11.07.2017

TFTP News: News Opens from KSL/Salt Lake City (1970s/1980s)







Posted to YouTube by user 'TV News Capsule' (top), 'aussiebeachut0' (middle), 'cmsloan2002' (bottom)
Length - 0:17 (top), 0:24 (middle), 0:46 (bottom)

Above are three openings over about a 15 year period for local news at KSL-TV in Salt Lake City, Utah. KSL was at the time of these news opens (from 1975, 1983, and 1989) the area's CBS station--an affiliation it held from its inception in 1949 until switching to NBC in 1995. The clips are brief (all well under a minute in length) and constitute the opening images that would have been seen by viewers at the beginning of newscasts. As such, they are the type of thing that presents an image the station is trying to project for its viewers.

The 1975 version (top) features the signatures of the newscasters, as if they are personally vouching for the content they're about the present. In 1983 (middle), titles declaring "Medicine", "Crime", "Politics", etc., provide a brief summary, and maybe make a promise, as to the types of content viewers can expect to see. This second open also utilizes the slogan "the News Specialists", which carries over into the 1989 open. The 1989 open (bottom) has more dynamic imagery, some of it aerial, of the SLC area, as if to show that KSL has got it covered. All three opens, as would be expected from local news, highlight the newscasters about to appear in the program.

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