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fandomhigh2010-07-21 01:02 pm
chosehumanity) wrote in fandomhigh2010-07-21 01:02 pm
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Teevee For Beginners, Wednesday
"Now we've talked about a lot of the more human parts of television. The watching, the shows, that kind of thing. But I can imagine that some of you have come into this class wondering just how we manage to stuff these images in a box in the first place."
Mitchell looked a bit more frazzled after the weekend - but he wasn't going to go into any of that. Not in front of his class. "Now we'd had film cameras for much longer at this point, of course. Using reflected light to burn images into a film strip very fast, so that if you played them back to back they'd look like something was moving."
He cracked a slight smile. "The history of television technology is a lot more muddled than that. A lot of different factors went into it: whether the people were ready for the idea of having film in the house, the willingness of companies to actually create and distribute TV sets, even though they might be sold at a loss or cut into their own profits, and the constant struggle for who got this patent or that."
"Depending on who you ask, people will answer the question of who invented television with any number of names, and I'm not going to go into them - it's confusing enough to us who've lived with the thing for the past few decades. The central problem of the TV was this: we do have these images on film, but how do they get to the people at home? You can't just send them in over the mail, that wouldn't work. At the same time, radio was very popular back then - which is a bit like TV but only sound, as you've probably found by now. TV had to become a middle ground between film and radio."
Mitchell held up a disk with a number of holes in it. "This is the Nipkow Disc," he said, "One of the first important inventions used for television. It could scan an image by essentially taking a bit of it at a time and casting it at another disc. It never really took off, but it was the start of invention - of what they called 'mechanical' TV. Analogue - you could see it working. The picture was small, and you could only ever achieve between thirty to hundred 'lines' - nowadays, a regular TV manages 525 lines on the screen at the very least. They were planning to use radio waves to project the images of one disc to another over a distance."
"But that technique had its flaws. At the same time, scientists had been working on something called the cathode ray tube since the late 19th century. A man named Boris Rosing first managed to produce an image with it back in 1907. The cathode ray tube is a little hard to explain, but the basic idea is that you've got three little guns that produce light in red, blue and green. You can how much each bit of your image has these colours, and then you communicate that information to TVs with their own three guns. It's... sinot that simple, but that's sort of the idea. If you can find a TV that's not digital, just look at it closely and you'll be able to see all the red green and blue dots of all the cathodes."
He rubbed at the back of his head. "But that's a bit complicated," he said, "Which is why I've brought this dummy." He nudged at the facsimile TV by his feet, which was half-broken-open so anyone could see the insides. "Have at, ask questions, whatever you'd like."
Mitchell looked a bit more frazzled after the weekend - but he wasn't going to go into any of that. Not in front of his class. "Now we'd had film cameras for much longer at this point, of course. Using reflected light to burn images into a film strip very fast, so that if you played them back to back they'd look like something was moving."
He cracked a slight smile. "The history of television technology is a lot more muddled than that. A lot of different factors went into it: whether the people were ready for the idea of having film in the house, the willingness of companies to actually create and distribute TV sets, even though they might be sold at a loss or cut into their own profits, and the constant struggle for who got this patent or that."
"Depending on who you ask, people will answer the question of who invented television with any number of names, and I'm not going to go into them - it's confusing enough to us who've lived with the thing for the past few decades. The central problem of the TV was this: we do have these images on film, but how do they get to the people at home? You can't just send them in over the mail, that wouldn't work. At the same time, radio was very popular back then - which is a bit like TV but only sound, as you've probably found by now. TV had to become a middle ground between film and radio."
Mitchell held up a disk with a number of holes in it. "This is the Nipkow Disc," he said, "One of the first important inventions used for television. It could scan an image by essentially taking a bit of it at a time and casting it at another disc. It never really took off, but it was the start of invention - of what they called 'mechanical' TV. Analogue - you could see it working. The picture was small, and you could only ever achieve between thirty to hundred 'lines' - nowadays, a regular TV manages 525 lines on the screen at the very least. They were planning to use radio waves to project the images of one disc to another over a distance."
"But that technique had its flaws. At the same time, scientists had been working on something called the cathode ray tube since the late 19th century. A man named Boris Rosing first managed to produce an image with it back in 1907. The cathode ray tube is a little hard to explain, but the basic idea is that you've got three little guns that produce light in red, blue and green. You can how much each bit of your image has these colours, and then you communicate that information to TVs with their own three guns. It's... sinot that simple, but that's sort of the idea. If you can find a TV that's not digital, just look at it closely and you'll be able to see all the red green and blue dots of all the cathodes."
He rubbed at the back of his head. "But that's a bit complicated," he said, "Which is why I've brought this dummy." He nudged at the facsimile TV by his feet, which was half-broken-open so anyone could see the insides. "Have at, ask questions, whatever you'd like."
Re: Talk to the Teacher
This didn't surprise her at all.