i'm just wondering if anybody could tell me whether these were created in-house (by anglia or meridian) or whether a design agency was used (and if so does anybody know which one?).
There were many stings used based on this theme, both anglia and meridian had the exact same trailers except they were just edited to include the correct stations name.
many of the trails were voiced by ali ballantyne and i believe, nick jackson, although they never did any continuity.
i'm just wondering if anybody could tell me whether these were created in-house (by anglia or meridian) or whether a design agency was used (and if so does anybody know which one?).
There were many stings used based on this theme, both anglia and meridian had the exact same trailers except they were just edited to include the correct stations name.
many of the trails were voiced by ali ballantyne and i believe, nick jackson, although they never did any continuity.
That's because Anglia, Meridian, and HTV pres/playout was all done at Meridian Southampton during the late 90s.
That's because Anglia, Meridian, and HTV pres/playout was all done at Meridian Southampton during the late 90s.
Only HTV West pres came from Southampton, HTV Wales stayed in Cardiff, they also housed playout for Westcountry, but their announcers were based in Plymouth.
Around 1997 you always saw the same generic UNM endboards, with the UN logo thing and the company's logo underneath, so obviously Meridian, Anglia or HTV. When Channel 5 started UNM were one of the biggest shareholders, so their stations got a boost in terms of Production, so Meridian and Anglia made alot for Channel 5 in the early days, alas it wasn't to last. When Granada bought UNM's stations in 2000 they wanted out of Channel 5's productions.
One thing I must ask is what was Westcountry's pres etc like before it became Carlton in September 1999. As from when Carlton bought Central both stations had similar pres and idents, and then at one point the same idents, how did Westcountry go on? Were their trailers same as Carlton's? Obviously their Idents were still their own, with big W, but www.carlton.com was added for sometime IIRC.
One thing I must ask is what was Westcountry's pres etc like before it became Carlton in September 1999. As from when Carlton bought Central both stations had similar pres and idents, and then at one point the same idents, how did Westcountry go on? Were their trailers same as Carlton's? Obviously their Idents were still their own, with big W, but www.carlton.com was added for sometime IIRC.
Carlton's presence certainly wasn't felt very much on Westcountry for a long time.
Firstly, Westcountry was still credited with producing it's own material - everything was still 'A Westcountry Production' and copyrighted to 'Westcountry Television Limited' right up to the last day wheras all Central's network output (not that Westcountry had any in fairness) was then produced under the 'Carlton UK Productions' brand and AIUI even regional output was coprighted to Carlton Television and credited as a 'Central Programme' rather than a 'production'.
With the idents, Westcountry's own set not only remained, but was still added to - during 1997, 1998 and even into 1999. The idea was even developed to include an opening animation whilst Carlton owned them. The final 5 (introduced around April 1999) were even produced in widescreen and transmitted as such on DTT, which I think makes Westcountry the first ITV station to have widescreen idents. The www.carlton.com URL was only added to the idents for the final couple of months before the rebrand; although Carlton had owned Westcountry for 2 1/2 years by this point this was the first time their name appeared anywhere on the station.
With trailers though, things got a bit more weird. Westcountry continued to produce trailers in house right up until the NPU generic trailers were introduced in mid-1998, but after autumn 1997 they were not branded with their own name - instead they used the generic ITV brand (even the 'blue bar' DOG was retained for trailers but with the old ITV logo rather than the 'W' logo).
Then of course came the big rebrand in September 1999. Iniitially it was only going to be applied to Central (which would be why Central got Carlton-esque idents in 1998 but Westcountry didn't) - Westcountry edits of the spinning blue hearts were produced and ready to go. Given that a few widescreen versions of the old idents were made, it may have been that Westcountry were going to be allowed to keep their own branding for regional output and only have to use the hearts idents for network programming - were they not rebranded the 'big W' design might have lasted (in commuted form at least) until 2002.
Ah well, now that Westcountry is about to complete it's 15th year, and won't get to finish it's 16th, perhaps it's time to kick back with a youtube clip:
Hard to believe that, at the time, this was considered to be the big bad cold face of 'modern' ITV - slick promotion packages and no IVC rather than Ian and Ruth flicking through the TV Times on the sofa. In retospect, Westcountry's debut looks so warm and friendly now!
EDIT: Found this one as well. For a small station, this news package is quite slick and professional (do consider that it's 11 years old!) - IMO putting to shame what a lot of bigger stations were doing at the same time. And they still quoted (01752) 333333 onscreen as their newsroom phone number until last year when they were finally forced to fall into line and quote a non-geographic number like everyone else.