Descriptions by bigrene2, mimitchi33 and Henrynguye5
Captures by SuperMuppet, TrickyMario7654, CrazySpruiker2001 and Henrynguye5
Editions by mr3urious, Jonathan Hendricks, mimitchi33, SuperMuppet, TrickyMario7654, DaVinci101, Henrynguye5, Blue2000, Michael Kenchington and TheRealMarcel2000
Video captures courtesy of SantaBob, Digital media resources and retro VHS trailers
Background
Gullane Entertainment was formed in September 2000 after Britt Allcroft left her self-named company. Before the formation, Allcroft used the Gullane name to produce the feature film Thomas and the Magic Railroad, which failed critically and commercially after its release, leading to her leaving the company. The newly-formed Gullane continued production of Seasons 6 and 7 of Thomas and Friends as well as other franchises, such as Sooty, Fireman Sam, and Art Attack. The company was acquired by HIT Entertainment on July 5, 2002, but it didn't close until 2003. The name is still used today for its in-credit and byline variants for most Thomas & Friends media despite the company's closure.
Logo: Fading in over waves passing by the camera, a reflection of a seagull is seen flying about. The camera moves upwards to reveal a sunset, with the gull shown in full. It starts to veer to the right, then starts to flap its wings while being doused among a white light. Then the gull turns into a metallic teal silhouette and a yellow arc draws in to finish the logo. While that happens, several lights appear and morph into the silver letters "GULLANE PICTURES" and then shines before cutting to black.
Technique: CGI.
Music/Sounds: Just sounds of the waves, the seagull squawking and flapping, and metallic screeching. Chimes can also be heard at the end.
Availability: Only appears on Thomas and the Magic Railroad.
2nd Logo (December 1, 2000-2003)
Logo: We start off zooming in towards the horizon over a body of blue water, with the horizon having fluffy clouds and the sun in the distance. A white gull flies over the ocean as the camera turns towards the spot, and when it touches the water with the tip of its wing, it creates a ripple and flies off. The screen rotates upwards to reveal that the ripple is a wide white "G", and with it clearing up, it gets placed in a teal box as well as "GULLANE" in a similar font to the "G" below, albeit at a normal width. The gull then flies over the logo and flashes, turning silver as the background flourishes to a white-aquamarine gradient. An underline and "ENTERTAINMENT" in a different font also appear below.
Variants:
On Eckhart, the completed logo shines with a reversed cymbal crash.
On the voiceover variant, once the logo finishes animating, it fades to black and the white URL "www.planetgullane.com" fades in.
Such examples include the US releases of Thomas' Trackside Tunes, Best of Thomas , Best of Percy and Best of James, and the UK releases of Truck Loads of Fun, Seasonal Scrapes, the My Little Thomas and Friends VHS releases, and the VHS version of The Very Best of Thomas & Friends, respectively.
It was also tacked onto the beginning of very early prints of the show's sixth series, as seen on the UK DVD release of The Fogman and Other Stories, the US DVD release of Salty's Secret & Other Thomas Adventures. and the Australian DVD release of Thomas and the Jet Engine, respectively.
This logo also appears on a 2002 Marks and Spencer UK VHS re-release of Thomas & Friends: Thomas Goes Fishing and Other Stories from VCI as well.
Outside Thomas and Friends related content, this logo was also tacked onto several other UK VHS releases of their content - appearing on Art Attack: Monsters and Other Scary Stuff, and the Sooty's Magic direct-to-video series, consisting of Sooty's Magic Show, Sooty's Magic Club and the extremely rare Sooty's Magic Birthday Party.
The short version appeared on at least UK airings of Eckhart.
Even though Gullane was involved with those two shows, this logo does not appear on either Sooty Heights or Sooty 2001, which instead use the Sooty Limited and Granada logos, respectively.
Variant: On early prints of Thomas & Friends season 6, the Gullane Entertainment logo just fades in.
Technique: 2D animation.
Music/Sounds: Usually the ending theme of the show, but on Thomas & Friends: Building the New Line for PC, the sounds of an engine puffing, three distorted dings, and various steam whistles are heard.
Availability: Very rare.
The early variant appears on early prints of Season 6 of Thomas & Friends and early Thomas DVDs like The Fogman and Other Stories; the normal variant appears on the Thomas PC game Building the New Line.
More recent DVD prints of Thomas & Friends Season 6 plaster this over with the 2000 HIT Entertainment logo.