FILM AND TELEVISION

"Brand up the usual suspects"

TV3's arrival is a good reminder that branding is an essential part of the television universe. A channel generates an identity through scheduling, personalities and 'channel idents', those logos between their shows that glue together the schedules and reinforce the brand identity.

'Idents' adopt particular modes of address to create a continuing 'presence'. Either they brandish popular commercial appeal or they go for public-service worthiness. And so it was ever since the origins of the TV species...

In the early days, regional ITV companies would herald their ancient roots by resorting to heraldic emblems of ancient kingdoms. Anglia would show a silver knight on silver steed, while Scottish TV had thriving thistles, and the fledgling UTV would depend upon a sort of join-the-dots design (an aerial? a network?) and a disembodied voice announcing "Ulster Television, channels 8 and 9."

Meanwhile RTÉ articulated a public service role and the first official language of the state with "Teilifís Éireann, bealach a seacht..." Its idents conjured up ancient history and a decidedly Catholic identity, based upon the St Brigid's Cross, an artefact fashioned of wild rushes. This became central to the station's own iconography, and through its various mutations remained a shadowy presence. It was almost as though the channel's 'ident' and identity were both caught between tradition and modernity (later on, Teilifís na Gaeilge's ident managed to combine ancient and modern far more effortlessly, with its lighthouse/landscape mix).

If RTÉ inscribed a 'local' and Irish identity in its mode of address, the BBC asserted global dominance. It deployed the image of the globe in all its authority and ceremony (the image lingers on in those hot-air balloons). But then in 1982 electronic wizardry and Channel 4 burst upon the logo scene. Its exploding, rainbow-coloured fragments turned into a colourful jigsaw, a composite figure of 4 - a perfect iconic summary of its 'alternative', pluralist remit, its mode of delivery and its programming portfolio.

Other channels were quick to ape this style while MTV's logos challenged all the rules with their postmodern pleasures, imitating and plundering cinema and art history. Next came BBC 2's equally witty and surreal character - the numeral 2 in various guises and situations.

RTÉ's 1990s idents have gone for the 'fundamentals' look - fire, water, earth and air - all New Age and ancient druids, though in one watery image the content looks dangerously close to disappearing down the plughole. Network 2's reinventions have been based on Eurovision colours though its latest rebranding makes you wonder how it really sees itself and its audience. Meanwhile to keep tabs on Irish TV stations' logos old and new - from ancient test cards to TV3's new logo or Network 2's latest ident (is it a flattened ring-pull tab from a lager can?) - check out Richard Logue's great website on the subject at http://welcome.to/irishtv

Stephanie McBride