VIDEO TAPE FORMATS By Stephen DaVega ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- AMPEX (quadraplex format) is an acronym, created by its founder, Alexander M. Pontiaff. It actually stands for (A)lexander (M). (P)oniatoff (Ex)cellence. Poniatoff's company was established in San Carlos, California in 1944 as the Ampex Electric and Manufacturing Company. Now Ampex Corporation is the parent company of Ampex Data Systems which manufactures digital archiving systems, principally for the broadcast industry. Ampex became a leader in magnetic recording technology, in both sound and video. Ampex was not a recording format, per se, but the company that invented the quadruplex format that dominated the broadcast industry for decades. The format was licensed to RCA (Radio Corporation of America) for use in their "television tape recorders" and Ampex's invention revolutionized the television industry by eliminating the kinescope process of archiving television programs on motion picture film (at least in the U.S.; in Britain, the BBC and most of the ITV companies continued to use kinescoping alongside videotape until the late 1960s; in most developing countries, many television broadcasters continued to use kinescoping alongside videotape until the mid-1970s). The Ampex broadcast video tape recorder also facilitated time-zone broadcast delay so that networks could air programming at the same hour in various time zones. One of the key engineers in the development of the quadruplex video recorder for Ampex was Ray Dolby, who went on to form Dolby Laboratories, a pioneer in audio noise reduction systems. The first magnetically-recorded time-delayed network television program using the new Ampex Quadruplex recording system was CBS's "Douglas Edwards and the News" on November 30, 1956. CBSs first color logo, which debuted in the fall of 1965. Since the early 1950s, Bing Crosby and others tried to record video on very fast- moving magnetic tape. One semi-successful attempt was the BBC's VERA format. Only Ampex had the wisdom to rotate the heads at high speed and keep tape movement slow. The "Quad" head assembly has 4 heads that rotate at 14,400 rpm. They write the video vertically across the width of a tape that is 2 inches (5 cm) wide and runs at 15" (38cm) per second. This allows programs of one hour to be recorded on one reel of tape. But in 1956 one reel of tape cost $300 (equivalent to $2000 in 2004). The machines themselves cost about $75-100,000 (about a half a million dollars today). So the only videotaped archives that exist are network programs as the typical television station could not afford an Ampex VTR. Ampex had trademarked the name "Video Tape", so competitor RCA called the medium "TV Tape" or "Television Tape". The terms eventually became genericized, and "videotape" is commonly used today. In 1948, ABC used an Ampex Model 200 audio recorder for the first-ever U.S. tape delay radio broadcast of The Bing Crosby Show. In 1950, Ampex introduced the first "dedicated" instrumentation recorder, Model 500, built for the U.S. Navy. In 1967, ABC used the Ampex HS-100 disk recorder for playback of slow-motion downhill skiing on World Series of Skiing in Vail, Colorado. Thus began the use of slow motion instant replay in sporting events. Also, that year, Ampex introduced the Ampex VR-3000 portable broadcast video recorder, which revolutionized the recording of high-quality television in the field, without the need for long cables and large support vehicles. Broadcast quality images could now be shot anywhere, including out of airplanes, helicopters and boats. In 1970, Ampex introduced the ACR-25, the first automated robotic library system for the recording and playback of television commercials. Each commercial was recorded on an individual cartridge. These cartridges were then loaded into large rotating carousels. Using sophisticated mechanics and compressed air, the "carts" were able to be loaded into and extracted from the machine at extremely high speed. This allowed TV stations to re-sequence commercial breaks at a moments notice, adding, deleting and rearranging commercials at will. The TV newsroom also began to use the ACR-25 to run news stories because of its random access capability. From the earliest days of the medium, television has been used as a vehicle for advertising in some countries. ... The Ampex video system is now obsolete. Those machines which still survive have been pressed into service to transfer recordings onto modern digital video formats. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8mm: 8mm (official name: Video8) is a type of video cassette recorder and video tape format originally developed by EIAJ (Electronic Industries Association of Japan) and others in 1983. 8mm camcorders often are similar to higher priced HI-8 units, having compact size, image stabilization, and digital zooms. Regular 8mm tapes are the exact size and shape as their HI8 counterparts, but record video at a lower resolution level, and therefore, are less expensive. 8mm has a maximum tape length of 120 minutes in SP mode or 240 minutes in LP mode and has a resolution of up to 270 lines. The video quality is somewhat better than that of the VHS format. Kodak released its first 8mm camcorder in 1983/84 w/255 lines of resolution. The tapes generally are either 60 minutes or 120 minutes long. One of the major drawbacks of the format is that the tapes are incompatible with VHS VCRs. 8MM (and Hi-8) tapes cannot be put into a standard VHS video recorder, a common misconception. Because the tape size is different than a standard VHS tape, it is not possible to make an adapter for the tapes that would fit in a VHS VCR. There are no adapters to achieve this. They must be transferred to VHS in order to be viewed on a regular VCR. 8mm is mainly used with video cameras and was until recently one of the dominant formats for video cameras. 8mm cameras were popular because the small tape size meant video cameras using this format could be much smaller than cameras using the VHS format. The tapes are about the size of an audio cassette, making the format popular for travel when space is at a premium. There were attempts to move the format over to the home VCR market as a replacement for VHS tapes. 8mm VCRs were manufactured, and even some 8mm tape versions of some movies were sold. However these attempts were generally not successful, and until the price of DVDs fell to reasonable levels, VHS remained the dominant format for home use. The 8mm video format was standardized in 1984. Sony introduced the Handycam, one of the first cameras to record on to 8mm video tapes. This type of camera soon became more popular than the more bulky VHS camcorder. 8mm is still a fairly popular format for video cameras, however it has currently been superseded by miniDV, also referred to as DV. It is also worth noting that 8mm tapes (like all videotape) will eventually deteriorate and lose their recorded contents over time. Tapes that are older than 10 years may start to degrade. Amongst other problems, they can become sticky and jam playback units or become brittle and snap. It is recommended that footage archived on the 8mm format, be transferred to miniDV (for future editing) or DVD (for long term optical archiving). Like all videotape, 8mm tapes should be stored vertically out of direct sunlight, in a dry, cool dust free environment. : HI- 8 originally developed by Sony in 1989, an analog video recording and playback format for camcorders that uses enhanced 8mm videocassettes (metal evaporated or metal particle tape). Hi-8 has an optional second AFM track for stereo sound and a maximum tape length of 120 minutes in SP mode. HI-8 tapes can be bought in 30, 60, and 120-minute lengths. HI-8 camcorders record their signal at at 415 lines of resolution, slightly less than Mini DV, but substantially higher than 8mm or regular VHS formats. Most often, HI-8 camcorders record sound in hi-fi stereo. Slight quality loss is suffered when copying or editing from HI-8, but a better than average image is maintained. Tapes from HI-8 camcorders generally must be played using the camera as the source, as Hi-8 tape players are rare. which means the user often must connect cables to their television or VCR. With 415 lines of horizontal resolution, Hi8 provides superior quality to the original 270-line 8mm format as well as VHS tape. DIGITAL8: Digital8 was originally developed by Sony in 1999. Digital8 records the same digital signal as DV onto less expensive Hi8 tapes. Hi-8 camcorders are backwards compatible and play back Video8 and Hi8 tapes. Hi-8 is forwards compatiable as well, able to use 8mm and Hi-8 cassesttes. Digital8 uses DV compression atop the existing Video8/Hi8 technological base. Digital8 records on Video8 or Hi8 tapes, but these run at twice their normal speed and thus hold half the time listed on the label. Digitlal8 cameras usually have analog inputs for digitally archiving existing analog footage. Audio is CD-quality. Only available as camcorders, not decks. is a format that is far superior to HI-8 or 8MM. Digital8 will records up to 500 lines of resolution. Digital8 will also play back existing Video8 and Hi8 tapes, even over 1394/i.link, allowing such tapes to be read into NLEs (at least, those for which the lack of timecode is not an issue -- batch capture utilities are unlikely to work, since Video8/Hi8 timecodes are not sent across the 1394 connection). Digital8 is a camcorder-only format as of Spring 1999; no VTRs are expected.