American Broadcasting Company logos

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

American Broadcasting Company logos used at various times:

1 Early ABC television logos
2 The ABC Circle logo
3 Modern ABC identities
4 See also
5 External links

[edit] Early ABC television logos

ABC 1946 logo

One of the earliest logos for the ABC television network was a microphone with the letters "ABC" aligned vertically within in it (the then-current logo for the ABC radio network), and the letters T and V on either side of the microphone. In 1948, the network was using a logo consisting of a map of the United States with the words "American Broadcasting Company" superimposed, and also used a logo designed to look like a camera lens with the capital letters "ABC" within it (this could be considered a precursor to todays "ABC Circle" logo).

In 1953, after ABC's merger with United Paramount Theaters (a former division of Paramount Pictures), a new logo featured an eagle and a circle of 13 stars surrounding the letters "ABC".

ABC logo used from 1957 to 1962.

In 1957, the network introduced a new logo, known as the "ABC Circle A," consisting of the lowercase letters "abc" inside a larger lower case "a".

[edit] The ABC Circle logo

ABC Circle logo, used from 1962 to the present

In 1961, Paul Rand designed a new logo which was introduced in the fall of 1962. This is the current "ABC Circle" logo, now used for over 40 years, of a simple circle with the lowercase letters "abc" in an ultra-modern (for its time) typeface inside. The typeface used is a simple geometric design inspired by the Bauhaus school of the 1920s; its simplicity makes it easy to duplicate, something ABC has taken advantage of many times over the years (especially before the advent of computer graphics). It does not correspond to a particular font; however, several common geometric typefaces (including Avant Garde and Horatio) are close, and a recently developed typeface is inspired by it. A variation of ABC's logo is used by Brazilian TV network SBT. A radio station in Mexico's Federal District, XEABC, duplicates the "abc" lettering as its logo.

Several variations of the ABC Circle logo have been used since then. In 1965, the letters "abc" were multicolored, an red "a", a blue "b", and a green "c", to emphasize new color programming. In the 1969 and the early 1970's the logo was animated with several concentric circles in a "tunnel" effect. In 1975 an orange ABC Circle logo rose over a reflective ocean-like surface to coincide with the slogan "Welcome To A Bright New World." In 1978, the logo appeared in a starfield. In 1983, a golden ABC Circle logo appeared on a blue diagonally striped background. In 1987, the circle consisted of thin multicolored diagonal stripes. In the late 1980s, three-dimensional computer animation was used to rotate the logo.

[edit] Modern ABC identities

In 1998, the network began using a minimalist identity consisting of a small simple black and white ABC Circle logo on a yellow background, with the words "We Love TV." underneath. A new four-note theme tune was introduced at the same time. Later variations of the identity used the words "America's Broadcasting Company" and "America's #1 Broadcasting Company". The network used yellow for entertainment, blue for news, and red for sports programming.

In 2002, the network went back to a more colorful, animated identity, based around the circular shapes of the abc letters.