The 'heart' idents from 1999 - 2002 are some of my favourites, beautiful animations I always thought, and I actually emailed Lambie-nairn once asking how the idents were made but they never replied!
Hello Adam, is the book called 'Brand identity for Television with knobs on?' If so I have that one, in fact it was given to me on my 18th birthday back in 2004 by Martin Lambie-nairn himself, my parents wrote to him and he sent it me through the post. I still keep it in the envelope it came in so that it won't get damaged, one of the best birthday presents I ever had. Lambie-nairn made some great idents, don't know if you know this but he sadly passed away about a year ago and if you ask me TV idents will never be the same again.
Ah Carlton. Pure nostalgia and great memories here - especially the MLN branding from the mid 90s (that psychedelic one being just before Videotech, if anyone remembers!) "Ident cleverly crafted using tech is infinitely better to me" absolutely spot on, I agree completely - the mid 90s missing the mark but getting it right by 1996 with Lambie-Nairn. All time faves are the ones from 1999 with the hearts and with so many delightful variants too. Carlton, despite it being around for a decade, really made a great impression and mark on TV identity. Great vid Adam 🙌
Question : How can you bid £43 million a year for the London Weekday franchise? Answer: When you make no programmes and depend on the company who used to run the franchise to keep making them. THIS IS CARLTON!
That is not exactly true. Thames Television continued to make programmes for the ITV network and not just for Carlton. Carlton were buying in programmes for many independent production companies.
@@johnking5174 John come off it. If Thames had not become an independent producer they had nothing to put on screen. And to be honest the independents weren't that great in 1983 and their products showed. What Carlton did put on in 1983 was dire. That Chris Tarrant game show, Brighton Belles. That one was so bad they didn't even complete the series run
@@robertcomer2767 Robert, where did I say anything different about this. Thames Television was always going to become an independent producer. Their MD said this was always the alternative plan if they lost their franchise. Thames Television also was so much bigger than just providing TV programmes to the ITV network. They had a huge archive distribution arm, which sold their archive to TV channels across the globe. RTE in Ireland, PBS in America, ABC in Australia, TVNZ in New Zealand, NRK Norway and CBC in Canada were big buyers of Thames programming. RTE in Ireland littered their two channels RTE 1 and 2 with many Thames shows from around 1975 onward.
@@robertcomer2767 Also, Thames Television had a subsidiary film company Eustom Films, which not only produced a lot of TV shows such as The Sweeney, Minder, Van der Valk, Danger UXB and Reilly, Ace of Spies, it also produced movies. Thames of course used this arm to make a fortune in profit, especially after 1993.
After adoring Thames (as commented on your previous review) and LWT, I remember to this day my heart sinking with Cartlon. Their idents seem to reflect their overall output and appeal - always feeling extremely "cheap and cheerful" (but not in the good sense) and not particularly in touch with their audience. The "various people" idents, whilst I get the intent, always felt so uninviting and somehow amateur - Cartlon was never one for much refinement; in some ways despite the warm colours they always seemed to have quite a 'cold' on-screen presence. Although both they and their idents did mildly improve in their later life, but were never one of the greats. The 1990s were a major time of change for TV in various ways, and to this day I associate Cartlon with the aspects of this I never took to. I was always trying to convince my dad to realign our main TV aerial so we could receive the adjoining Meridian region properly instead! Looking forward to a review of LWT. 🙂
I really do enjoy the ident review videos you do Adam. I liked this one about Carlton. It's weird because when I saw the star carlton logo, I kinda felt reminiscent even though I was born in 96! I dare say that you're well aware but, BBC One (and I believe Four. Not sure about Two.) have updated their idents.
Thanks Hannah! Glad you're enjoying the series! Yes I've seen that BBC1 have updated their idents! I'm sure an episode on them will arrive sometime soon!
I don’t know what’s happened to itv ,London we had Thames and LWT making great shows after 93 to me itv started to loose it’s prestige ,on a sad note the south bank Tv centre once a proud symbol of LWT is to be demolished ,just like the ATV centre and Thames Euston road itv don’t seem to have a base anymore I miss the regions but maybe I’m showing all of my 54 years ,great we have these channels to remind us ,cheers 👍🏻😊
Great video. Carlton was a silly name for a channel. I remember missing Thames a lot especially as every programme on Carlton at the start of its tenure seemed to involve Tony Slattery! Maybe they thought that not naming the channel after the region, we’d refer to London as CarltonLand (as happened for Granada)
All I can remember Slattery wise was Just A Gigolo but that was made by Central. I don't believe Carlton were that bothered about London specifically. Carlton just hoped they would end up majority owner of the network. At which point the entire network would've been rebranded Carlton. As for the name Granada. Granada is a stupid name imposed by an American.
As a Londoner it did take time for an 8/9 year old me to get used to Carlton over Thames. In 1994, they dropped the 'Television for London' part and just featured shorter idents featuring various people of different occupations around London like the first batch. The 1995 Carlton logo was also seen on certain video releases before it's own logo was used in 1996, before the use of the stars logo. The stars logo would also be seen in Central and Westcountry when Carlton took over of those areas in 1999. They also took over HTV who used the heart intros, before flashing into a more generic ITV hearts background with the HTV logo, this was used from 1999 also. A star variant was also used in cinemas in the rather intimidating Carlton Screen Advertising logo where a huge star appeared as a branding iron. I think this was still seen a little while after ITV eliminated all region identity in 2002, but I could be wrong there with that ident (as well as Carlton Video) seemingly disappearing around that time. The idents themselves shown here are only a handful of various idents that Carlton used throughout the years as well.
@@rajnirvan3336 It was sad to see them go, but it's just one of those things. Getting involved in the conflict between the UK Government and the IRA certainly didn't help. :(
First comment, Carlton a behemoth that eventually helped end the wonderful period of time in which ITV was solely independent. Not a fan of Carlton but a great video
In fairness (I hate to be fair to them, mind!), Carlton weren't responsible for the destruction of ITV; that was entirely down to Thatcher's Broadcasting Act and the toothless regulator, it created in the form of the ITC. Regulators since then - ie. Ofcom - have had the opportunity to correct some of the damage done by the amalgamation, but have "bottled it" and just renewed ITV plc's franchises, instead. As they're due to look again, next year, maybe they'll grow a pair, this time..? I'm not holding my breath!
When I think of Carlton TV, I associate it with awful "shiny floor" shows like "Barrymore". BTW, there's nothing "delightful" about "Watership Down". It's bloody terrifying!
Carlton hardly made anything themselves (certainly far far less than Thames had done anyway), as they functioned more as a 'publisher broadcaster' rather than a programme maker. Barrymore, and many other 'shiny floor' shows, were actually made by Carlton's rivals, London Weekend Television (LWT), who had the London weekend franchise (Friday tea time until closedown in the early hours of Monday). LWT made so much of the networked output at weekends that when I was a small child I genuinely thought that LWT were my region's weekend franchisee too (we had Central on our main aerial, but could also get a ghostly HTV signal on the other aerial that fed the tv in the bedroom).
@@MrDannyDetail In my region, LWT was our weekend franchise, with Thames at weekdays. I was very young when Thames ended, as I was only 7 in 1992. But I remember Thames branding very well. I grew up watching Rainbow, produced by Thames and was a great young kids show. LWT was always brilliant. As my dad said, when you saw the first LWT ident we knew the weekend had started. LWT used to kick off at 7pm Fridays, however come Jan 1982, LWT moved their start time to 5.15pm Fridays, as they complained to the IBA that Thames Television were putting on programmes at 6.30pm to ensure viewers would not be leading into LWT. They loved to put on Thames Sport on a Friday at 6.30pm, viewers hated it on a Friday. Sometimes they had adult educational series about depression, suicide, divorce etc, all designed to force viewers to watch BBC One instead. LWT and the IBA finally agreed that Thames were playing dirty, and so come the new franchise period of 1982, Thames lost one hour and 45 minutes on a Friday (and rightly so).
@@johnking5174 That's interesting. In fact I was interested enough in what Thames were showing just before the switch to LWT on a Friday evening that I researched all 700 Fridays from the era of the 7pm handover. It's true that for just over the last two years they were usually showing Thames Sport in the 18:30-19:00 slot, but it looked to me like a fair few of the other regions were also showing either a dedicated local sport programme, or the second half of an extended local news that also feature sport later in the programme, so I'm not sure how much Thames were actually playing dirty. The 6pm-630/635 slot was often a local current affairs show called Today (and later on 'Thames at 6'), so that may be what you were thinking of in terms of the adult education series, but again it is actually a local programme being broadcast within the 6pm-7pm timeframe which appears to have been set aside for local variations, before most or all of the network came together for the primetime shows, so again I'm not sure how dirty Thames' scheduling can actually be considered to be. All shows listed were in the 1830-1900 slot, unless otherwise stated: 02/08/1968 University Challenge 09/08/1968 University Challenge [Broadcast nationally by ITV Emergency Service due to an ITV technicians strike] 16/08/1968 University Challenge [18:35-19:05, Broadcast nationally by ITV Emergency Service due to an ITV technicians strike] 23/08/1968-27/12/1969 University Challenge 03/01/1969-14/11/1969 Peyton Place 21/11/1969 Royal Family [17:55-19:00, continuation from part one shown 16:50-17:45, with a 10 minute ITN News bulletin in between] 28/11/1969-19/12/1969 Peyton Place 26/12/1969 Nearest and Dearest Special: The Ghost of Picklers Past [18:10-19:00] 02/01/1970-05/06/1970 Peyton Place 12/06/1970 On The Margin: Today Election Special 19/06/1970-18/12/1970 Peyton Place 25/12/1970 All Star Comedy Carnival [18:00-20:30] 01/01/1971-29/01/1971 Peyton Place 05/02/1971 Apollo 14: The first moonwalk 12/02/1971-26/03/1971 Peyton Place 02/04/1971 Mad Movies 09/04/1971 Today… Is Good Friday [18:25-19:00] 16/04/1971-23/04/1971 Today [17:55-19:00] 30/04/1971-02/07/1971 Today[18:00-19:00] 09/07/1971-27/08/1971 Riptide [18:00-19:00] 03/09/1971 My Brother David 10/09/1971-01/10/1971 I Dream of Jeannie 08/10/1971-24/12/1971 The New Dick Van Dyke Show 31/12/1971- Riptide [18:00-19:00] 07/01/1972-25/02/1972 F Troop 03/03/1972-31/03/1972 Bewitched 07/04/1972-12/05/1972 F Troop 19/05/1972-04/08/1972 The New Dick Van Dyke Show 11/08/1972-08/09/1972 Arnie 15/09/1972 Crossroads 22/09/1972-22/12/1972 Crossroads [18:35-19:00, preceded by Today 18:00-18:35] 29/12/1972 We Was All One [18:00-19:00] 05/01/1973-13/04/1973 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 20/04/1973 Crossroads 27/04/1973-14/09/1973 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 21/09/1973 Today [18:15-19:00] 28/09/1973-21/12/1973 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 28/12/1973 Sunday and Monday in Silence [18:00-19:00] 04/01/1974-05/04/1974 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 12/04/1974 Crossroads 19/04/1974-30/05/1975 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 06/06/1975 Crossroads [18:30-18:55], Europe - The Nation Decides [18:55-19:00] 13/06/1975-15/08/1975 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 22/08/1975-29/08/1975 London - The Making of a City [18:00-19:00] 05/09/1975-19/12/1975 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 26/12/1975 Crossroads 02/01/1976-26/05/1978 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 02/06/1978 World Cup ’78: France v Italy [17:30-19:45] 09/06/1978-01/09/1978 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 08/09/1978-22/12/1978 Emmerdale Farm 29/12/1978-05/01/1979 Father, Dear Father 12/01/1979-06/07/1979 Emmerdale Farm 13/07/1979-03/08/1979 Get Some In! 10/08/1979-19/10/1979 ITV ON STRIKE 26/10/1979 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 02/11/1979-14/12/1979 Thames Sport 21/12/1979 Crossroads [18:35-19:00] 28/12/1979-28/03/1980 Thames Sport 04/04/1980 Easter Star Games [18:00-19:00] 11/04/1980-09/05/1980 Thames Sport 16/05/1980-18/07/1980 Looks Familiar 25/07/1980 Olympics ’80 [18:00-19:00] 01/08/1980 Thames News 08/08/1980 Looks Familiar 15/08/1980-26/09/1980 Thames Sport 03/10/1980 Telethon Final [18:10-19:00] 10/10/1980-19/12/1980 Thames Sport 26/12/1980 Survival Special: Penguin Christmas [18:00-19:00] 02/01/1981-10/04/1981 Thames Sport 17/04/1981 Siegfried and Roy [18:00-19:00] 24/04/1981-05/06/1981 Thames Sport 12/06/1981 Prince Charles at the Sunshine Lunch 19/06/1981-18/12/1981 Thames Sport 25/12/1981 Film: The Muppet Movie (1979) [17:50-19:40]
I’m sure the announcer in that Watership Down clip was the BBC’s David Allan - not to be confused with Dave Allen - he’s done announcing on the BBC and has even presented country music on Radio 2!
The 1996 (and indeed 1995) batch were designed by Central graphics in Nottingham rather than Lambie-Nairn (who had designed the original 1993 set and the 1999 hearts). Carlton as a company I had more time for than Granada, against most peoples' feelings who follow these things. I've had to explain this many times - it's because Carlton invested more in the ITV operations they acquired than Granada did - Granada may have kept a few more 'legacy' brand names, but nothing behind them in terms of staff or budgets for local or network productions. These became more and more token as time went on. Whereas Carlton, even though they removed the Central and Westcountry brandnames, still kept regional production going, especially at Central and indeed really turned Central into the Carlton production base - they enjoyed having control of a decent studio and set of crews that came with the Nottingham complex and indeed did a reverse of what ATV were chastised for in the 1970s. Then, ATV were accused of making too much network programming in Elstree and not enough in the Midlands (i.e. Birmingham), and the Central structure was meant to redress that balance. Carlton, in a complete reversal of this, were the London weekday contractor but concentrated more on productions made in Nottingham through "Carlton UK Productions" and as "Central Presentations". Plus they had been shareholders in Central for quite some time. So really they ought to have been a Midlands franchisee but got to take the London advertising income. But in London they were already put on the backfoot by using facilities shared with a Granada-owned company, LWT - the latter of which being the founders of the Network Promotions Unit (NPU) which is what became the unified ITV/ITV1 presentation team which rendered all regional presentation redundant. The other good thing about Carlton was them acquiring the ATV/ITC programme libraries from Polygram and saving them from further neglect and therefore getting them back into ITV ownership long-term and given proper preservation attention (with help from the BFI of course). Ident-wise it may have been worth mentioning the CENTRAL idents that were made in 'CARLTON-style' in '96-7.
Central Presentations; who were, incidentally, also responsible for the early Meridian idents (Central had a 20% stake in Meridian Broadcasting). As I understand it, the reason Lambie-Nairn was (again) given the job of producing the Carlton (*spit*) idents, was that their programme announcers complained that the Central produced ones were too dull. Oh and the less said about those "carlton-ised" Central idents, the better........
Central Television began in 1982 for the midlands, however Carlton started to get their dirty hands on Central in March 1987 when they bought a 20% stake in the company. In January 1994, with the one year freeze on other ITV companies purchasing others, Carlton jumped quickly to purchase the remaining 80% and took full control on 10th Jan 1994.
Carlton made some damn good Children's Programmes (same with Granada) like "Mopatop's Shop" (co-produced by the Jim Henson Company) and "Old Bear Stories" among others
I didn’t realise that was unique on the ITV network at the time! Loved Thunderbirds. I dare say it’s the only thing I remember about the channel - that after an episode, I’d wonder why Will Smith’s “cousin” had a TV channel named after him.
I was at the filming of part of that 'Carlton New Year' show. It was a Paul McCartney gig at the Mean Fiddler in Harlesden in November. It felt strange to have the 'Happy New Year' takes!
Cool video Adam well when New Years Of 1993 came along after December 1992 Thames left after being on the air for 24 amazing years Carlton in my opinion wasn’t bad but I do prefer Thames myself.
Great video 👍 in my opinion i think Calton is better than Thames not that Thames is bad i like the classic Thames ident with London and the bridge my favourite Calton ident is the stars and hearts ident.
And Carlton Television officially died on 1st February 2004, when ITV plc took over all of England and Wales regions as imply ITV from 2nd February 2004.
Best one I saw had a firey background with carlton in front and a hot branding iron comes in to create the star logo. Wanna say I saw it in the cinema but could of been dvd..?
Well for me that was the beginning of the end of me watching itv. I can’t say I have watched much on itv in the near 30 years since Thames lost its franchise. The opening ident from Carlton summed up what Carlton was to offer cheap tacky television.
You would have thought after the debacle of the Broadcasting Act 1990, when Thames was ousted by a company who should never have been given a licence to broadcast or should have had it revoked that they wouldn't do this to Channel 4. God only knows what will happen. Wonder if ITV will be putting in a bid?
@@robertcomer2767 Well, ITV Schools used to air on Channel 4. Also, I can recall seeing a piece of Channel 4 continuity featuring a slide for an ITV programme.
The Carlton Television Sun Video Logo Is Taken The VHS Releases Of Bananas In Pyjamas And Tots TV And Rosie And Jim From Along With Carlton Star Logo Is Taken From Gerry Anderson's Captain Scarlet And The Mysterons And Stingray And Of Course Gerry Anderson's Thunderbirds The Original Series. Thunderbirds Are GO. F.A.B Virgil. Merry Christmas Mate. X
Never liked Carlton. Never seemed connected to London. Too corporate and I probably watched ITV much less because of it. And the identity were as uninspiring as the channel. To me at least.
Carlton was such a cheap operation that needless to say, they aren't missed by many. Their on air look, aside from the 1999 Hearts idents (probably the BEST Carlton ident) reflect that. They basically operated as a subcontractor for London Weekend Television during the weekday franchise, operating out of The London Studios sublet by LWT and pooling their local news service with LWT as the London News Network. They rarely (if ever) produced any programmes of their own and was mostly a distributor and bankroller at best for independent productions. Honestly, the ITC could have very well merged the weekday and weekend franchises of London in the 1991 franchise round if they wanted to, but either LWT or Thames would have had to take a hit or be merged in a shotgun marriage of sorts like ABC and Rediffusion 23 years before.
I preferred the Central Presenations ones, personally; if I had to put up with the company, at all! Carlton rented space at LWT's Kent House (that went on to become known as "The London Studios") and jointly owned London News Network; prior to that operation being taken over by ITN. The ITC couldn't combine the London Weekday and Weekend franchises, as the rules regarding media ownership and advertising share were quite clear at that time and dictated the two licenses be kept separate; the rules were relaxed, in time for Granada & Carlton to merge into ITV plc.
