The Birth of the VTR
The Race Begins
The VCR took from many technologies in order to develop, most specifically the sound tape recorder. The same company who created the first international sound tape recorder, the
Model 200
, was the Ampex Corporation, and they also pioneered the development of the world’s first video tape recorder (VTR). The VRX-1000 used a similar magnetic tape as in the sound recorder, but the primary problem occurred in the amount of tape need to store a visual signal.
The first patent for the video technology occurred in
1927
when Boris Rtcheouloff described a technology where a visual signal would be recorded on magnetized tape similar to sound tape being developed by
Fritz Pfluemer
and the German company
AEG
. However, Rtcheouloff was never able to create a practical model of this video recording machine.
David Sarnoff, the head of RCA (whom NBC was a subsidiary), declared in 1951 that he wanted three inventions for the 50th anniversary of RCA that would take place five years later. They were an electric air conditioner, an electronic amplifier of light, and a "videograph" that was a "television picture recorder that would record the video signals of television on an inexpensive tape." (Wolpin p. 52) The major push for the development of the VTR came from the network’s cost of producing Kinescopes. Kines as they were called were a filmed reproduction of a television program. Through the use of Kines, the networks were able to delay the programming on the west coast of the US. However, the Kines had many problems, one being that the film had to be processed in a few hours in order to broadcast to the west coast. Also, since film operates at 24 frames per second, and television at 30 fps, their was a problem in trying to synchronize the video signal. The major problem with Kines was the expense where a half hour show could cost as much as $4,000. (Wolpin, p. 52)
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