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Old 04-05-2017, 10:29 PM
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old_tv_nut old_tv_nut is offline
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Early testing of HD video coding

I'm starting this thread, prompted by the off-topic discussion of early HD cameras and VTRs in the thread http://www.videokarma.org/showthread...50#post3182050.

The BTS KCH-1000 cameras, modified to several different proposed image formats, were used to create otherwise identical video sequences for subjective testing. This involved live shoots at the then otherwise unused Ed Sullivan theater in New York, and also scans of ShowScan 60 fps film on a special telecine installed at Zenith.

The telecine consisted of a newly designed projector with a bed for mounting the BTS camera. Unfortunately, although the the projector seemed very sturdy, the weight of the camera at the end of the mounting bed made it oscillate enough to make the pictures unsteady. By this time, we could connect a camera to the 6 foot rack of the DVS solid state frame store, and capture 10 seconds of video, and then transfer it to the HDD 1000 Sony tape machine. The projector designer included a single frame stepping mode. So, I got to adapt an old Zenith/Heath computer to run a script, issuing RS-232 commands to the projector and the frame store. The film would be stepped, then after a one-second pause for vibrations to die down, the frame store would capture a frame(progressive) or field(interlaced). When ten seconds was accumulated, it could be transferred to the tape by assemble edit. I spent many nights to 3 am babysitting the transfers.

Unfortunately, there was an accident that ruined some of the film (scratched it badly), so that the test committee judged it unusable. What happened is that a visiting expert from Kodak decided to be helpful and change the film between runs; but he didn't know that the projector was designed (for some reason I will never know) to run the take-up reel in the opposite direction. He threaded the film the way most projectors work, and when it was turned on, the tension servo went open-loop and rapidly wound the film in a jumble onto the take-up reel. No-one was willing to pay for new prints (I guess Showscan had donated them from prints already in stock), so none of the scenes on that reel were ever used.
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