1. Proposal – Unit 32
An ident is a small video clip shown before and after programs. They vary greatly depending on what
the channel stands for and what programs are being shown, sometimes they even change
depending on the time of the night, although this is slightly rarer and something you’d tend to find in
larger channels such as the BBC or Channel 4. I have been asked to create an ident for teen channel
The Grid. Specializing in US drama and youth oriented chat shows my ident needs to be aimed at a
younger audience. Looking at the brief I have come up with an ident that I feel will fit the channel
perfectly. The ident is a time lapse of a motorway at night which will slowly pan up revealing the
background, then will move up into the sky, it will then blur slightly and a black line will fly on from
the left and the channels logo will appear above this line in a white font. I feel this ident will fit into
the brief as it fits with the grungy and urban feel that teenagers tend to be associated with. I have
learnt this by viewing other idents such as the More 4 Street Ident, as this shows a city scene and is
aimed at a teenage audience.
Before starting the project it is important to consider the budget. For me the budget was very easy
to calculate as I already have all of the tools required to film and produce the ident, so I would value
the production costs at less than £10, as I may need a filter for the camera lens, and it will also take
up some of my time getting to the location. The timescale may be more difficult to calculate as there
are many factors that will culminate and may slow progress slightly. Things such as varying weather
conditions or unsuitable locations will slow progress as I intend to shoot the ident at night, meaning I
have a smaller window to film the footage required for the ident. All in all though, I expect the
production and filming of my ident to last no longer than 2 weeks. As there will only be a single
person working on the ident there will be little in the way of management and roles as I will be
covering all of these, however I do intend to manage my time efficiently. Before I started this
project I had completed a number of different pieces of production paperwork such as a Gantt chart
that documents the time in which I will start and finish specific tasks, and a research document that
looks at different idents for inspiration and guidance. From this research document I have
discovered several things which have proved themselves very useful when I was planning and
producing my ident.
It is very important to produce storyboards for my idents as it gives me a good reference to go back
to and gives me a way to visualize the ident and produce the ident the way in which I intended from
the start. A good way of doing this is to produce several storyboards which will show what happens
at specific times in my ident. Because there are no real key frames in my ident and no cuts I won’t
need to have times as it will just run for a specific time (around 20 seconds), this means I can focus
more on the quality and imaginativeness of the shot as opposed to using multiple cuts to “stitch” the
ident together.
With each of my storyboards I was able to see the advantages and disadvantages to each idea, and
from these two idents I was able to choose the one I felt was stronger, and would represent the
channel in the way I intended from the start. It is good to have a number of concept ideas as you’re
able to whittle out the good ideas from the bad ones and replace things that need to be changed
and altered in order to get the best and most suitable ident possible.
George Pratt Unit 32 | Assignment 3 | Task 4