Blue Peter

Refinement & Direction

After a period of creative exploration, in which we worked closely with the Blue Peter team to gain an understanding of the core brand values, we focused on refreshing the graphics in a way that was both contemporary and in-keeping with the heritage of the brand. It needed to appeal to the show’s younger audience, conveying the playful personality that sits at the core of all aspects of the Blue Peter brand and incorporating the iconic imagery of the show, whilst signalling the bright, dynamic future ahead.

Creating a type lock-up with overlapping letters in the logo helped bring a handmade feel, recalling the famous “Here’s One I Made Earlier” saying that’s been intrinsic to the show’s identity. After playing with the form of the ship, we steered away from changing its shape in the design to ensure its visual identity wasn’t lost, but added rounder edges to the badge to match the softer typeface.

Storyboards & Styleframes

Mapping out the title sequence through storyboards was essential for this animation, because we wanted to ensure the movement was dynamic and snappy, but still legible for viewers. A series of sketched boards was drawn up to help map out what needed to be shown & when, and this informed the composition of the style frames for the titles.

With short title sequences like these, timing the movement through an animatic helps to ensure the animation fits with the music, and gives a stronger sense of how the final asset might look, which helps to manage expectations. Balancing vibrant graphics with photos and text meant we could make the most of the space, but still keep it fast-paced and fun.

Illustration & Iconography

Evolving from the exploration of the logo, we developed a library of icons that could be used across the brand’s assets. A key section of this was for the titles specifically, with a range of illustrated icons created for each of Blue Peter’s presenters, representing their diverse personalities and interests. These icons were then expanded to include ones that represent the brand itself and the key pillars, such as the strands like “Access All Areas” and “Challenge”. Working with this illustrated asset library allowed us to keep a consistent look and feel across the wider supporting assets, such as the lower thirds and wipes, in a way that still injected fun and personality into each visual.

Presenter Photoshoot

Blue Peter has always been led by a cast of excellent presenters, so of course they had to be the focal point of the titles. Previous iterations of the titles often featured a lot of video, which could sometimes be a challenge to continually refresh to ensure the sequence feels up to date, but just using single still photos lacked the energy we wanted to build into the titles. Having several shots of each presenter in different poses hit that balance between efficiency and fun, so as part of our work on the project, we attended the photoshoot to advise from a compositing and animation point of view.

We were on hand on the day to advise on poses, lighting, and energy, to ensure it all aligned with the animated world we were building. The Blue Peter team were keen to ensure the show and each individual presenter was represented authentically, so items were used to promote the show itself or to depict their interests. This gave us a range of snapshots into who they are and what they bring to Blue Peter, and we later composited these into the titles, giving the sequence a personal, presenter-led feel.

Strand Stings & Consistency

The key pillars of Blue Peter’s format have always been the individual strands that encourage values like creativity, ingenuity, adventure, and discovery, whether through charity-focused events, highlighting environmental issues, or helping young viewers learn crafts with objects around the home. These strands continue today, and summing them up into short, snappy animated stings while still representing those core values was a great challenge for the team.

Each strand needed its own look and feel, instantly recognisable through bold colours and themed iconography, but also had to follow the overall brand look & feel. The playful font and sketch-style icon library helped to tie these stings back to the title sequence, and using the Blue Peter badge as one of the letters gave the set a consistent, branded finish.

Broadcast Toolkit

 Broadcast assets like wipes, frames, and stings needed to be flexible enough to suit a wide variety of content. We wanted everything to look playful, bouncy, and full of fun, to reflect the characteristics of the logo animation as well as the show itself, but also ensure that the content was the focus on-screen. Including a few small icons from the asset library helped to tie each asset in with the wider toolkit.

A range of clean backgrounds and frames were created to help integrate popular audience elements like letters or artwork, and kept minimal to ensure any type used was legible. We also provided a clean end-card with space for the credits, but ensured that graphical elements from the title sequence were included to create a cohesive and recognisable identity from start to finish. Finally, an additional sting was created specially for the Book Club in the style of the other strands, to help tie external reading activities in with the show.