View Full Version : Variety of old footage types in WGN show


old_tv_nut
12-25-2005, 10:21 PM
WGN (Channel 9 in Chicago) just aired a two-hour retrospective of their "classic" children's programming, including Bozo the Clown ("Bozo's Circus"), Ray Rayner, and "Garfield Goose".

http://wgntv.trb.com/wgntv-prog-bozogarray,0,5417529.story

The program included the widest variety of sources I have seen in one show; color tape with TK-41s and later cameras; mono kinescope recordings, some of them appparently made from old color tapes (you could see the banding in costumes known to be highly colored); and even some color kinescope recordings.

I recorded it off the Dishnetwork satellite feed onto a DVD recorder and simultaneously from a digital off air receiver onto another DVD recorder. The satellite feed version is long enough to contain the entire program, but may have some MPEG artifacts from the low bit rate that Dish uses. The off- air one went to a DVD recorder that I found out allows exactly 2 hours in the LP mode, so I lost the last minute or so of the program due to the clock being slightly early.

I thought they set the hue on the old tapes of TK-41 stuff a little toward green (reds slightly orange). Some of the TK-41 stuff went green on over-exposed highlights, but the camera registration looked good even in the corners (unlike the Howdy-Doody DVD). On some clips from the TK-41s, poor horizontal linearity was obvious when the camera was panned.

The color kinescope had an interesting and distinctly different quality, with the saturated colors apparently hitting the limit of what the film could do, "blocking up" in film parlance.

So far, I have not seen any plans to make copies of this program available for sale.

Dave A
12-25-2005, 10:54 PM
For the fans of WGN, check out a website with bunches of downloads;

www.wgngold.com

A great resource of their history. The above mentioned show is not there though. May be too new, but maybe a request to them may get it there. A quick look at their current schedule shows no repeats this week.

The brains behind all of this WGN programming is one Ward Quall, an old friend of mine and one of my heros in broadcasting. Now quite retired and living in Arizona, his tenure there dates from the 30's.

Wally Phillips rules,

Dave A

oldtvman
12-27-2005, 07:14 AM
i believe channel 9 started broadcasting color in 1961 the cubs and white sox games were in color back then, and all local programs and movies were in color. one of the first color programs i remember was ray raynor in the morning with bugs bunny cartoons all in color.