Ident Research

To give my primary product a sense of depth and increase its production value I need to create a short series of idents before my short film begins. The purpose of an ident is to credit the various production companies involved with the creation of the film. The list can vary in length due to the nature of production. If the film has been created internally within one company or 'in house' there is only be a need for one company to be credited. Due to the nature of my film, if it was produced by a professional production company, it would have been created on a low budget and therefore a group of companies would have worked upon the product Below I have embedded a series of idents and deconstructed them through a series of questions which relate them to my primary product.

How do the idents reflect the companies brand identity?

The TV channel 'Chiller' is a very popular source of horror and suspense films in the United States. With 33% of all households in the US receiving this channel  it reaches a wide audience. providing a proportional income. The nature of their budget is overtly shown through the ident with the use of CGI and professional varnish over the entire production. The use of a monochrome colour scheme directly reinforces the channels products what it airs. 

Link to my product: Similarly to the products aired on Chiller, my primary product shares the same genre of horror/suspense. Despite my film not heavily being horror it has numerous elements of the genre and therefore the idents could be suitable for my own product. I plan to use this ident as inspiration.

How effective is the length of the idents?

The embedded video features two indents of similar length, five seconds. The first is fast pasted and ,through the use of fast moving computer generated liquid, catches the audiences attention well. Furthermore the use of an extreme close up which progresses into the reveal of the companies logo provides a hook for the audience.  As the ident does not dwell on any part of the animation it does not become boring or monotonous.

Liveaction Vs Computer generation
For the first and second ident it is quite possible that there visuals could be constructed physically rather than with the use of CGI. However it is also very clear that this could be difficult and time consuming which in term would add additional expenses on the production of them. The second ident features a cobweb infused logo which is explored with the direction of the camera. Again, it would be possible to recreate this, especially with the development of web spray etc however this would take time to prepare and use up resources which add to the cost.

How do the idents reflect the companies brand identity?

BT vision, a discontinued 'On Demand' service, was an alternative for many to watch previously broadcaster content. This content was targeted a very wide market including children, and the ident reflects this. As a multi-sourced distributor BT has an annual income of 17.8 billion the company has a very large budget for campaigning and promotion. This clearly evident within the above ident as it uses a computer generated animation which mimics stop animation. The models displayed are particularly realistic and this would have taken specialist software and animators to create, adding to the cost significantly.
Link to my product: Despite the very pleasant tone of the advert the mimicking of stop motion could be presented in an unnerving way. Combined with the themes of the first two idents I believe I could create a very effective ident which represents my production company.

How effective is the length of the ident/
Due to the composition of the ident, the primary structure is revealed slowly. The length of the advert allows for the gradual exposure of the subject creating mystery. In comparison however to Chiller's idents it is longer. This could be argued to be due to the purpose of each. The BT vision slip is overtly meant to be placed during the advert break on the channel or before the TV programme on the demand service while the Chiller ident is more dynamic to its significantly less screen time.

Live action Vs  Computer generation
Despite the misleading style of the animation it is not stop motion. The ident uses a type of animation that copies the style of the highlighted type but allows for more freedom. Also, as stop motion is a lengthy process and particularly time consuming and replicating reduces the process, it is often used instead of stop motion to reduce production costs.


Conclusion: This activity has allowed me to explore the various genres of ident and develop my own ideas. I will be using the Chiller ident as inspiration for my own and I will follow up this post with some experimenting concerning the creation of the ident.