Sky News New Graphics On-Air

What do ye think the chances are of the skynews website relauching too over the next 24hs? Even if it's just a change in the template.

(Edited by patdublin at 2:28 pm on Sep. 30, 2001)

Well, put it this way, they're not exactly easy on the eye, are they? You can't watch a report without some glaringly blue and red block of text appear on screen. The graphics displayed during a live report are pathetically unprofessional.

As for the sidebars, well, I'm speechless.

Everything else is great - titles, music, studio, presenters (!). The graphics let the side down... badly.

(IMHO)

I like the music, it is quite good, and the use of the logo, although a little excessive, is good too.

One thing I'm missing is a menu at the start of the hour, its been there for a while, and I always liked it, building up to the hour and all that, I think it should be added.

So what exactly was the delay of weeks, for this? surely not!

Probably wanted to make sure they got it right (well they didn't really)

Graphics are too big, astons are overwhelming at times

I actually was thinking that Sky Digitital (or SKY DIGITAL now!) should have an option on the EPG to turn off all the DOGs on the channels, and customise stuff for SKY NEWS, like astons, font size and all that, to suit different televisions, now that would be good!

Later peeps

I've made two changes to the logo from TV Ark, I know these are technically mocks, but they fit in here well enough, let me know what you think.
http://www.caldecote57.freeserve.co.uk/creations/change1.jpg
http://www.caldecote57.freeserve.co.uk/creations/change2.jpg
Both done in five minutes and so are poor quality but they are just ideas so they'll do as they are(just for the record the bottom one was better aligned when I did it in Photodraw)

I'd prefer to see the first one rather than the real one

The sidebars are alright! They connect to the logo and clock in the top left corner and it doesnt take up much space. The only thing that needs to be taken care of are the hidioudly oversized astons and the size of the text on it. Also, the astons need to take up the whole of the bottom of the screen, and not have a little gap at the bottom (a suggestion for this gap is the return of the news ticker).

Colours and arrangement are dreadful.

Sky News have lost their design sense! At any one time, the screen is full of distracting block colour. The size of the graphics need to be reduced, and the colours toned down. What ever happened to transparency graphics?

Blue, red, black, white - find a colour scheme! And as for the logo, well, good night.

I'm sorry - but the graphics are very disappointing for me. I'm off to design my own!!

Those astons would be very swish if as everyone else has said were smaller. The new titles are fab. I must say that the studio looks better now with all the new branding - it seems to gel more. A couple of questions though:

1. Is the Sky News logo on the front of the desk really there? Previously it was a dark blue. Does this mean its superimposed?

2. Where's the link to the Sky website? It's gone. Is this another attempt to get people to use the active service?

But that Live DOG has got to go. IT's awful! I think that we may see a few tweaks in the next few days. Good to see that videowall is put to use. In the first few days I thought it would gather dust. The set has grown on me and today it looks much fresher than it did a week ago.

Ok I think I must be going mad, I see no real media icons just a picture of Kay Burly at the top of the page and all the old material.

Somebody please direct me to the titles!

They're definately there - near the top under the title. I've downloaded them so they are there.

http://www.tvhome.f2s.com/ikonboard/upload/tnews3.JPG
http://www.tvhome.f2s.com/ikonboard/upload/tnews1.JPG
http://www.tvhome.f2s.com/ikonboard/upload/tnews4.JPG
http://www.tvhome.f2s.com/ikonboard/upload/tnews2.JPG

Well, these are screen shots of a powerpoint presentation I created for a fictional news channel.

And I'm not 'blowing my own trumpet', but if you compare these with Sky News' graphic package, I would have said the Sky News package was created by a 16 year old.

But these were!

Picture credits: Sky News; itv-f1.com


(Edited by DAS at 6:05 pm on Sep. 30, 2001)

I'm generally impressed by the whole lot - if only those astons (both the blue and the red ones) were made smaller, or removed. At least they aren't constantly on screen now, in the first couple of hours they were left up throughout reports, and I don't know about anyone else but whenever I see them on screen It always feels like the screen is split up - because it lines up with the DOG.

Music is great IMO, I like it more than the election stuff. But it was a pretty lame effort at relaunching the thing, the old logo is still up on the website, and was up on Sky News Active for hours after the actual on-screen look changed.

I've seen the 'Sky News Flash' a few times now, the second time being when bin Laden was reported to be in hiding for his own safety - ok, I'll say it, they broke it before anyone else - but the aston was um... giant! The breaking news text was pretty shoddily put on too. But on the other hand they did go live to Pakistan, Washington and spoke to their defence chap within about 2 mins of the news breaking, in comparison News 24 did report it a few mins later but Ms Mahwinney just said they'd keep viewers updated, although they did, about 10 mins later, get around to doing some live reports. Perhaps a sign of Sky aiming for the super-fast approach to news? I was amazed by the US networks - sorry I'm going off topic, but it should be said - CNN, Fox and the like didn't report this until 50 mins after Sky and the Beeb.