Design- Screen Tempo

Screen tempo must be taken into account amid the production of a TV Ident because of the notifications needed for the audience members, since if a TV Ident is too quick and the shots within the ident are cut too soon the intended audience will find it hard to identify the channel they are watching. The absence of symbol or logo identification of the TV programme will result in the channel not gaining any self-identification which could affect the channel in several ways. Thus, timing plays a major role in idents to uphold their output message towards the audience.

A case of this is when BBC released a fast pace edited ident where playing football forming a circle as they did it, the purpose of this ident was because the England football team playing was coming up next on the channel. Thus, the viewers watching it will be more hyped up as to what they are about to see and prepares them mentally and boosts up their morale. With the advancement in technology has allowed them to add more elements, for instance the loop they use when they kick the ball towards the middle of the circle but it spirals and goes back to each player. Not only it looks advanced and professional, the tempo fits perfectly. 

Another concept where the tempo will be drastically different to this is if ITV was about to show the hit drama ‘Downton Abbey’. The ident will be slow in order to make it look dramatic and because the show itself is quite slow paced. 

Ident designers know that idents aren’t able to show more than one topic of footage within each ident, since it could be unclear to the audience members as to what to expect next in the scheduled TV programme. It relates to the duration for idents as they should come up to 15 seconds giving ident designers a reason to stick to one topic of footage instead of attempting to apply multiple to one ident. They ensure to create idents that will inform the audience as to what channel they are on, but channels such as BBC One usually shows idents which identifies their channel and not necessarily what TV programme would be coming up next. They use continuity announcer who informs them with the upcoming programmes, speaking to the viewers directly rather than pitching it to them via idents.

BBC 3- The screen tempo in this ident varies from fast to slow and they have used fast moving shards of shapes, bright funky colours and layout to mirror the TV programmes they show on their channel.

BBC 2- In this ident it shows a 2D number 2 with splattered turquoise powder/paint with a high frame rate making the number 2 as well as the paint appear as if it’s flying in the air in slow motion, this could indicate also reflect the programmes they show, for instance informing the audience that a cooking program is cueing up next.