The Blocks, the current logo of the BBC. |
|
| Industry | Broadcasting |
|---|---|
| Headquarters | London, United Kingdom |
| Website | www.bbc.co.uk |
The BBC logo has been a brand identity for the corporation and its work since the 1960s in a variety of designs. Until the introduction of a logo in the 1960s, the corporation had relied on its coat of arms for official documentation and correspondence, although this crest rarely appeared onscreen. With the increased role of television for the BBC in the 1960s, particularly after the foundation of ITV, the corporation used its logo to increase viewer familiarity and to standardize their image and content. The logo has since been redesigned a number of times, most recently in 1997 with the BBC blocks, a logo designed to work across the mediums of the internet and digital television.[1]
Contents |
Before the BBC Introduced the BBC Logo itself, in the form of the slanted boxes, the BBC used a variety of different symbols with which to represent themselves. In printed media and corporation correspondence, they used their Coat of Arms, while on screen they used a different logo type. Originally, they used a stylized BBC text on early equipment, not unlike the Caption that accompanied the BBC One COW Globe. This logo was rarely seen on screen, with captions containing the words "BBC Television Service" along with matching clock. Following that, a logo type was made called 'The Bat Wings'. It was made of various elements; the eye shape in the centre of the logo rotated and represented Television itself; the large lightning bolts along the side represent broadcasting. Many of these elements also form part of the coat of arms.
In the 1950s, the first incarnation of the BBC Blocks logo appeared in the 1950s. It consisted of square boxes with slanted letters, not unlike the first slanted logo seen in the 1960s.
In the 1960s, the BBC Logo consisted of the familiar slanted boxes with italicized bold lettering. This was introduced soon after the introduction of ITV in 1955. This type of logo would go on captions at the end of productions as well as on cameras and other equipment used by the BBC. They became important when popular BBC programmes and clips from the BBC archives were being sold to be aired on other networks and channels.[1]
In 1971, a new softer logo was made, rounding off the boxes and making the spaces between the boxes larger. This logo was used on BBC merchandise, as well as the BBC One idents and the BBC Two clock. More now than ever, merchandise was being branded with the logo, as more productions were being sold via the BBC's American identity, Lionheart Television. Also, records and videos were now starting to be produced and a corporate identity was getting more and more essential to ensuring that the audience knew it was authentic and that the quality programmes they were watching could be attributed to the BBC.[1]
In 1986, the BBC produced yet another new logo. Since the last one was made, a consumer brand was becoming part of nearly every TV station and corporation at the time. The BBC needed a strong and unified identity, and a change of identity was key. Michael Peters was hired to make this all inclusive BBC identity for the corporation. They took the old logo, sharpened up the boxes again and set them to an angle of 17 degrees. They also sharpened up the text to make it completely symmetrical. Also counters were added to the logo for the first time. These counters were coloured blue, red, green for the nations of Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland respectively, as well as the three phosphors of television as seen on the BBC Two ident of the time, as well as on most of the BBC2 idents of previous times. This logo went on to be used extensively, with much merchandising of all sorts being produced with it on. It was also based on the rebrand of BBC One and BBC Two in 1991, when these two channels were given a total corporate look, unlike previous ways of branding the channels.[1] Also, there were special versions of the logo for the regions: all the lines were blue in Scotland, red in Wales, and green in Northern Ireland.
In 1997, when doing a channel rebrand project, Martin Lambie-Nairn suggested that he looked into the current logo choice and see what he could do, given that the BBC at the time was also looking into the BBC Brand as a whole. What he noticed was that the BBC had a system that meant that every service or department had a different logo scheme. It had a BBC logo and the name with character. Lambie-Nairn decided to address this when he took on the project, as with all these logos the core brand itself was severely weakened. It was also appropriate to look at the way the BBC was branded, as the BBC was about to take off in digital television and the internet, among other different ventures. After seeing a number of problems with the current logo, he decided that a new logo was necessary.[2]
The logo was technically unsuitable on-screen. When shrunk, it lost the lines underneath and the counters (the sections in the Bs) and also when in colour on a colour photo it again disappeared or parts vanished. Also on a TV or computer, diagonals are difficult to work with as the logos pixelate, and anti aliasing is required to make the logo work. The previous logo also followed the idea of the slanted boxes, and related the BBC back to the very first logo in the 1950s and 60s, which was not what the corporation wanted at that time. Technically the logo never looked comfortable next to the brand and straight letters. Finally, it was expensive to print as stationery would always have 4 colour letterheads, and alongside other BBC brands could mean anything up to 10 colour letterheads and stationery.[1]
Lambie-Nairn's solution is the BBC logo that has been used since October 1997. By straightening up the boxes, it removed all the problems associated with diagonals and those associated with disappearing lines. This kept the boxes' shape, so that it would still be familiar with what people know about the BBC. The typeface used is Gill Sans, made by Eric Gill. It was chosen because it was elegant, robust and has a timeless appeal: the typeface had been created 60 years before and so avoided the typeface looking outdated at a later date. This typeface also eliminated the disappearing counters issue, as the counters of the B's were much larger. Appropriately, some of Gills' statues adorn the exterior of Broadcasting House. The logo was also designed so that anything could be added after the BBC logo, be it department, corporate, brand, TV, radio etc. Also, by using this system, everything looked like it came from the same organisation, and it was also easy to add new logos. This system also only used black and white letter heads, meaning a big cost saving to the BBC and the licence fee payer.[2]
The only visible issue with the system, was that the logo for the BBC television and radio brands did not show their personality. Lambie-Nairn proposed to show this as personality in the idents themselves, and evidence of this can be seen in the idents for BBC One made just after the logo was introduced. The BBC One Balloons were made using the new logo, with the personality device in the balloons. The BBC Two idents, the 2s remained the same but with the new logo added underneath.[1]
Internally, the logo is known as the BBC blocks.[3]
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||