T1 - Target Audience Research

As I have chosen to create an ident for 4Music, I need to work out the target audience for this channel. To get this information I have set up a survey for people to answer, I will also hold a focus group asking similar questions. This will help me to get  more qualitative response compared to the survey.

Click here to take survey

The responses from the survey

Q1 - Do you enjoy watching music video channels such as VIVA, 4Music and MTV?
      - Yes  6
      - No   1




Q2 - How many hours a week do you spend watching these channels?
      - >2   3
      - 2-4  2
      - 4-6  1
      - 6+   1

Q3 - What genres of music do you enjoy listening to?
      - Pop
      - Rock
      - Rock
      - Everything...except Rock
      - Indie, Pop
      - Rap
      - Alternative Rock

Q4 - What kind of setting would you like to see in an Ident?
      - Urban       5
      - Rural        1
      - Coastal     0
      - Industrial  1



Q5 - What is your favourite season?
      - Winter     4
      - Spring     0
      - Summer  2
      - Autumn  1







This shows that the majority of people who watch music video channels spend less than 4 hours doing so, and enjoy more rock music than other, "up to date" music thgat would be expected to be seen on music video channels. I also learned that my target audience would like to a wintery urban ident. 

T4 - Understanding the design of idents

This ident shows a plug winding around 2/3 rings and plugging into the 4Music logo, lighting it up. Each of the rings shows a different area of christmas, the green ring shows the traditional christmas tree, the blue shows pine cones and the yellow shows presents. The design of the ident tells us when it should be shown, the dark background suggests that this would be an evening ident with the logo being like a christmas tree and lit up at night. This ident lasts 13 seconds and is quite fast paced as a result. And it appeals to audiences with the use of bright colours and christmas theme, a holiday celebrated globally. Its most definitely entertainment as most people know what channel they are watching and tells you the channel at the end of the ident. It gives me the impression that they will be celebrating christmas in the form of music.



In this christmas ident, we see people doing generic things that are done at christmas time, such as wrapping presents, writing cards and drinking and eating mince pies. There isn't a whole lot of information included to tell us about the channel other than that they will be playing christmas songs over winter. The ident lasts 28 seconds which should be long enough for the majority of program information. The onscreen tempo mixed but mainly very fast, with shots changing within a few seconds of each other. It appeals to the viewer by offering a happy and cheerful place to listen to christmas during christmas time, and is entirely entertainment led using the image of a modern christmas to appeal to a mass audience. This gives me the impression that the channel, like most channels, celebrate christmas.



This ident for MTV Hits features different blobs moving in tune with the music, mimicking various dance moves. The ident doesn't reveal the channel name until the very end, with each lasting around 10-15 seconds. The onscreen tempo for each ident changes but is generally fast paced and uses this to distinguish between genres and channels with the use of different styles, for example, in one ident club music is used whereas in another soul is used to appeal to a different audience. These idents are more entertainment based but don't miss out on the opportunity to advertise the channel. These idents give me the impression that this channel will play a mixture of popular music.



This ident for 4Music shows two people dancing around a petrol station and the design tells us the channel through the distinctive pink and white colour scheme. It lasts about 30 seconds of fast paced dance and music to appeal to a younger audience. It does this as well by using a particular type of music and dance. And again this ident is mainly entertainment led but still tells the viewer where they are. I get the impression that this channel would show a lot of current and mainstream music.



This suite of idents show several parties through the viewpoint of a snowglobe which then gets shaken up. The design tells us what time of year it its and that MTV will be showing christmas-ee stuff. Each ident lasts around 15 seconds and have a speedy tempo. It uses different types of parties to appeal to a different viewer base; the first uses a rocker party, the second uses a generic party to advertise MTV Hits, and the third uses a club to appeal to that audience. The idents are mostly information based to show which MTV channel the viewer is on through the use of music and having the channel name onscreen for the majority of the ident. It gives me the impression these channels play a variety of music between them.

Summary

A common theme throughout the idents is the use of movement, and how the music in the background fits the visuals and can be manipulated such as in the MTV snowglobes idents. Common key conventions used are bright colours, animation/animation-like movements and a sense of humour. Elements I need to include in my ident are humour and manipulation of the diegetic world (either with time or animation).

Suite analysis



These idents are part of the Snowglobe suite used by MTV over christmas 2009. The others fit in with the rest of the suite by showing the view of a club/party through a snowglobe that gets shaken up. It is different from the rest in the suite by the setting and the channel it was used for as well as the audience it is trying to appeal to. I would expect the ident to be shown at all times, maybe more likely to be seen at night or in the evening. And to appear next to a program about music or after/before a song.

T3 - Understanding the design of a suite of television idents

What is a suite of idents?

A Suite of idents are a collection of several idents that are all linked by some theme. This provides a variety of idents to choose from and makes it more interstin for the audience to watch. As well as maintain the channels theme or create a new brand identity in the case of a new channel.



Time and place

Having this variety of idents to choose from ensures the right type of ident appears next to the right program content, for example, a positive ident wouldn't be appropriate next to something such as "The Godfather". It is also useful to have different idents for different times of the day.





Re-branding a channel

New ident suites can help to rebrand a channel and change the image affiliated with this channel. This has happened recently with more4, who have changed from a mature channel with documentaries  to a more open ended channel.




 These 3 idents are part of the same suite for BBC1, and all use the theme of circles. They don't really appeal to a specific audience, unless its appealing to circle enthusiasts. They aren't aimed at a specific time of day but may be used before certain programmes, such as the hippo ident would be used before a documentary,  and the footballers before a sporty program. They're intended to be used throughout the year, and convey no particular message about the channel.

The 3 idents used the theme of circles in different ways, the 2 lower ones use live action, whereas the hippos are likely more CGI than entirely live action.

T2 - Understanding the limitations of the television ident

Typography

Typography is the art of type/text. And includes things such as the font and  the colour used for on-screen text. This can be limiting for idents as they may be restricted to using a certain font, but on the other hand it can be positive to have this limitation when designing idents as it creates a brand identity with the logo, so that its easily recognisable when seen. This can be seen with companies like the BBC and ITV, the only channels not using the standardised font are those with a specific target audience and programming e.g. kids channels like CITV and CBeebies, or BBC3 which appeals to more comedy and wouldn't fit the normal font.

Colour

Different channels use different colours to create a brand identity with their channel, for example, E4 use purple in their idents, and channel 5 use a lot of bright, luminescent colours. This can be limiting to the creator as they have to stick with specific colours.

Aspect ratio

The aspect ratio of idents must be 16:9 as to fit on the screen of most modern televisions, which present the image in this widescreen format. This doesn't really cause much of a limitation as it is just the size of a screen and is seen as standard.

Adhering to a desired tone
A channel ultimately wants to appeal to a specific audience, and can aid this with the use of idents, by identifying certain aspects of a channel, such as comedy central or BBC3. While avoiding others such as extreme acts of violence on a kids channel.



Duration

Most idents are over the 30 seconds we usually see, some are over a few minutes long to fill time if needed. As can be seen from the BBCs football ident.

T1 - Understanding the purpose of television idents and the opportunities they present

Identifying the Channel

The first Ident was seen on the BBC in 1953 with the development of more than one channel,
audiences needed to know what channel they were on. The BBC ident was nicknamed "Bat's Wings" due to its look. Over time the idents have improved with newer technologies and the circular format for the BBC indent was introduced in 1962, showing a map of Britain split into the regions they broadcast in, inside a circle. After this the famous "Globe" ident was introduced in 1963.






Organising the Schedule

Idents can be used to organise a channel's program schedule by informing the audience what is on the channel at what time and to potentially entice the viewer to stay and continue watching instead of changing channels, for example with this ident from BBC Parliament.



Segmentation of the scheduling

Non commercial channels such as the BBC do not have time to show ads programs and use indents for a multitude of reasons;
      -To provide information about the channel/programmes
      -To promote other programmes on the channel
      -To regulate the channels schedule/fill time between programmes
      -To provide a break for studio workers such as on news or sport programmes

Creating the right tone and appealing to the target audience

Indents can be used to advertise what sort of channel it is, which is vitally important for a channel to have, appealing to the right target audience. This was done well by BBC4, initially, to show off a more factual and intellectual channel


Creating a brand and encouraging brand loyalty

Building a 'brand' for a channel is vitally important to its success, idents help to endorse a channel logo or name so the audience recognise it instantly, like the E4 ident is easily recognisable from its almost surreal setting. And encourages loyalty to the channel.


Creating corporate identity

Channels are no longer limited to one country, and as a result idents have become increasingly helpful to create channel brands in other countries. These create a corporate identity that can be sold worldwide and diluted to be used across multiple platforms, e.g. Online, TV, etc. providing a constant theme across platforms.

Packaging and Re-packaging a series of programmes or event

Idents have been used to identify that a particular program belongs to that channel, for instance 'Dave' has an ident for Storage Hunters. This was also done by BBC3 when they had coverage of the olympics.