Crowds listen as President George W. Bush speaks after taking the oath of office for his second term on Jan. 20, 2005, in Washington. Plans for President-elect Barack Obama’s inauguration on Jan. 20 are taking shape.

New York Times / VINCENT LAFORET

With less than two weeks to go until a historic presidential inauguration, the nation’s television networks are finalizing ambitious coverage plans, but the camera platforms will be more crowded than usual.

At least a dozen networks, including relative political neophytes like BET and MTV, will be broadcasting from Washington. Nickelodeon is even sending two pint-size reporters, and QVC, a shopping channel, is setting up at one of the inaugural balls while it tries to sell memorabilia associated with the swearing-in of Barack Obama, the nation’s first black president, on Tuesday, Jan. 20.

“You can feel the excitement in the air,” said Phil Alongi, the executive producer of specials for NBC News.

Sean McManus, the president of CBS News, said the network’s stations have shown strong interest in televising every hour of the proceedings. In fact, when the news division floated the possibility of ending network coverage in the early afternoon, under the assumption that the parade would start to seem repetitious, some of the stations objected.

“We had a lot of affiliates who said that on this historic day they’d rather be doing inauguration coverage than pretty much anything else,” McManus said.

David Bohrman, the Washington bureau chief for CNN, said the network’s coverage would be longer and more exhaustive than in previous years. “People around the world are going to watch this event,” he said.

As in previous years, the coverage on ABC, CBS, NBC and the cable news networks will run from 10 a.m. until the early evening. The day will be bookended with special editions of morning shows and special reports in prime time. Fox will offer a feed of the Fox News Channel to its affiliates.

Networks also see entertainment value in the inauguration week. HBO will be the exclusive broadcaster of an “opening celebration” on Sunday, Jan. 18, the inaugural committee said on Tuesday. That concert event will be available to all cable subscribers. Such a deal is not unprecedented: In 1993, for instance, HBO paid to carry part of a Sunday concert celebrating Bill Clinton’s first inauguration. In an age of countless news media options, television remains the primary medium for translating the pageantry of an inauguration to the American people. This year’s event is expected to draw unusually large audiences.

“It’s a historic time and a historic president facing historic challenges,” said George Stephanopoulos, a co-anchor of ABC’s coverage of the event, along with Charles Gibson and Diane Sawyer.

Partly to avoid the logistical hurdles that are expected on Inauguration Day, ABC and CNN will broadcast from the Newseum, a recently reopened museum dedicated to the free press on Pennsylvania Avenue. MSNBC, meanwhile, will have a portable studio on the Mall, where it intends to interact with the crowd. Fox News did not respond to a request for comment.

Niche channels that are not known for politics are also making plans. Two cable channels that feature programs for black viewers, BET and TV One, say they will celebrate the inauguration with hours of live coverage. Nickelodeon’s two young correspondents will report from the inauguration. MTV will be broadcasting a special on that Tuesday evening that will focus on Obama’s call to community service, including broadcasts from New Orleans and a town in Kenya.

C-SPAN, the cable channel of record on Capitol Hill, will telecast the inauguration in full, beginning with Obama’s train ride on Jan. 17 from Philadelphia to Washington. On the eve of the inauguration, when Obama and others participate in a day of service to commemorate Martin Luther King’s Birthday, C-SPAN will show archived speeches from past inaugurations.

With millions expected to travel to Washington, the inaugural committee has repeatedly advised would-be attendees to stay home and watch the proceedings on television. Attendees without tickets will be standing on the Mall and watching the event on big-screen televisions, Alongi noted, so “why not sit in the comfort of your home with your family?”

Given the expected crowds, the pool of networks that share camera feeds is adding cameras to the area. Along with the traditional camera inside the Washington Monument will be a new one that faces the Lincoln Memorial, Alongi said.

Producers want to ensure that the broadcasts acknowledge the historic nature of the day. To that end, expect to see shots from a long-lens camera that stretches from the Capitol, where Obama will be sworn in, all the way to the Lincoln Memorial, where the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. ended his march on Washington 45 years ago.

Historic images will also play a role in the proceedings. CBS said in a news release on Tuesday that Change and Challenge, a special report at 9 on the night of the inauguration, would include images of the civil rights movement as it traces the “journey to the inauguration.”

An hour after CBS’ special report, ABC and NBC will broadcast special reports at 10. The cable networks can also be expected to offer late-night coverage of the inaugural balls. MSNBC expects to be live until at least midnight.

The prime-time coverage of the inaugural balls will face stiff competition on Fox in the form of that other classic American election, American Idol.