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Loving the BBC Three Idents

27/09/07

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They are seen more often than advertisements and yet most simply wash over the audience without causing any kind of a reaction. Television idents, the brief clips shown between programs on any given channel, provide visual candy whilst an over-friendly voice-over announces the next and upcoming shows.

Most idents (at least here in the UK) are dull, lifeless and uninspired, merely acting as filler and barely performing a more adequate task than a blank screen. A select few, however, can be surprisingly brilliant.

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Channel 4 generally sports above-par idents, but for me the grand-daddy of them all can be found on BBC Three.

Produced by the iconic Lambie Nairn design agency, the current set of BBC Three idents feature a cast of blob-like characters called, funily enough, The Blobs, who babble nonsensically, sing, yodel and dance.

My favourite BBC Three ident to date features the yodelling blob, with two dancing blobs in the background, interrupted by a cow. Watch the blob to the right. The supposedly masturbating blob is a close second. Brilliant. More BBC Three idents can be found on YouTube.

The blobs themselves were crafted by Aardman Animations of Wallace and Gromit fame, hence sharing that unique Aardman look. In a stroke of genius, rather than writing and recording new sound clips, Lambie Nairn raided the BBC sound archives to provide voices for the blobs. The result is something that could never have been achieved with new material.

Rather ironically, the entertainment value of the BBC Three idents far surpasses that of most regular programming on the channel, which mainly consists of repeats and comedies barely deserving of the title. Idents better than the shows they introduce? There's a turn-up for the books.

Any other television idents out there worthy of recognition?

Comments are closed for this journal entry.

Steve Tucker

28 September, 2007

Ha! Brilliant! Makes me wanna watch more TV. Last two are the best in my opinion :)

Simon

4 October, 2007

The idents – better than ‘Spendaholics Saved My Life’ on BBC Three? Never!!! Well… maybe, but it’s a guilty pleasure!

They’re great idents, always hoping they’ll add more and more – but still blown away by the Channel 4 stings, they’re wonderfully done. It’s also worth checking out the E4 ‘estings’, they’re a mixed bag, but I usually find them entertaining me between episodes of Scrubs.

The idents that I’m tempted to write a stiff letter to the Daily Mail (under the pseudonym ‘Angry from Breaston’) about, are the terrible BBC radio identities. In an effort to bring the stations closer together (why?), they’ve made a nasty ‘one-size-fits-all’ type-in-a-circle, that kills the old ‘Five Live’ and Radio 1 logos off. It’s grim. I can’t understand how an organisation that can create brilliance (the BBC Three idents) got away with this. Ouch.

Now… where’s the Basildon Bond got to?

kitsimons

5 October, 2007

The Channel 4 idents are great. E4 sports nice off-beat idents as well. Never heard the BBC radio idents though – shows how much I listen, eh.

Kitsimons...

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...is the online home of Simon Kitson, a web designer with a healthy enthusiasm for standards-compliant, accessible design and a penchant for blogging about nothing in particular.

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