Paul Higgins presented tonight’s bulletin.
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Paul Higgins also presented Wednesday night’s 7pm News.
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Tamara Oudyn is back from holidays and presenting Friday - Sunday in Victoria.
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Good post, I remember when I used to care this much.
Would be good if they go for a paired back, imagery-driven opener - something less abstract than their current sliders. I’d be happy to see something like their #knowthestory promos, a few cuts of slow-motion news footage set in time with the new theme. Real polished and minimalist.
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Urgh I wouldn’t. Stuff like that always looks horribly pretentious. And without fail includes close up shots of ethnic children, as if they are photographic scenery, or are meant to convey something meaningful through their eyes. Dated, dated, dated.
That is a particular bad version of the ‘genre’ there.
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Well, here’s a random fun fact: A small audio sample of the ABC News theme is played, when you get a ‘Breaking News’ notification via the ABC app. Nice touch. 
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I’m assuming you just got the “breaking news” of Australia not doing well at the oscars or whatever?
Ahaha yep, spot on! 
Not just wondering. It’s things like this that keep me up at night.
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Ian Henderson is back from holidays in Victoria tonight.
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No news is more inane as the obligatory yearly news reports on Australia’s ‘performance’ at the Oscars/Golden Globes.
Hello all.
So does anyone have any new info. on what might be happening with ABC news presentation and the news themes etc. Do we believe we will see any changes soon?
I’m saying On Friday 20th or Saturday 21st of January during the events of Trump’s inauguration, but this is my opinion and isn’t backed up by anything
Cheers mate.
Does anyone have any inside info. with some substance at all?
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Can’t you just be patient and wait a week?
If they did then it would already be posted for the world to see…
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Personally, I’d be willing to predict that the ABC will want to wait until Late January/Early February (or another time period which isn’t dominated by a major news story, like next Friday/Saturday will be) before launching their new look.
Next Friday/Saturday, I’d expect the ABC to be primarily focused on the actual coverage of Donald Trump’s inauguration. Yes, there’ll most likely be some special presentation for the coverage but that was probably prepared for weeks if not months ago.
I’m pretty sure that people who work at the ABC (or any media outlet) would not at all be appreciative if someone posted any inside info on a major branding relaunch on a publically accessable online forum without their prior consent.
As much as I’d also really love to hear more about this relaunch of ABC News myself, we’re just going to have to be patient. In due time, all will eventually be revealed…
Well there’s no any new information that I know about, but I can give you a rundown of what I and we now know so far:
• The ABC have been using a new typeface recently that has been customly designed in house by the ABC’s Digital Network department. It’s been named ‘oneABC’, and its purpose is to replace the ABC’s current library of over 1000 fonts, and become the main corporate typeface. Uses of it so far include, the ABC ME logo, Radio, Upfronts, HD logo, title-cards, the App, websites, some promos and the new ‘News’ logo.
• The new On-Air Presentation will feature a new Black and White contemporary colour scheme to distinguish their content. The new graphics will mostly likely use the new font for all graphics and some changes have already begun with the font on ABC News 24 now modified just a few weeks ago. The black and white colour scheme on it’s own seems a bit bleak, but if the recently overhauled ABC App and updated websites tell us anything, yellow may play a part in the On-Air Presentation as well, as it seems the ABC are ditching the blue for yellow as their corporate colour. I have a feeling the ABC are trying to merge both the Television and News Service identities together as new promos such as the ‘Australian Of The Year’ ones that have been doing the rounds on ABC are using the yellow colour, lined box element seen in the Upfronts and the ‘oneABC’ font:
Perhaps the lined box element will also play a part in the new On-Air Presentation? Time will tell.
• In regards to News theme, all we know is back in August 2015, the ABC was toying around with the proposal of a News theme that would be played across all mediums of TV and Radio. Candidates considered then were, the current theme, Majestic Fanfare and most notably the 1985-2005 ABC News font with a modern rendition by The Bag Raiders. At the moment, we know nothing if the ABC has gone ahead with this, but with ABC News 24 and ABC NewsRadio set to be renamed to ‘The ABC News Channel’ and ‘ABC News on Radio’, it would make sense for one theme across all services to unify the brand further.
• We don’t have a solid date yet, but as some of the ABC’s identities have been recently updated, most notably ABC Radio, we can only assume soon. I’d say like @SydneyCityTV, Late January/Early Febuary would seem possible.
I suspect we may see some of the new elements of the relaunch to be in Trump’s Inauguration Presentation, but we’ll have to wait and see. Like the teaser trailer for ABC Radio’s new look back in December, the ABC will hopefully let us know when changes to the News Service are approaching. Hopefully that covers everything we know so far. I hope soon we’ll see a new promo in some form later or early next month. 
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Well that explains why the font looks like a weird conglomerate of a bunch of disconnected elements from different fonts. Shame they didn’t get it created professionally, or just license a good looking font from the libraries out there.
Yellow can be a problematic theme colour too (just look at how the ABC logo doesn’t really stand out from the background in that picture above), it’ll be interesting to see how ABC’s new theme goes.
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It seems the ABC is trying to give themselves a corporate identity that is unique to only itself, similar how some corporations have been creating custom typefaces for their logos and properties like Google (or known by its corporate name Alphabet) did back in October 2015.
It also does seem a good amount of “T.L.C” (not Red Rooster’s Tender Loving Chicken unfortunately 
) did go into the design and execution process judging by the ABC’s Digital Network blog post:
https://digital.abc.net.au/2016/04/22/oneabc-typeface/
To even go as far as trying to invoke Australian Outback culture into the design!
First was the connection to the land with a coastal and outback feel. The open spaces of a wide brown land played a significant role. A sense of contrast that is simultaneously austere and rich. A true sense of inclusiveness that celebrates diversity and multiculturalism. And finally that special larrikin mentality that does not take itself too seriously.
They also provided a video of its creation which is very descriptive and in detail:
To be honest IMO, I quite like the new typeface a lot, and I feel some of the characters stand out very well and distinguish their font from the others with the slanted cuts in some of the characters and the tail on the ‘i’. I even sometimes feel like I’m getting Design OCD when they decide to use a different font for some of their ‘Australian Of The Year’ promos: (note the ‘J’ and the no corner slant on the ‘7’ in the top picture)
I’m quite excited about these new design changes at the ABC, as they seem the most significant since the adoption of the metallic lissajous logo to the corporate identity in 2001. It also seems ABC News’ relaunch will be more significant in more than just graphics, as new technology will be adopted to enhance the viewing experience. Hopefully we won’t have to wait much longer to see these changes and enhancements. Fingers crossed! 
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