ITV Ventures

Background
Granada Ventures was a British home video distirbutor that was orignally founded in 1980s as Pickwick Video until 1992 when Carlton Communications acquired the company and three years later in 1995 they renamed Pickwick Video to Carlton Home Entertainment and it was later renamed to Carlton Visual Entertainment in 2002.

In 2004, both Carlton Communications and Granada merged to form "ITV plc". At the time, Carlton had their existing home video unit, while Granada had a deal with Video Collection International. The merger meant the deal could be revoked and that Granada programs were able to be released through Carlton's unit, which was soon rebranded as Granada Ventures, therefore allowing all ITV-produced shows on DVD to be branded under one name.

1st Logo (1989-Early 1992)


Logo: A series of gray and white vertical lines are formed on the screen. Then they flip around a few times to show brief clips of some films from Pickwick's Library (including a yacht race, boxing match, and even Thomas the Tank Engine). After that the text "PICKWICK", in red italic letters appears sliding in letter-by-letter from the right and the word Video appears written underneath in dark blue and underlined in red. The text then shines.

Trivia: The clip of Thomas the Tank Engine is taken from the episode Thomas Comes to Breakfast.

Variants:
 * Originally, Australian releases only feature the ending animation starting from when the text appears on-screen and freezing it for 30 seconds with the full music underneath it.
 * On later Australian releases the music starts 5 seconds into the warning screen, and the logo is a short version with the opening similar to the second logo.

FX/SFX: The lines, the letters and the shining.

Music/Sounds: A synthesised rock tune entitled "Superman 3" done by Anthony & Gaynor Sadler, which was also heard on Earthvue on the then-Prevue Guide (now Pop) around that time.

Availability: Seen on Pickwick videos from the UK and Australia around the time period such as the 1989 UK VHS reissues of the Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends season 2 VHS releases Thomas, Percy and the Coal and Other Stories, Percy and Harold and Other Stories, The Deputation and Other Stories and the 1991 UK VHS release of The Best of Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends, among others.

Editor's Note: None.

2nd Logo (Early-Late 1992)


Logo: A series of the same grey and white vertical lines are formed on the same screen. Then they flipped only once and the same word "PICKWICK" from the first logo and appears in the same font as the first logo but now they appear letter-by-letter from the left. Then the same text "Video" appears also in the same blue script from the previous logo now appears this time underlined in blue ripples down and places itself underneath the word above.

FX/SFX: The lines, the letters and the "Video" text, it's basically a very cheap recreation of the first logo.

Music/Sounds: A synth hum which sounds similar to the one used on the Roadshow Home Video logo in Australia, followed by five drumbeats and a different synth warbling sound.

Availability: Rare.

Editor's Note: None.

3rd Logo (Late 1992-1995)
Logo: The camera travels through a curvy blue maze and drops down a keyhole, revealing serveral blue and purple copies of the maze. It then pans through the bottom-most area of the maze and reaches a yellow light coming out from another hole, then it begins to travel upward through the hole and spins around a bit, which eventually revealing the word "PICKWICK" appearing in blue and in the same font as before against a black background and the word then shines.

Variant: An rare prototype short version variant exists starts with two copies of the word "PICKWICK", one on top of the other being viewed from the left side before the camera goes through the first letter "C" and travels quickly between the two copies until coming out again through the second letter "C". The ending is largly the same as the main logo except it shines differently.

FX/SFX: The CGI maze, great CGI animation for it's time and it has way better animation than the previous logo.

Music/Sounds: A dramatic tune sounded like something off an action film. The short version has a heavenly chorus.

Availability: Seen on Pickwick videos from the UK and Australia around the time period.

Editor's Note: One of the more memorable British logos of the VHS era. Some aspects of it are quite ahead of its time.

1st Logo (2004-2005)


Logo: On a background, the 2004 Granada logo with "Ventures" below is shown.

FX/SFX: None.

Music/Sounds: None.

Availability: Seen on Granada Ventures DVD releases from the era.

Editor's Note: Nothing much to say here. It's clear to be an obvious placeholder for the next logo.

2nd Logo (2005-2013)


Logo: Same as the 2004 Granada logo, but the word "Ventures" in a white font fades in on the bottom of the screen.

Variant: A shorter variant exists.

FX/SFX: Same as the full version of the 2004 Granada logo.

Music/Sounds: Same as the full version of the 2004 Granada logo or none.

Availability:
 * Appears on releases from this time period, such as Pocoyo & Friends: Volume 1.
 * The shorter variant appears on ITV releases that were licensed to independent distributor Network Distributing.
 * It makes a surprise appearance on the Talking Pictures TV airing of The Arsenal Stadium Mystery (1939).

Editor's Note: None.