ITV Discussion Thread

More to the point, how many companies try to use the generic term for what is still a group of companies, and paste it everywhere trying to promote the name as a brand.

ITV is not a brand. It is the product of creative bankruptcy. The only way the second terrestrial network can get out of this morass is to rename themselves completely.

That was the beauty of regional identity, and perhaps a key element of its strength back in the day. You didn't have to have "Granada Television" or "Yorkshire Television" next to the symbols in order to know what it was. The trouble with ITV is that it completely rebrands its entire image every few years or so - the only continuity throughout corporate rebrands is the three letters.

But then again... isn't that enough? So long as it reads "itv" on screen, lowercase or not, isn't that enough of a recognisable "symbol" for viewers?

I have the slight feeling you won't accept any branding that ITV come up as you are still getting over the dropping of the regions 10 years on (or 13 years on if we are talking proper regional idents, even longer if we are talking about 'proper' Tyne Tees presentation)

I think all British television idents - for all channels, with the possible exception of Channel 4 and BBC1's swimming hippos - have lapsed into such blandness that it's time to do something radical.
ITV1's "something vaguely yellow happens" theme is entirely unmemorable. At least the celebrity idents of 10 years ago had something recognisably interesting to look at.
Just to be different, I'd introduce invision continuity (a nod to past ITV) and make stars out of the announcers (they could be on All-Star Family Fortunes etc and, with luck, develop cocaine habits worth featuring on the front page of The Sun).
Get people noticing ITV again.
Make ITV different from all the me-too names-made-from-initials-in some-arty-farty film-sequence format that almost every channel now uses as an ident.
Idents are made these days BY professionals who make idents FOR professionals who make idents - not for viewers or to establish a good logo that's universally recognisable.
A spinning globe, a model of a knight on a turntable, a London skyline, or a big, colourful number 4, would not be subtle enough for the graphic design industry.
What they give us instead is subtlety on top of suggestion on a layer of hint, something that's mean to suggest something about "brand" and "values", rather than a bold, universally understood image.
The accompanying music is also appropriately wishy-washy.
What we've ended up with is graphic design masturbation rather than something that actually sticks in the mind of the viewer.
Almost every modern British ident is forgettable.
The result is a diminution of the very brand values these graphic designers are supposed, so hard, to be protecting and nurturing.
They then end up having to redesign the brand/ident etc all over again in a few years' time, having lost any of the punch that an old-fashioned says-what-it-is ident from the 50s to the mid 90s had.

The problem with the current ITV idents is yes the music, and also the rather lazy attempt of applying the logo on them, back when they launched in 2006, the rowing boat did have a nice form up, but now the logo appears [itv] then 1 then [] on most of them.

Bring back Lanterns!

True - just look at the 1995-1999 Granada ident and the 1999-2002 local Yorkshire one. Both didn't have a name on them, just the logo. Grampian's 1998-2000 ident was similar. Tyne tees did the same thing with their 2000-2002 local ident, even though it was a new logo!

The joy of both the Granada and Yorkshire TV logos was that they appeared at every programme juncture, in some form or another, from 1968 onwards. They were clear, distinct images. They were a distortion of each company's initial letter. Above all they were familiar because they'd been around for so long.
Indeed, they were familiar enough by the late nineties to stand without the explanation of what they were for local continuity. So there was no need for text as well as the logo.
These days there are no abstract images/logos for television channels, just text spelt out.
That blandness is the principal reason why anyone who's not very interested in idents couldn't tell you what ITV1's ident is. And that is a failure of graphic design because it's not making enough of a connection with the average viewer.

BIB: being somewhat pedantic... YTV had been using various text-less idents featuring just a rotating chevron (mainly for regional continuity) since the early '80s.

In any case I agree with you completely - and I think it's often misunderstood that in order to be memorable, you've got to be badly or crassly designed. This isn't the case, as looking through ident history will tell you. The 1982 C4 ident was memorable because of the animation and the bright colours, not because it looked a mess. The YTV chevron was, as you rightly point out, a distinctive interpretation of the first letter of the company name. This is where the "2012" talk about ITV's new logo bothers me. The London 2012 logo was certainly distinctive, but in all honestly looks rather pathetic and unprofessional.

While we're talking about distinctive logos and brands, does anyone remember the Granada Sky Broadcasting channels from the mid-1990s? All the channels initially used different versions of the same logo - it was a "G" encased within the Sky '90s "circle". For me it created a Rubin-style situation because the white-colour part of the logo also strangely looked like a hook. Here's an image to demonstrate:

http://hub.tv-ark.org.uk/images/otherchannels/goodlife_images/gsb_goodlife_shutdown97.jpg
(from The TV Ark)

Well, if you want an example, Stagecoach. Here in Fife, the buses read Stagecoach in Fife, Rennies, then over the tay it's Stagecoach Strathtay, stagecoach in perth.

The buses carry the same livery (except Rennies), and have the same fleetname, just a different area name. But, in essence, they're all separate companies, with local management. The legal lettering on the bus (the small lettering near the entrance door) is the clue to who actually runs it. In Fife, it's Fife Scottish Omnibuses. In Chorley, it's Ribble Motor Services.

I agree this could be a great idea if implemented properly. They could even make cost savings by merging Weather and Continuity.

It very definitely is, under what bizarre logic do you think it's not?

Just like Stagecoach nationally save for London.

National Express UK Bus have the same livery on National Express Dundee, National Express Coventry, National Express West Midlands and NX Hotel Hoppa! Same idea!

See, public transport can do it!