United American Video Corporation

Logo descriptions by Michael Bass, Brillemeister, StephenCezar15 and PAV123

Logo captures by Brillemeister, Midaba2004, Livin', Eric S., and SuperMuppet

Editions by Brillemeister, mr3urious, V of Doom, Nathan B. and StephenCezar15

Video captures courtesy of Brillemeister and Xpk951

1st Logo (1984-89)
Logo: On a background consisting of an American flag, a white rectangle flips forward into view. Inside of the rectangle is a red segmented upside down trapezoid with a star in the middle and the blue script text "United American Video" also in the middle. The logo zooms back towards the top of the screen as it is replaced by a grey background with a red, white and blue line. Beneath the line is the white text, "For better picture quality, adjust tracking control on VCR."

FX/SFX: The flipping of the rectangle and the wiping transitions...

Cheesy Factor: ...which are very cheap, especially for the time period.

Music/Sounds: None.

Availability: Extremely rare. Not all tapes used this logo, so be on the lookout.

Scare Factor: None, thanks to the silence and the effects, but it's far tamer than what followed in later years.

2nd Logo (1989-91)
Logo: On a mostly blue gradient starry background with black in the top right corner, we see an American flag come out of nowhere and zoom out at the top of the screen. We then see a brief shine where the American flag zoomed out, and the large letters "UAV," which are blue with red stripes and are meant to resemble the American flag form after the shine. After this, we see a white star zoom out and rest on the "A." The text "United American Video Corp." appears below the letters.

Variant: On some tapes, the text is not shown at all.

FX/SFX: The American flag zooming out, the shine, the letters forming, the star zooming out, the appearance of the text below. It's an immense improvement from the previous logo.

Music/Sounds: A tremendous "whoosh" sound that slowly increases in volume. This is something that should only be heard on low volume.

Availability: Uncommon. Seen on some tapes of The Andy Griffith Show and some public domain cartoon tapes. It was also spotted on a VHS of Southern Comfort.

Scare Factor: Medium to high, due to the whoosh, but it got even worse with the next logo...

3rd Logo (1991-96)
Nicknames: “Whoosh of Death”, "The Palindrome Logo", "UAV from Hell"

Logo: Against a black background, a giant, two-toned blue letter A comes lazily sweeping from the back, joined by (turning around, in small white font) the letters making up the word "CORPORATION", and from the sides by the letters "U" and "V". A red bar indented with the word "CORPORATION" comes up from the opposite direction, spinning slowly like an axle, until it stops to interlock with those letters. The entire logo then immediately shifts to face toward the upper left and pauses for about 1.5 seconds; then the entire animation plays in reverse. (like a palindrome, meaning one half of the logo is playing forward, and the other half is played backward).

FX/SFX: The multiple rotating CG letters and bar, the slow zooming.

Cheesy Factor: This logo suggests that the designers really wanted to use their new computers just for the thrill of it. Sadly, CG logos are no longer so thrilling, nor were they even when this was made. Also, it looks almost excruciatingly corporate, and the animation playing in reverse midway through seems like this company didn't have that large of a budget to begin with!

Music/Sounds: Same as the previous logo.

Availability: Can be found on tapes of this era, especially public domain cartoon tapes as well as some old Davey & Goliath tapes. These are easy to spot out, because the logo covers most of the video cover. It also appeared on the 8 min. series of workout tapes.

Scare Factor: High to nightmare. To put it simply, the black background, slow giant letters, and loud noise, all combine to make one feel as though they've seen something blow up. Some tapes make it even worse by making this the first thing shown on the VHS.

4th Logo (1996-98)
Nicknames: "UAV in Space", "The Palindrome Logo in Space"

Logo: A supernova (a large explosion from space) happens on a black background. The UAV logo in the previous logo, this time with "ENTERTAINMENT" in gold lettering on the red bar, flies into view. Once the logo is into place, light beams come out of it, and pans ever so slightly towards us. The supernova (as well as the light beams) then disappears, leaving the UAV logo on a black background.

FX/SFX: CGI animation.

Music/Sounds: An explosion sound, then a truncated whoosh sound from the previous logo (which is much softer), then a synth note.

Availability: Seen on some Gilad tapes.

Scare Factor: Medium. The explosion from the beginning of the logo will throw people off, but it's mellower than the previous logos.

Final Note: Later on, UAV became Sterling Entertainment Group.