Tempo Pre-School

Credits

Editions by
Michael Kenchington

Background

Tempo Pre-School was the pre-school imprint of Abbey Home Entertainment, Just Entertainment and Abbey Home Media.

1st Logo (4 March 1991-2005)

• 

Visuals: On a white background, we see a black-outlined oval with a drawing of a jack-in-the-box juggling three blue balls. The jack-in-the-box has red and yellow-green sides with red polka-dots clothing and a matching hat and a red spring. The box is blue with a yellow zigzag drawn on it. Above the jack-in-the-box is "Tempo pre-school" in red drawn font.

Technique: None.

Audio: None.

Audio Variant: On the 1995 UK VHS releases, it's the start of the Fun Song Factory opening theme.

Availability: Used for fourteen years on releases from the company. From 1996 until 2005, it would be used in tandem with the next logo.

• Mainly seen on promos for tapes in the Tempo Pre-School lineup during the early-to-mid 1990's, such examples include:
  • Read Along with Postman Pat and Postman Pat's ABC and 123 Stories.
  • The It's Fun to Learn with Spot trilogy ("Colours and Shapes", "Opposites and First Words", and "Alphabet, Counting and Telling the Time").
  • The Little Learners series (Mr. Men: The Great Alphabet Hunt, Paddington's Alphabet Treasure Hunt)
  • The A Day Full Of... series (A Day Full of Songs, A Day Full of Fun, A Day Full of Surprises and Songs and A Day Full of Animals and Songs)
  • Fun Song Factory and Fun Song Factory 2
  • Bump: My First Video and Bump and Friends
  • Spot Goes to the Farm and Storytime with Spot
  • A Bear Called Paddington, Paddington's Holiday Fun and Paddington Christmas Special.
• It also appears on several VHS compilation releases, such as My Favourite Playgroup Video, and NSPCC Children's TV Favourites Volume 2, respectively.
• The Oval-less version appears at the beginning on several Abbey DVD releases licensed to Prism Leisure, including Mr Men: The Great Alphabet Hunt, Paddington's Alphabet Treasure Hunt and for some reason, Mona the Vampire.
  • It also appears on several early Abbey Home Media releases, such as the 2002 DVD release of The Wonderful World of Nursery Rhymes.
• However, some later VHS reissues of these releases, and any DVD reissues plasters this logo with the next one instead.

2nd Logo (1996-2011)

• 

Visuals: We see a blue box with yellow zigzags around it, in a corner of a bedroom. The camera revolves to the front of it, then after a second, it shakes. It does so a few times, then a jack-in-the-box (in its same style as before) with two blue balls either side of its face and one on top jumps out (a la the Harveytoons logos) and sways forwards and backwards 3 times. The words "Tempo pre-school" appear in the same font and in an arc via shining light, then the bedroom corner changes to a white background with the Jack-in-the-box in an oval. The Abbey Home Entertainment logo appears at the bottom right corner of the screen.

Variant: On the DVD release of MacDonald's Farm - When I Grow Up, the logo is silent, and cuts off before the logo changes.

Technique: CGI.

Audio: A keyboard synth with a xylophone back-up, plus a quiet thudding sound when the box shakes, followed by a springing noise when the Jack-in-the-box jumps out. When the words appear via light, a twinkling sound occurs.

Availability: Appears on almost every release from the label at the time on both VHS and DVD from Abbey Home Entertainment, Just Entertainment, and Abbey Home Media:

• It appears on the Fun Song Factory releases Christmas at the Fun Song Factory, Party Time at the Fun Song Factory, and "The Fun Song Factory at Old MacDonald's Farm" ("Fun Song Factory: Fun and Games" and Fun Song Factory: Nursery Rhyme Land solely use the Tempo Video logo), as well as two tapes from the 1998 TV series: "Colours, Collywobbles, Hide and Seek" and "Please & Thank You/Picnic Time/Helping".
  • However, the 2002 reissues of the original live shows from Universal Pictures UK plaster this logo with theirs instead.
• It also plasters over the previous logo on DVD reissues of older VHS originals, and on some VHS reissues.
• Oddly enough, it also appears on Redwall: The Movie, which uses Tempo Video branding on the packaging.
• During the Just Entertainment era, this showed up on VHS releases of Polka Dot Shorts, Rolie Polie Olie and MacDonald's Farm.
• It also appears on compilation releases such as Bumper Favourites are a few other examples.
  • It does not, however, appear on Calling All Toddlers! and Calling All Toddlers! 2, respectively, which both have the Video Working for Children logo instead.
• On Abbey Home Media releases, this logo always follows the former company's logo.
  • As such, you can find it on VHS and DVD releases of Wide Eye, Pocket Dragon Adventures, Little People, Harry and his Bucketful of Dinosaurs, and Elmo's World: Wake Up With Elmo and Dancing, Music and Books!, among others.
  • It also appears on the 1996 UK VHS releases of The Happy Birthday Video and Bedtime Stories, the 2000 UK VHS releases of Baby Bright and Babar: King of the Elephants, and the 2001 UK VHS releases of Baby Bright 2 and Bump's Christmas Story, respectively, and also at the end of the 2000 UK VHS release of Rupert and the Song Snatcher and Other Stories from Tempo Video.
  • One of the last releases with this logo is Get Squiggling!: Animal Magic.