PBS idents
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PBS idents are the television idents used by the US Public Broadcasting Service. Programs distributed to its member stations end with an identification including the network's name and logo and often a voiceover, known in the industry as a "system cue". Prior to 1984 the logo was usually displayed on-screen for eight seconds; since then the logo has appeared on-screen for five seconds.
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[edit] National Educational Television idents
[edit] First ident
In 1962, this was National Educational Television's first and only known ident. A red block sets down from the left side of the screen, then, a yellow block rises up from the center of the screen and a blue block sets down from the right side of the screen. Afterwards, the blocks turn into the letters "N-E-T" before coming closer to each other. Then a man's voice from 1962-1969 would say "This is N-E-T, the National Educational Television network." As he says this, the words National Educational Television appears above the NET logo and bends to form a roof with an antenna on it, which connects the T. In 1969 the same man, although he did the voiceover in a deeper voice, would say "This is N-E-T, the public television network." As he says this, a blue line is drawn above the letters and continues to form to its usual position. The music was a choppy synth composed by Eric Siday, the same person who did the synth for the S from Hell ident for Screen Gems and the CBS in Color jingle for CBS three years prior to this ident.
[edit] Main network idents
Note on logo dates: The given ending dates are only the time they ceased to be current; in some cases, they have appeared on television concurrently with later logos on reruns of older programs.
[edit] First ident
In 1970, Macdonald Carey (known as Dr. Tom Horton on Days of Our Lives) would voice-over and say "This is PBS, the Public Broadcasting Service." This ident served the network for its first year. The picture was simply a still with the words PUBLIC, BROADCASTING, and SERVICE written in red, yellow, and blue, respectively. During this ident's time, it served as a filler for the NET ident until the second PBS ident was introduced.
[edit] Second ident
In 1971, PBS introduced the long-running "people" ident, which still serves the network today. This logo starts with a blue P on the upper-mid screen which moves back. Suddenly, it turns into a "P-head" (with the face facing the left direction), the word PUBLIC appears below it, and both move to the left of the screen. Following it is an orange B, 2 black dots appear within the B, and the word BROADCASTING appears below PUBLIC, coinciding with the second dot. Then, a green S comes to the far right, 2 black dots appear within it, and the word SERVICE appears below BROADCASTING, coinciding with the second dot. The animation is rather choppy, as is the music accompanying this, which is performed by a moog synthesizer. The music begins with a rapidly descending, telephone-like scale, followed by seven moog tones. It has been reported over the recent years that this logo was very unnerving (particularly to children) due to the moog music, the black background and the letters' bright colors and dots.
This logo is retained on the Best of The Electric Company and Sesame Street:Old School DVD sets.
[edit] Third ident
In 1984, the logo introduced the "split identity" format, which has become the most popular revision in the people identity's history. A purple P head, just like the one in the previous logo but turned backwards, starts the ident. Then, a piece of it gets copied to the right to form the new logo. The letters PBS come below it in Lubalin Graph. Music (composed by Jonathan Elias) accompanying this logo is a majestic piano chord accompanied by some pizzicato tones, then a softer version of the piano chord. This logo can still be on the "Voices & Visions Show", and on "The Mechanical Universe".
[edit] Fourth ident
The logo was remodeled to its fourth format in 1989; the first to implement computer-generated imagery. In the ident, the P-head first used in the previous logo appears by rotating from the left edge of the screen, leaving a trail, then filling the screen. Simultaneously, a group of lines streak across the bottom of the screen leaving behind PBS in very small letters on the lower-left corner. Music consists of a bell string, followed by a man's voice (most likely sounding like Liam Neeson) saying "This is P-B-S".
It is sometimes the earliest of the surviving PBS identities, which would often plaster over idents from pre-1989 shows. (This ident was affixed on all new feeds of PBS shows in October 1989, replacing the "people" and "split identity" closings; however, both are still occasionally seen on older prints, according to TeamFX2000. In turn, when feeds of programs displaying Parental Guidelines were instituted in 1996, much of the availability of the 1989 PBS tag, then usually seen on PBS Kids shows such as "(Barney & Friends)" *, "Sesame Street", "Bill Nye the Science Guy", and "Lamb Chop's Play-Along," was removed.) Variations shown here include:
- -- In September 1991 the PBS ident has an announcer Liam Neeson saying "This Is P-B-S" simultaneously with the bell string.
- -- On Time Life videos' PBS videotapes, there was a silent version of this logo after the episode was over.
- -- It's episodes from before December 1992 show the version with Liam Neeson announcing "This is PBS" over the bell string tune.
[edit] Fifth ident
Introduced in 1992, the fifth PBS identity might appear on prints from local PBS stations, but is otherwise rather rare. The animated variant has a glass circle appearing and disappearing with faces of various people before being consumed by the eye of the P-head zooming out. The P-head is orange in an orange environment similar to the pink environment of the alternate, and the familiar "PBS" text spins in, white and in typewriter. Perhaps in a backlash against the proliferation of computer-generated animated IDs, this version was created traditionally on film. The P-head is frosted glass, the PBS text is rotated into place by rods beneath a rostrum. A non-animated variant appeared on a few shows, such as Triumph of the Nerds. The music, composed by Peter Fish, is jazzy, with a female voice singing in the background. The announcer this time, Maximilian Schell, says "This is P-B-S". On the non-animated variant seen on Triumph of the Nerds, the announcer is different (the still variant's announcer being Susan Sarandon). Additionally, this logo was the last to be seen on children's' shows as well as adult programming (although the next ident occasionally made appearances on the 1996 television shows Arthur and Adventures From The Book of Virtues); after 1993, PBS Kids programs utilized special ident of their own. A short featurette about the filming of this ident was aired on some PBS stations to fill airtime.
[edit] Sixth ident
The PBS ident was revised in 1996. Now only seen as the ending ident of Adventures from the Book of Virtues, its composition now included of a variety of objects: A telescope rotates in the lower left corner; a globe of the Earth appears at upper right; while at center a framed windowpane zooms in. The various objects fade away to reveal the P-head, which is initially yellow with the right section colored blue. These colors change to blue and green, respectively, while the text "PBS" fades in below and fades to yellow. A female announcer, Lauren Bacall, says "This is P-B-S". She is the only announcer to reprise her job for the following logo (7th logo). The logo dropped in late 1998.
[edit] Seventh ident
The first well-known identity in years was the seventh PBS identity, used from 1998 to 2002. Its animation begins with a man or woman holding up a round disc containing the PBS P-head. As he/she holds the disc in front of his/her face, several superimposed acrobats jump and somersault around the logo. The letters "PBS" fade in at right, while "www.pbs.org" in smaller letters appeared below. This was the first PBS logo to include the network's web address, as well as the first to be made in a version with a 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio for HDTV programming, and is sometimes still seen today. The accompanying music is a world music/new age piece, with the same announcer saying "This is P-B-S" as in the sixth logo.
On rare occasions, this was the very last logo to ever appear on a children's' show like In the Mix.
[edit] Eighth ident
The eighth (and newest as of 2006) PBS ident is quite different from all of its predecessors. It features live-action footage and has many variants, including "Young People," "Performers," "Flowers," "Daddy and Son," and "Generations." The voiceover is now a woman saying "We are P-B-S," or occasionally "I am P-B-S." It was introduced in 2002 and is still being used.
[edit] PBS Kids idents
Prior to 1993, PBS Kids television programs used the same PBS idents seen on adult-oriented programming. Starting that year, however, a new ident was commissioned specifically for children's programming that consisted of three P-heads, one of them blue, another one orange, and the last one green, complete with appendages drawn as a cartoon. (These colors change throughout the ident and eventually stop on blue, orange, and green, respectively.) The P-heads dance and sing "This is P-B-S! Hooh!" on this ident, then stop when a dog (also shaped as a P-head) walks by the lower portion of the screen and barks "Arf!" At the same time, the blue P-head adlibs and his red hat flies off of his head for a moment, then drops back on his head. The "PBS" text appears in black at lower left, and the music is a rock/pop tune. This was used on programming such as "Barney & Friends", "Lamb Chop's Play-Along", "Kratts' Creatures" and others.
Sometimes, on the PBS Kids television they use this TV cartoon ident and the same P-head colors.
Just after the sixth PBS ident in 1996, this logo added an E/I balloon.
The identity for PBS children's' programs was revised on May 16, 1999, coinciding with the establishment of a 24-hour PBS Kids feed, and made even more dissimilar from the regular ident as well. The animation begins with a child character (either a girl or a boy) with stylized features and green skin taking part in an activity or simply running into view. When the character's face is close up, a circle zooms out around the head while the letters "PBS" appear above in a thought bubble. The completed circle is set against an animated background of vertical lines. At the end, there is a sung voiceover saying "Doink! P-B-S Kids!" There are several variations of this ident. The latest two were introduced in 2003.
Some stations only began using the PBS Kids ident with the 1999 revision.
[edit] PBS Kids GO! idents
Prior to 2004, all PBS Kids programs used the same series idents. Starting in the fall of that year, however, another series of new idents were commissioned for use on programming with a focus on telling children to be active, which consists of a blocks motif and several kids doing several forms of exercise. At the end, the PBS Kids GO! logo appears, with a simple voiceover at the end, a boy saying "GO!". Therefore, this makes this the first PBS ident that had a voiceover not mentioning PBS. As with other current PBS idents, there are several variations.
[edit] PBS Kids Sprout idents
PBS Kids Sprout got its first ident in 2005, which consists of a green flower with the words PBS Kids written on it and the word "sprout" under it in children's handwriting.
[edit] PBS Home Video idents
The first distinctive ident used on PBS Home Video titles was a large P-head on the center of the screen, first seen in 1990. Initially, a cloudy sky pattern fills the ident against a black background, which fades to a blue P-head against a cloudy sky background. An announcer says "The following presentation is from PBS Home Video" afterward, the screen fades out and cuts to any of the above post-1984 idents. The ident (minus the announcer) would repeat itself at the end of the videotape.
In 1998, the ident was revised to: a blue circle, a green circle, and a red circle (each containing a P-head). The circles merge together and turn purple once they touch and turn black when "PBS HOME VIDEO" ("PBS DVD" on DVD releases) fades in. There is no cut to a PBS television ident except on PBS Kids titles.
Coinciding with PBS Home Video's distribution changing to Paramount in 2004, a new PBS ident was created: It begins on an ethereal blue/purple/red CGI background, then the PBS logo appears within a circle with "Be more" on the left and "PBS" on the right. Again, there is no cut to a PBS television ident on this logo except on PBS Kids titles.
[edit] External links
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The following external sites may not have verifiable information. Wikipedia makes no effort to verify the contents of external sites, and the following sites may not be reliable sources. |
- Screen captures of PBS idents past and present, as well as footage of vintage promos
- TeamFX2000 - Representations/descriptions/information on past PBS idents up to #7
