When Should You Give Your Production Graphics A Shake-Up?

There are many different things a production company can do to add to your initial footage, ensuring that the things that appear on camera filmed in a studio or discussed there after being broadcast from outside can be complemented by an array of special effects, props and graphics to give it a look not just of professional quality, but of extra clarity.

In the latter case, this can involve a lot of graphics, often in coloured backgrounds with either stationary writing or, especially in recent years, rolling text. The latter is a common feature of news channels and can be especially useful in situations when breaking news comes thick and fast, just as election night coverage, as the results roll in.

However, just as the news and political events can be fast-moving, so can methods of presentation and the use of graphics change.

Why Graphics Change

For example, if one looks at TV election night coverage, the very simple presentation of the black-and-white days, when the only graphic the appearance on screen of simple plain white writing listing the latest events, has given way to a riot of colour, 3D swingometers and all kinds of graphic diagrams to depict landslides and collapsing stacks of cards.

These graphics often changed from one election to the next, aided not just by a desire to add some entertainment and impress with enhanced technology, but also to communicate more sophisticated data to those who aren’t psephology nerds.

As there is no major election imminent, there won’t be a new set of graphics for any such programme soon (unlike last year). But in other areas like sport, there are different natural points when it makes sense for you to change the graphics.

Layouts And Graphics To Change In The New Football Season?

As the Premier League season begins, TV coverage may demonstrate this. Some of the on-screen graphics may be tweaked by the different companies with coverage (Sky Sports, TNT Sports and the BBC), as will elements of studio layout.

These changes may not be as immediately obvious as the appearance of new presenters or disappearance of old ones (no Gary Lineker, fully clothed or not), but they will be the result of some studio and production design work carried out over the summer in preparation for the season.

Of course, the studio graphics and tech at the largest broadcasters will be very sophisticated and reflect the large budgets those broadcasters have, but even at a smaller scale, the new season offers a chance for change and if you use our studios, there is no need to keep things the same all the time.

Seasonal changes are such an obvious opportunity in sports broadcasting, with the additions in recent years coming from the use of technology in decision-making such as goal-line technology in cricket and the use of Hawk-Eye in several sports.

Timing Your Regeneration

Along with this technology, the new season is indeed a great time to give a studio a new look. This needs to be attractive and well-thought-out; however, unlike an election night, when the graphics may or may not catch the imagination (the BBC’s use of pastel colours last year grated on some people), you may be stuck with a poor design all season.

The idea of changing layouts applies to many shows.  In Doctor Who, for example, renewal has always been a central element of the series. This has not just been seen when the actor playing the title role changes through regeneration, but the way the costumes change, the layout of the TARDIS and even the design of the Cybermen.

However, it has not always been so. As the Doctor Who site notes, the interior of the TARDIS was essentially unchanged for the first 26 years of the show.

Change Or No Change?

This does raise one question when it comes to updating the graphics, studio and any other presentational feature: are there times when you should adopt the old mantra that “if it aint broke, don’t fix it”?

You may consider the answer to be that sometimes, keeping things as they are is still a good thing to do. Change for change’s sake is not necessary.

Against that, with graphic technology improving, new props (and we have plenty), plus the need that can arise in cases like sport to fall in line with new in-game technology that helps make decisions, there are also many times when upgrading the graphics and the props is undeniably the right approach.

If you need to upgrade your facilities or do something new with production to harness new graphics technology, we have the means to help, so you have something wonderful and new to present to viewers.