What "got you" interested in TV?

As mentioned before, the CiTV branding of around 2000 was something I loved, especially when they moved to their larger set, I absolutely loved it.

A few years after, the 2004 ITV News rebrand was something I couldn't wait for. I remember the sneak preview on Friday's Evening News and then the Monday launch, I loved the set and the music, everything. That's what really got me into TV presentation and this website.

I'd say the Sky News rebrand of 2005 contributed too.

Many of these reasons seem familiar to me - though I think the 1997 BBC One balloons launch is what prompted me to discover the world of pres websites. (One site still has a screengrab I contributed from way back then!)

I do remember being around 8 and recording closedowns, just because I was curious about what happened, and occasionally being up early enough to see channels going on air. Later, we had a satellite system installed looking not just at 19.2E for Sky, but also Hotbird at 13E - so I got to enjoy the fantastic tombstone-era Sky presentation, getting to see a whole load of how European telly looked, and the joys of BBC World. And the Astra promo loop. And the handover between Nickelodeon and Paramount. And much more besides...

At uni, I managed to put my enthusiasm to good use with our student TV station, and from there have managed to turn it into a rather enjoyable career in broadcast engineering. At least now I can claim I'm interested because it's work...

Careful - C4 will come knocking soon with hoarding like that. Talking of which though I remember my nan keeping loads of old papers and being fascinated as a kid finding the TV listings pages in them.

I think the earliest thing I remember that got me interested in the presentation of TV was the ITV schools logo and rotor shown on mornings. This seemed fascinating to me as a 6/7 yr old with the computer graphics, the music that would go on forever and the odd way you had "ITV Schools" shown on Channel 4.

Also the rebranding of Tyne Tees to Channel 3 North East seemed to me to be a massive deal at the time. In a household that only had the main four channels to see the change from the TTTV 1992 grey logo to this big, shiny CGI '3' with its booming music (which now looks god awful in hindsight) it was quite a big change involving idents, promos, news etc. Add in to that the "Birthday Spot" that Tyne Tees had after CITV and before Home And Away, with the in-vision continuity announcer (usually Bill Steele or Kathy Secker) reading out cards and listening out for friends names and on a couple of occasions my own.

The BBC 1993 'virtual' news era also was fascinating with the seemingly massive studio, glass crest and music intro, especially the six and nine o'clock news if I was allowed to stay up late. Then after seeing an episode of "How do they do that?" which explained the whole thing was virtual, with the studio being just a basic desk, robotic cameras moving about and computer generated lighting rigs - it was just "wow" to a ten year old.

My interest in television began as a young child. I've been told that when we got our first VCR at home, tapes would be made of the ad breaks and played to keep me quiet! One of the earliest TV adverts I can recall is, for some reason, this HP sauce ad from around 1984:



In terms of programmes I remember seeing as a child; there's Let's Pretend (with that yellow caterpillar), Pigeon Street and You and Me stand out as early memories - as well as, for some reason, Pebble Mill at One and Farmhouse Kitchen.

I can remember vaguely some of the presentation used on air from the mid 1980s onwards: I just about remember the striped ==2== logo, as well as the closing era of ITV frontcaps - the ones I remember most were the Central moon (usually going into Crossroads - for some reason, the old orange end credits used up until 1985 also stick in my mind from a young age) and my local station ident, the Ulster Television telly-on-a-stick.

UTV also provided me with the earliest memory of TV news titles, when they launched "Six Tonight" in September 1987, with their, by NI standards, modern CGI sequence:



I think around the same time, BBC NI introduce CGI titles to "Inside Ulster".

Other landmark early TV memories include the first soap storyline I remember - Sarah Louise Tilsley being born in Coronation Street; and the first international TV news story I remember sticking in my mind - the Zeebrugee disaster. I also remember Johnny Logan winning the Eurovision for Ireland - all from 1987.

Then, come early 2000, I discovered Television Ark (as it was then), the MHP etc... and more memories of idents, adverts and programmes came to life again.

It's hard to pinpoint for me.

'Unofficially', I've probably always been interested in TV pres. I am part of what was probably the last generation which experienced the ceremony of being marched into 'The Television Room' at school in order to sit on the floor in front of some gigantic wooden-cased Ferguson set to watch that weeks schools programme live (I will also never forget the day when we were made to watch words and pictures with no sound because the TV was 'broken' and the caretaker had to be called in to point out to the teacher that this was because the mute switch had been pressed but the teacher and TA couldn't work this out on their own when dealing with such high technology - always gratifying to know I was being taught by search learned, switched on people!). This was the era of ITV Schools on Channel 4, and whilst pretty much everyone who grew up in those days would have duh-dih-dah'd along to the countdown clock, I also found the rotamotion before amazing and loved it when we got there earlier to see more of the animation.

A few years later, I stumbled across a completely accidental recording from TSW in December 1988, featuring the last half of blockbusters, all of the ITN 5:45 news and the first half of TSW Today. I claimed this tape as my 'recording tape' (remember those days??!!) but made absolutely sure this recording was never wiped over - mainly to preserve the animated Central Production endcap from Blockbusters and the TSW ident which by then was no longer around - I still have this tape to this day, still with that now 25 year old recording on it (which still plays perfectly with no dropout either whilst much newer VHS recordings I have haven't faired so well - maybe VHS tapes were so expensive in the 80's for a reason)

I also note (although I didn't really think about it at the time) that when recording anything off TV in the early 90's I took special care to make sure the ident was on the recording, and if I paused the recording for ad breaks this was only done after the break bumper had aired, and I would always get the entire end credits sequence along with any production captions in too.

Whenever we went on holiday to a different ITV region, I'd (again not particularly thinking much of it) make sure I tuned in to ITV whilst I was there to see that station's presentation (although didn't necessarily think about it on those terms at the time) whilst I had the opportunity. Probably the last time I remember doing this before becoming an 'official' pres fan was late 1999 when I went to London for the weekend and tuned in to ITV specifically to see an LWT ident (which I didn't actually see, as what I actually saw was the last Carlton link of the week and so only saw the same old hearts ident which my own station Westcountry by then was airing anyway - I then had to go out for the evening and left early in the morning so didn't get to see any LWT at all).

I also always 'noticed' things about pres (particularly on ITV) - I thought it odd in the mid-90's when all LWT programmes had 2 endcaps on (the LWTP/LWT Programme for ITV era) and I noticed when this changed, I noticed when the Central cake disappeared, when endcaps on ITV stopped having 'for ITV' on them etc etc). I'm an avid fan of Prisoner which C5 repeated in their early days, and I noticed when they shifted from using a 'daytime' to a 'nighttime' ident to introduce it etc etc.

'Officially', I didn't get into TV pres until mid-2000 when I stumbled across sites like TV Ark, MHP, Sub-TV etc. By the end of 2000 I'd built up quite a library of dodgy 45Kbps realplayer clips of various idents and junctions from the resources of the time. These were all filed away in a folder called 'Continuity idents' (SIC!!!) which I still have to this day.

As for what actually caused this interest to happen? Not a frigging clue!

Yes I remember being marched into the Telly room as well to watch How we used to Live, I was hoping our teacher would show us the ident and countdown before the programme but he never did

Certainly it was the ITV regions that got me hooked I got fascinated by the endboards and then the presentation I was lucky to see both Yorkshire and Tyne Tees who both had different ways of presenting. My first visit to the Midlands and I was blown away by Central cake idents in fact I was so sad I used to take my portable with me just so I could view it

Its how i stumbled onto TV Forum really and been hooked ever since.

As to BBC News, well it was certainly around the cream and china red era I got fascinated with BBC World realised how superior it was and I saw this at uni, in those days quality of the stream was pretty awful so I invested in a 13e 80cm satellite system, which then became a dual block at 13/19e to what is today a motorized system of so many channels.

These days the idents arent as fascinating, I find sports presentation more interesting and you get to see some decent broadcast feeds so you get to see the whole thing put together before it goes on air

This programme, without a doubt is at the heart of my interest in television:



It's sad that these days there isn't really a popular show which can act as a springboard for talent, both on screen and behind the camera. It was a vital training ground for many people starting out in the industry in the 90s.

The style of the programme was mimicked across television, and we're not just talking shaky cameras and shouty presenters. For instance, the CITV 1998 break bumpers mentioned a few pages back. Prior to The BB break bumpers were boring, "Back Soon/Welcome Back" affairs, rather than a variety of bumpers with a similar theme.

This Gem

Can't help but smile when I see anything about The Big Breakfast - even click through to the Rick and Sharron clips.

I can remember trying to work out how Carol Vorderman could be on Countdown and How-2 on C4 and CITV at the same time (I think I tried asking her through the speaker on the TV but surprisingly that didn't work).

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/61/Network7.jpg/250px-Network7.jpg

Network 7 on Channel 4, 1987-1988. A friend and I even went down to see an episode filmed during the second series - I was that obsessed with the presentation, design, wonky camera angles, captions and so on.