by the announcers.
The announcers were recognised. Roger Shaw, Ian Stirling and Ruth Langsford are local celebrities because people could see them and recognise them and there name was used on the station. I doubt many people have a clue who Peter Griffin is, much less what he looks like.
And throughout all of this, TSW's name wasn't used that extensively in announcements. But you still knew you were watching TSW.
Compare that to today, we have 'ITV1' pushed to us at every opportunity, it's on trailers, it's on idents, we're frequently reminded in continuity announcements that our alledged 'local' station is part of it and yet what is generally called? ITV! No one calls it ITV1. Brand names cannot simply be established by plugging them to death, there needs to be a uniqueness that makes that brand different to everything else. That's what ITV had, and their sole strategy to compete in a multi channel environment is what? 'Make us exactly the same as everyone else'. Umm, how do they expect that to work?
Compare that to today, we have 'ITV1' pushed to us at every opportunity, it's on trailers, it's on idents, we're frequently reminded in continuity announcements that our alledged 'local' station is part of it and yet what is generally called? ITV! No one calls it ITV1. Brand names cannot simply be established by plugging them to death, there needs to be a uniqueness that makes that brand different to everything else. That's what ITV had, and their sole strategy to compete in a multi channel environment is what? 'Make us exactly the same as everyone else'. Umm, how do they expect that to work?
Why the hell can't ITV understand this? Why do they think that slick ITV1 branding, talking over credits, crap generic credits sequences, etc DOES NOT GET VIEWER LOYALTY. Decent local continuity announcers does. Even a decent national continuity announcer would be better (like Channel 5) but the local part is part of ITV's Unique Selling Point.
JA
Jamez
Anyone else see the rather massive cock-up at BBC Two's closedown last night?
A trailer for 'Meet Joe Black' was shown, but with the voice of the announcer saying 'Thats it from BBC 2 for tonight, Breakfast will be here at six, but until then, we'll leave you with the best of ceefax....We appologise for the loss of this programme, we are trying very hard to get things back to normal...I'm glad to say we can now return to.........' (fades into Ceefax).
Obviously pre-recorded announcement, but why were they looping themselves?
Oh, golly Chris, I'd forgotten about the TSW (and Westward) team until you mentioned them. Now they WERE a set of well-known, 'personality' CA's if ever there were.
And, they were extremely popular and kept the audiences across the junctions. JUST what we've been talking about here.
Roger, Ian, and more latterly Ruth; but not forgetting Jenny Clulow and Judy Spiers from earlier days.
(Edited by Nick Harvey at 2:55 pm on Dec. 28, 2001)