The UK’s Golden Age of TV Branding: Sky Atlantic, Channel 4, and “Quality” American Imports

This chapter focusses on channel idents: the brief logos appearing between programmes. In the multichannel environment of the early 2000s, idents were elevated beyond simple navigational aids informing the viewer of upcoming programmes to become engaging pieces of entertainment in their own right. They were accorded larger budgets, often making use of live-action as well as motion graphics, and included bespoke music and sound. Combining audiovisual analysis of idents and interviews conducted with graphic designers and composers, this chapter examines idents for Channel 4 and Sky Atlantic from textual and production perspectives. In the early 2000s, both channels increasingly relied on licensing “quality” programmes from US premium channels such as HBO for the development of their brand identities. The channel idents therefore had an important role in recontextualizing US imports for UK viewers, whilst communicating the unique brand identity of each channel. This chapter begins by setting out the functions of idents before exploring the wider industry context. The remainder of the chapter consists of case study analyses, drawing links between the aesthetic character of idents and the industrial contexts of each channel—one being a commercial public service broadcaster, the other a premium subscription-based channel. Overall, it is argued that idents stretched the creative boundaries of televisual promotional texts during the build-up to the peak production era, preceding or even anticipating the nature of the programmes seen in the peak TV era that followed.