Now and Then

From huge shoulder-mounted camcorders to smartphones; from mega tape-to-tape editing suites to simple computer editing; from VHS distribution to the internet; from streaming video to instant YouTube uploading, video has come a long way!

When Videomaker magazine first hit the newstands in 1986, video cameras were just beginning to make a foothold in consumer’s homes. Our first few issues were full of stories about those darn “Format Wars” – Beta vs. VHS, remember that concern? In fact Beta versus VHS was so prevalent at the time that we devoted full issues to each format, along with VHS-C and 8mm. Although each format was very different, they all shot video using the same physical recording device: videotape.

VHS-C was featured in our June issue 1986 issue and 8mm (Video8) in August, followed by VHS in October 1987.  Of the 58 camcorders featured the average price was a whopping $1646. Only one camcorder was priced under $1000, the Zenith VM6150 “Sharpshooter” VHS. Tthe Minolta CR-8000S 8mm camcorder was the only one that topped the $2000 mark at $2186. Imagine that! Today, you can get a pretty beefy camcorder for $1600, and a pro-level cam for $2000!

We featured only 2 Beta format camcorders and we had a sidebar that stated: “Beta camcorders remain a viable option for quality minded video producers. Boasting the highest resolution among consumer-level formats, (until the arrivals of Super-VHS and ED Beta,) and benefiting from excellent format-specific editing capabilities, Beta is especially practical for dubbing to other formats.”

Although Beta was a superior format, VHS eventually won out do to price and availability, although, if you ask me, $1600 in 1986 was a VERY high price for a ‘toy’ for the average household. Not a lot of “Video Memories” were being made back then – not by the average family, at any rate – but that was just the beginning. As soon as the prices started to drop and the cameras became easier to use with better quality, the video genie was out of the bottle and not about to go back. Consider the quality we have now for a sub-$300 camera, it really blows one’s mind!

Since then the omnipresent video of today has surely changed not only the way people keep precious memories of their family’s lives, but has changed the world – as recent events in the Middle East has shown us.

So for a “blast from the past,” let’s take a look at a few numbers to compare how camcorder sales have affected the way people track events around them using video cameras.

In the Early Years – Growth
In the Fall 1987 issue of Videomaker, we wrote: “The Electronic Industries Association reports, ‘in terms of percentage growth, the hottest video hardware product is the camcorder.’ For the first six months of 1987, camcorder sales totaled more than 580,000 units. The statistic reflects a 49 percent jump over the previous year.”

In 1990, Newtek introduced the Video Toaster, considered the first non-linear editing system. It wasn’t long after that that Videomaker began dividing its editing features between tape-to-tape editing and non-linear editing tips. Non-linear was clunky, processor heavy, and expensive; computers were pricey and few people wanted to go that route. The TV station I worked at then was a test market for a lot of industry products and we were one of the first in the country to work on the Toaster. It was the first time I’d touched a computer and it was a bit daunting. Tape-to-tape seemed so much faster, but that changed in time.

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Courtesy: philotfarnsworth.com

Eighty-four years ago, the first known video transmission was made from an idea conceived by a child who was only 14 years old. August marks the birth of the man known as the Father of Television – Philo T. Farnsworth – and it seems fitting to tell a bit of his tale.

Was he a child prodigy? Or just a visionary with the drive to make something of his vision? Growing up in a home without electricity, one can imagine he might have had ‘power sources’ on his mind a lot.

Born 105 years ago in 1906, it’s an interesting fact that as popular and worldwide his invention has become, he’s not very well-known at all, and in fact lived his life in obscurity and died nearly penniless.

Farnsworth came up with the idea of picture transmission when he was 14 years old* and showed his chemistry teacher sketches for a vacuum tube that would electronically copy images on a screen, one line at a time. His first transmission was a 60-horizontal line image of a dollar bill and he subsequently applied for and earned the patent for an all-electronic TV in 1927. Electronics engineers at the time were testing other methods of transmitting images using spinning discs.

In the 1930s,engineers at RCA (Radio Corporation of America) were in the process of inventing a different type of television using a cathode tube and he became embroiled in a decade-long legal war that ended with RCA paying Farnsworth a million dollars for royalties for patent licenses for several of his inventions including TV scanning, syncing, and contrast control.

Many of Farnsworth’s 165 patents for electronic inventions include amplifiers, a system for air traffic control, night vision devices, radar and cathode-ray and vacuum tubes.

As remarkable as it sounds, television is still a ‘young’ invention – and is already disappearing form many households today. Farnsworth passed away in 1971, just when his invention was really starting to get a firm foothold in American households. Farnsworth didn’t gain wealth from his invention, and, in fact, spent his lifetime fighting to hold claim to the patent, and his wife continued to fight the battle until her death.

Want to see the man talk about his work? Here’s a YouTube clip of him on the TV classic “I’ve Got a Secret” from the 1950s.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKM4MNrB25o After everyone is amazed that the inventor of TV was such an unknown man, notice what he says about TV at 6:15 on this clip. He talks about the ”future” of TV, including better utilization of the bandwidth, hoping to expand it to 2000 lines rather than 525 lines, visual memory, and flat screens – this is Hi Def, folks! It took four decades longer to get this. What a visionary.

I love history, and the history of television in particular, and although TV might be approaching the end of it’s life as we know it, as video producers we all owe a bit of gratitude to Philo T. Farnsworth for his vision and amazing mind.

If you want to read more history of TV or video, check out LabGuy’s site: http://www.labguysworld.com/ Among other things he has his very own museum of “Extinct Devices” including his collection of old video tape recorders and old video cameras. Hum… I wonder if he’d be interested in that old Panasonic VHS cam sitting on our “museum shelf”.

* Some reports say Farnsworth was 15 or 16, but he says he was 14 on the “I’ve Got a Secret” show mentioned in this report.

PHOTO CREDIT: Farnsworth Archives, philotfarnsworth.com

Videomaker is celebrating 25 years of helping people make better video! Join us this Thursday, June 2 at 5:30 PM PST at ustream.tv/channel/vm25anniversary as Videomaker founder and publisher Matt York looks back on a quarter century of helming the nation’s premiere video training resource. This is a special presentation just for Videomaker fans and readers, so we hope you’ll join us!

Ever since the first movies caught the public eye, people have dreamed of harnessing the power of moving pictures to tell their own stories. There was once a time when, unless you had some connection to either the Hollywood film industry or professional television, there was virtually no way to get your message in front of an audience. The advent of home video technology changed all that. Suddenly, it was possible for ANYONE to be a movie maker. All across the world, ordinary people began to discover their own potential, becoming documentarians, citizen journalists and indie movie directors or just using video to document their own lives for fun. Community activists could turn the spotlight on vital overlooked issues, young directors could create professional-grade movies in their own backyards, and new parents could record their childrens’ first steps for posterity.

It was in those heady days when that first generation of videographers was just discovering its new potential that one young upstart video enthusiast had a dream: Matt York wanted to create a magazine to help ordinary people to master video technology. The result was Videomaker, the first magazine dedicated to home video enthusiasts and prosumers. Today, Videomaker is still going strong. Although it’s still dedicated to the same core mission – helping people make better video – it’s changed in ways that Matt never could have foreseen. Today’s Videomaker is more than just a magazine: It’s also a thriving Internet community, a series of online webinars and live workshops, and a line of trusted expert training DVDs. Looking back, it’s hard to believe how far we’ve come!

This week, we’re taking a moment to really think about all the changes we’ve seen. From the rise of the Internet to the dawn of digital video, the video world is astonishingly different than it was in 1986. No one knows this better than Videomaker publisher Matt York, who has personally overseen the creation of every single Videomaker issue since we first began printing 25 years ago. Join us this Thursday as Matt reflects back on the history of video and Videomaker, how it’s changed over a quarter century and – perhaps more importantly – how it’s stayed the same. Check out
ustream.tv/channel/vm25anniversary Thursday at 5:30 p.m. PST to view live streaming video of this event.