Movies for TV - Early Television Foundation

KINESCOPE RECORDING 123
New York time. This meant that the performers had to do the same
thing twice in one evening, and very often the two shows were not
exactly similar. Also, they were tired by midnight, or later, when it
was time to go on the air again. With the advent of magnetic tape
for recording, the repeat performances ceased and a record made
at the time of the broadcast is now played over the network lines
at the proper time. Sometimes it is made in New York, (or the city
where the show originates) sometimes it is made on the other side
and the middle of the country as well. Thus,
the central standard
time region can have its own recording to play at the proper time
and so can the other two time zones. This often helps to reduce line
costs.
So far television has not been in a position exactly paralleling
radio since the coaxial and micro-wave relay circuits do not yet
link the east and west coasts. There is a parallel in the extension of
the cable to St. Louis and Omaha, but because the time difference
is not three hours, the disparity is not as great. Most of the kinescope
recording systems installed to date, with the exception of that of
Paramount, do not provide instant, or even particularly rapid processing,
so that only with the Paramount system is it possible to show
a film within a few minutes of the time that it was recorded.
The requirements for a film recorder are more severe than for
a sound recording machine. As we have seen the eye is considerably
more critical than the ear and will reject pictures which are not first-
class. In addition to which, it tires much more readily. The condi-
tions under which the film is recorded do not lend themselves to
optimum results, and since the recorded picture can never be better
than the original, a poor reproduction will obviously be produced
if the latter is not of first-class definition and clarity.
To start with, we have a maximum of 525 lines per frame;
of these about 350 actually are usable in the picture. There is loss
of definition in the spreading of the lines in the fluorescent coating
of the screen. There is an additional loss of definition in the very
slight spreading of silver in the film emulsion. When the film is
reproduced, there is another loss in the resolution of the film camera
mosaic, and in the final presentation on the screen of the receiver,