Television's opening night on BBC 4

[Gubbins]

I had to switch it off after 20 minutes.
The presentation was childish.
Even the camera angles had one looking up at the presenters.

Marks: Unclassified.

[Andrew2]

Originally Posted by dave walsh

I hope the "footage" that remains unseen is not wiped-the Irony would be too much really.

I was thinking the same myself. It would be nice to see the stuff that PaulM refers to packaged up and perhaps shown on a special 'Birth of TV Extra' show, a bit like those Big Brother or Strictly Come Dancing supplements. Late night on BBC4 would do.

[stevehertz]

Originally Posted by dave walsh

Taking on board the expected criticism's as outlined here, all of which are probably justified to some extent, I thought it was much better than I'd expected-for a general audience.

1. For once it seemed to give JLB a much better description than is usually the case, going some way to illustrate the prejudice against him [notwithstanding that the mechanical system was domed to failure] and the shameful way in which he was treated by all and sundry, especially the ejection from his own Company by someone tactfully described as a strong character. The information that he wasn't even invited to the opening Ceremony might point the average viewer to a greater recognition and understanding I thought it would be "focussed" on EMI but that wasn't the case. I would have liked a reference to the Baird Colour transmissions or a question re that to the amazing Mr Reveley but I recognise it would be considered outside the scope of this program. There was a welcome brief reference to the fact that he actually went on to do other things, rather than just an impression of overall failure, which is how it will often come across.

Dave W

I'm just not getting the preoccupation with Baird given that the programme was to celebrate 80 years of TV and certainly nothing at all to do with colour - experimental or otherwise. Regarding the broadcasting equipment and chosen system it should have given a 50/50 account of the 'race', maybe even majoring on the EMI system, which after all is the one that 'won' and was adopted, and it's electronically scanned system is still in use today albeit in updated form. Don't forget, 405 line broadcasts lasted from 1936 until 1986 (?) - some 50 years! To me, it's like comparing a steam driven vehicle with an internal combustion engined one. Yes they both propel vehicles but the one is streets ahead of the other, and yes, still in use today. To sum up, it was a programme about mechanically scanned television (and amateurishly done on that note) plus a decent nod in the direction of the first broadcast.

[Tractorfan]

Hi,
If anyone is still interested in watching it, it's on again this evening at 10pm on BBC4.
Cheers, Pete.

[McMurdo]

I enjoyed it despite the valid criticism shown here. Seeing inside the old rooms of Alexandra Palace and the lovely art deco former cinema (now arts centre) was worth a look; the ride up the mast tower in the vintage lift; seeing Paul M on the screen with his collection after wandering through his website many a time not knowing who he was; spying all the vintage tellies 'behind' people in various collections as they talked, interviews with people who were there all that time ago, and watching really clever people find out just how inventive people could be in days gone by. The prof was getting quite emotional at the end, you could feel the struggle he'd had. Don't delete it Graham, give it a chance!

edit: here are some of the university's pic & video files taken during filming

http://www2.eng.cam.ac.uk/~hemh1/logiebaird/

[Freya]

Just finished watching it, to my mind, its aimed at people who know nothing about televisions origins. Hence why so many enthusiasts are up in arms.
Also noted that contributors like Jeffery B and Paul M don't get mentioned in the credits.

[dseymo1]

Aside from the programme's merits or otherwise, does anyone know why Baird bothered with the live flying spot system at all for their demo? Surely the whole show, including the continuity announcements could have been done via the wet film system.
In any case, Baird had previouly televised horse races and such, presumably using a Nipkow disk equipped camera. I appreciate that this was in lower definition, but what was the obstacle to developing that system for high-def studio use?
At least the programme set me thinking about such things, which can't be all bad!

[OscarFoxtrot]

I was also disappointed by the end credits which scrolled far too fast (which is usual nowadays) as it would have been nice to see some of who / what and where was involved in the programme.

It wasn't up to the standards of early 1980s Open University programming though.

[AidanLunn]

Originally Posted by PaulM

I had high hopes of this, but my fears came home to roost. The BBC just can't be trusted to take this topic seriously and is unable to make a good job of it. I've said that for years now, and whilst this effort was better, in my view, it still failed.

I feel I should point at this point that this wasn't made by the BBC, it was made by an independent company. Sure, the BBC share some responsibility but I've always believed most responsibility belongs to the person or group whose fault the failure is. So the production company should take most of the blame, they planned and made the thing. I won't delve too much into the politics but my hint here is that it strikes me strange that when the trend changed from production being in-house from broadcasters to being commissioned from independents, especially after at least 25% of programming being commissioned from independents was made law by the Broadcasting Act 1990, overall programme quality of British TV began to decline sharply.

*****

My review follows, but I should point out that I was falling asleep from about the mid-way mark as I've been on early shifts all week. I couldn't miss this, though, so I thought I'd use the occasion to "inaugurate" my recently-finished Ekco TMB272, instead of missing it and watching it another night. So as I was nodding off and I haven't seen the complete programme yet, my review is based on what I've seen, probably about 80% of the programme.



I too share a feeling that the producers didn't really know what to do with this or who it was really aimed at as a result but it seems to me that this was trying to aim more at the casual viewer or the wider television historian rather than TV collectors or TV technology historians (of which we have many on here).

I don't mind the out-of-place sets, as long as they are not *too* out of place. I think a TV22 in this kind of documentary, while a bit irritating, is far more acceptable than a set with its guts taken out or a 1960s set. At least the TV22 has a little "art deco" about its design, so it wouldn't have looked too out of place if you don't know quite as much as we do about these things.

The only thing I found very irritating was the show giving the impression that the pictures were fuzzy and appallingly poor. No doubt some noise would have been present on the first night's transmissions, but not so much you could barely make out what was on the screen! I think that's a result of some researcher looking at poor quality off-screen photographs from the time and assuming that's how the TV picture actually looked.

That's the nitpicking over, otherwise I think this was a decent production. Not quite what I was expecting, as I was expecting more but given what we received we do have more than some other documentaries covering the topic have given us. At least they tried to get the studio technology as correct as they realistically could do on a BBC Four budget (i.e. the size of an ant's nit). I did not go into this expecting a Hollywood blockbuster budget to spend on R&D and recreating that first night, although I was slightly disappointed that they didn't at least do something more with Ally Pally than a visit, but I suppose they couldn't do much with it.

What I also was impressed by was their attempt to get what was broadcast accurate. The recreation of the opening announcement was impressive enough, but the uncovering of the original audio recording of the opening speeches elicited a small "wow!" from me. Then there was the 54-second delay between the end of the Baird programmes and the closing announcements. It's that level of detail that makes me unsure what audience this was aiming for, unless it tried to aim itself to as wide an audience as possible. Those aiming for a more general audience don't tend to focus on that detail - the episode of that Jeremy Clarkson series "Inventions that Changed the World" didn't even mention the intermediate film technique! And that rates slightly better than this in my estimation. Even the project as a whole - to recreate the opening night of television - is a novel idea. I know it has been recreated before, in Fools on the Hill, but that was a backdrop to a love story, not the main attraction, and that is why I find Fools on the Hill of little interest beyond the shots inside the studio and the control gallery.

I will re-view the programme over my coming weekend off, so I may post a re-review, but I think it deserves an entirely fair 5/10, for ranging from the totally predictable to the completely unexpected (to me, at least).

But there was still much room for improvement. What about a complete recreation of the opening night as seen in addition to the documentary about how it was done? I would much rather see a recreation as the viewers at home saw it. At least that Professor Danielle more than made up for the less interesting bits

[PaulM]

A conventional Nipkow disc-based camera for 240 lines would be a nightmare! The disc would be the same size as the flying spot one and the light required to illuminate the subject would be horrendous. A Nipkow disc has no 'storage' (an iconoscope does), so each individual pixel is 'instant' and there is no frame time integration. This was the reason for going to flying spot as it reverses the scheme and only illuminates the scene spot by spot.

BTL's (Baird Television Ltd) big hope for live TV was Philo Farnsworth's Image Dissector which can be viewed as similar in principle to a Nipkow disc with no moving parts. They had one at the opening, but there's debate about whether it was used. Farnsworth's Image Dissectors were small, light, clever and as blind as bat! As with a mechanical Nipkow disc, there was no storage and the light needed was enormous. There was also a problem with scan geometry with contemporary reports saying that the picture was 'banana shaped'. For live TV, ('direct TV' in the jargon of the day), BTL had few sensible options. Very soon after the AP trial they produced their own iconoscope and camera but they couldn't use it due to the patents which belonged to RCA.

BTL wanted to do 'Films to the home' which suited their owner's (Gaumont British) and played to their strength - the telecine. Marconi-EMI fell in with the BBC/GPO plan for live pictures to add to live wireless. Thus, it was more than TV systems that were on trial, it was for what kind of TV - filmed or 'direct' TV. I tried to drum this home to the programme makers and I made some head-way but not as much as I would have liked. Ironically, in the long-run, it's BTL that won as pretty much everything is now recorded!

Furthermore, excluding the transmitters, the source of the core technologies was also a choice - American (Marconi-EMI) or German (BTL). It's much, much more complicated than the programme suggested!

Cheers,

Paul M

[AidanLunn]

Originally Posted by Nicklyons2

Taking up Paul's point, I think the production demonstrated the 'negative toward engineers - pro academic bias'. A prof wasn't required at all, there are plenty of papers describing the Nipkow disc and the effects of the persistence of vision etc. What was required was an engineer to realise the theories.

I think this was a misunderstanding on the producers - whoever contacted the Professor of RF Engineering was probably under the mistaken belief that this automatically made her an engineer. Not necessarily.

[PaulM]

Originally Posted by AidanLunn

I feel I should point at this point that this wasn't made by the BBC, it was made by an independent company.

Aidan,

Yes, indeed, it was Windfall Films who made it. However, 'he who pays the piper calls the tune' and it is the commissioner via the executive producer who does that. The BBC is ultimately responsible for the commissioning and thus the output. I standby what I said - the BBC can't do this properly as it's too close to their own PR needs.

It has been floated today (not on this forum) that the only way to have this done properly is a crowd-funded documentary pitched to sell to one of the other channels. It could be done and it's an interesting idea.

Any thoughts/comments?

Cheers,

Paul M

[FERNSEH]

Wasn't the Intermediate Film Technique (IFT) a German invention developed by Fernseh A.G.? A partner firm with BTL.

DFWB.

[AidanLunn]

Originally Posted by PaulM

Yes, indeed, it was Windfall Films who made it. However, 'he who pays the piper calls the tune' and it is the commissioner via the executive producer who does that. The BBC is ultimately responsible for the commissioning and thus the output. I standby what I said - the BBC can't do this properly as it's too close to their own PR needs.

I do agree, the BBC do share some of the responsibility, however, the idea to celebrate the 80th anniversary may also have been as vague an idea as just that in a commissioning editor's head, then they made have contacted a producer or director (or several) they have worked with to come up with a programme format which they then approved. Rare now but it still happens in this era of many independent production companies - this is how the new 2002 onwards version of Top Gear was pitched is the first example that comes to mind. Even if you don't have much insight into how this was commissioned, you have more insight than me as I wasn't involved at all, so how it was commissioned could be conjecture, but how programmes are commissioned certainly isn't.

I wouldn't write the BBC off totally, even in this day and age they can still commission a cracking good *informative* documentary - if you have two hours to spare, then the recent documentary on the Hillsborough disaster and the resultant cover-up in the corridors of power gives the best of BBC documentary today:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yIAGkOpzSk

I mention that because can you imagine any other British broadcaster making such a documentary to even the standards of what we saw last night? I seriously cannot imagine ITV, Sky or many other channels being interested in such a project and even if they were, all other broadcasters apart from the BBC are subscription or commercially funded, so they will begin to dictate what should be in the documentary because the advertisers or shareholders will have a hold over the commissioning editors as to what to show - i.e. what makes a profit. I'm a pessimist by nature, so it's up to you if you want to take what I'm about to say with a pinch of salt but a documentary made by people like us, whilst extremely informative, would put off the average viewer - the people that broadcasters are interested in. The average viewer isn't even interested in why or how a figure of 405-lines was decided upon, even though it interests us.

I fully support the idea of a crowdfunded documentary, but it must be made by the right people and pitched to the right people. People that can be as informative as those who made that Hillsborough documentary above, it's not easy to condense 27 years of events into two hours, but that team - also from an "indie" - did it. So if they can condense an event and 27 subsequent years into two hours, I can't see how they'll find it difficult explaining everything we as enthusiasts think should be included in such a documentary as what many were expecting to see last night. I say all this in the full awareness that the documentary last night pales into insignificance compared to what the Hillsborough families have had to go through, but the documentary makers of what was seen last night fall into a "factual entertainment" rather than strict documentary producers.

The BBC can still do quality, incisive documentaries, you just have to find those who are willing to tell the truth and not a sugar-coated, dumbed-down twisted version of "the truth". Typically, they tend to be either individuals themselves passionate about the subject or those who have climbed their career either mostly or only within the BBC - many people from other companies (typically those who have less interest in accuracy and more in interjecting some kind of "story" structure into documentaries) work in the corridors of the BBC now and therefore they bring their working practices and creative input that they inherited from the commercial sector. The commercial sector hasn't always had such an attitude - many of those who worked for ITV companies years ago brought their working practices from the BBC, because that's where they started. I can't imagine ITV making anything as serious or as accurate as Thames Television's "The World at War" now! And I doubt anyone else could!

[dseymo1]

I wish they'd at least hinted at Baird's struggle to overcome the latency of selenium cells, and particularly his use of dv/dt to derive a higher-resolution signal/image. Using photomultipliers is cheating!
it's a pity that the old Open University crew don't still operate from AP. I'm sure they could have come up with a far more accurate and convincing demonstration on a shoestring, and from the proper location (well, OK, next door).

[PaulM]

Indeed, the Open University could have done this properly!

The BBC can't do it without being partisan and that's whether it's 'in house' or by the use of an 'indie'. The BBC does not have a monopoly on good documentaries - the recent excellent Aberfan documentary by ITV is an example. The full story of television links many things, politics (small and large 'p'), technology, personalities, biography, economics, international and corporate rivalry/co-operation to name but a few. I maintain that the BBC can't do this particular topic - it won't spend the money and it can't divorce itself from the PR it inevitably carries. They have form on this demonstrated by several previous attempts, and although this one was better, it was still not in the 'good' class by any measure.

Pitching and defining a new documentary is certainly a major issue, but that is the thing the BBC can't do properly with regard to this topic. I refer you to my links further up to the Russian made documentary on Zworykin. With its drama/biography root it's accessible to the lay viewer (well, if you know Russian!) and the quality is first class. It appeals to the tech and the lay viewer as being thorough, it has human interest and it is well made.

On the question of Fernseh, and of general interest, attached are two drawings from Ch5 of my thesis showing the linkages of the primary players. It may not be 100% accurate (although I was pretty careful), but I think it helps to put many of the linkages in this story into perspective.

Best regards,

Paul M

[dave walsh]

I very much take Steve's point about the superiority and longevity of the electronic 405 lines [p43] but the economic and social history of Television is so bound up with it's development-especially from the thirties that it's at least as interesting as the Technical side-well that's my opinion anyway.
I'm a bit obsessed with Baird I admit, having always felt that his public image seemed unfair and strangely distorted, even before I began living in Bexhill and learned so much more. Using the motor car analogy it could be argued that [as we were apparently broke post war] we made the best of an older system and improved it [like Microsoft perhaps] while others bought a new vehicle.

I only mentioned colour to illustrate that everyone has something they would have liked to see included in the 80th Anniversary but that might NOT be deemed relevant [as I said]. I understand, for example, that the Germans had a similar b+w CRT system on the go at the same time [525 lines?] which could have been mentioned. There's was apparently distribution via cable, not Broadcast. Like Baird's use of telephone lines to cinemas in fact

Kevin's comments [p45] about the welcome opportunity to be "seeing from a far" aspects of Ally Pally and the other things he mentioned are very what I had in mind as well. I made my first visit to the "Fools on the Hill" site a few years ago and it made an extraordinary impression on me. The building was being used as a Forum for the local 6th Form selection process at the time. Despite being there with someone who actually works at BH, I was mistaken for a teacher by the organisers, a parent and then finally a security guard by some young people trying to find their way in. It was apparent that [although locals] they had never been there before and didn't have a clue what it was-they were interested to my surprise!

Many thank's to Aidan for taking so much trouble to expound at length on the organisational/structural factors that are in play currently [49+54]. Examination shows that "it was ever thus". It's nice to have one's suspicions confirmed by someone with obvious credibility but in I fact I've enjoyed ALL the inputs. Don't forget that the wonderful Mary Whitehouse objected to quite a few programs that she hadn't seen though Overall BBC4 is the best pro rata value for [our] money in my opinion. I recorded the program again last night [just in case]. As with the Bob Monkhouse Archive program [also BBC4] I may put together extracts from it with the News Night item for selective viewing.

Dave W

[FERNSEH]

Television started in Germany in 1935 using a 180 line non interlaced system. Like the Baird 240 line system it also had a 25Hz picture rate so there was a degree of flicker.
IFT was used and possibly Farnsworth cameras.

DFWB.

[Panrock]

Others here already have very ably commented on the programme itself

For my part, I thought it might be of interest to provide some narrow technical detail of the (likely) original Baird apparatus, as deduced by me. What follows is an edited part of a feasibility report I volunteered to the production team while things were still at a very early stage. The original document included illustrations, including an annotated guide to the different component parts of the Spotlight Studio. This has since appeared in the NBTVA 'house' magazine.

If nothing else, what comes through is that an accurate re-creation of the Baird Spotlight Studio would have been very, very hard - nay impossible within the budget and time constraints available to the programme makers. The original Spotlight Studio was a magnificent piece of engineering and inventiveness.


Overall physical structure and size

The floor space required is shown on Fig 1 (not included here).

The barrier between the scanner and booth looks like it may be of steel. Probably advisable!

The ceiling panel looks to be of board


Motor

High speed, high power motor, governed at 6000 rpm.


Lamp

Carbon arc now obsolete, produces high level of UV. A Xenon Arc may have to replace it.

The high pressure filling makes Xenon Arcs safety-critical to handle. Such lamps require specialised startup and high power current-source power supplies. Some form of forced cooling could be required.


Photocells

Huge surface area photomultiplier tubes appear to have been originally used. These would be blue sensitive. They will require high voltage, low current power supplies, potential divider chains and effective ambient light cut-out protection. If this fails, they can be ruined.


Electronics

Valve-based signal amplification and sync processing would have been used.


The 240-line standard

The pertinent facts appear to be as follows:

240-lines.
No. of active lines: 220.
Aspect ratio: 4:3.
Frame frequency: 25 Hz.
Line frequency: 6000 Hz.

Frame period: 40.00 mS
Line period: 166.67 uS
Frame sync pulse length: 2.00 mS (12 lines)
Frame back porch length: 1.33 mS (8 lines)
Line sync pulse length: 13.33 uS (8% of line period)
Line back porch length: 3.33 uS (2% of line period)


The Nipkow disc and spiral shutter

I've worked out some provisional specs for a disc. There's no need to worry about these right now, but they could come in handy later. They will certainly need double checking before the design is worked up in a CAD package. Basically, this is for a 4 x 60-hole spirals disc with an inner ring of holes for line syncs and a separate hole for frame syncs. Light through the holes could presumably trigger monostables with suitable time constants.

The picture would soon become blurry and jagged if the positional accuracy of the Nipkow holes wasn't perfect.

Because of the high rim speed (approaching the speed of sound), operation in a vacuum would be mandatory. Balance would be critical. Once drilled with Nipkow spirals, the intrinsic balance would be compromised. A separate balancing arrangement would likely be required.

The disc would need to be as thin as possible to avoid vignetting on the picture. Such a thin disc would be fragile and could shatter in use.

In this conception, a spiral-shaped broad slot on another disc in front selects the appropriate 60-line Nipkow spiral. This front disc would rotate at 1500 rpm and be 1:4 geared to the 'main' Nipkow disc. The gear tooth profile would need of a type to ensure silent operation.

Overall disc diameter 915.00 mm (3 ft).
Outer guard band: 7.50 mm.

Number of Nipkow hole spirals: 4 (concentric).
Number of holes per Nipkow spiral: 60.
Sync hole rings: 2 (60 holes for line and single hole for frame - placed to inside of disc).
Max radius of outer Nipkow hole spiral: 450.00 mm.
Min radius of inner Nipkow hole spiral: 434.29 mm.
Mean radius of all four Nipkow hole spirals: 442.15 mm.

Radius of line sync hole ring: 425.00 mm.
Radius of frame sync hole: 410.00 mm

Line segment outermost width (including sync & back porch): 47.12 mm.
Line segment innermost width (including sync & back porch): 45.95 mm.
Line segment outermost width (less sync & back porch): 42.41 mm.
Line segment innermost width (less sync & back porch): 41.35 mm.
Line segment mean width (including sync & back porch): 46.54 mm.
Line segment mean width (less sync & back porch): 41.88 mm.
Total (240-line) raster height: 31.41 mm

Thus the raster, off-disc, would measure approximately 42 x 31 mm.

Keystoning: 7%.

Aspect ratio of each quarter section (not including sync & back porch): 16:3

Nipkow/sync hole diameter 0.13 mm.

Rim speed at 6000 rpm: 287.46 m/s = 1035 Km/h = 643 mph.

A g-force check will be required to establish whether the stresses in the disc are manageable.


Shrouding/structure/pump

There will be some heavy engineering involved with this project. Efficient vacuum generation and sealing will be needed, and the manufacture of a massively strong bell housing around the disc.


Optics

A projection lens would be needed, focused on the disc surface

Projection magnification would need to be about x14 to give a 600mm wide scanned area.. The same factor would determine the relationship of distances in front of and behind the lens. The lens would need to be of sufficient aperture to gather the entire light cone diverging out of the Nipkow holes at its operating distance. Generally, the operating distances should be the maximum possible, to keep the diverging light cone narrow. This would also allow a thicker disc.


Ventilation

Safety

Insurance

Time

Cost



Steve

[PaulM]

Thanks for posting that Steve, it's an interesting specification.

One question if I may, please, do you have evidence that photomultipliers were used? These were really very new at that time and wrapped up in patents and secrecy. The images we see of the inside of the box suggest large area photocells (not selenium based, but one of the newer emissive types). Farnsworth could just about have had the technology for a photomultiplier, but what about BTL itself?

The Wikipedia page is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photomultiplier and a quick glance through some of the literature doesn't really offer any clues.

Did you find something definitive about this?

Thanks.

Paul M