Television Technology Demystified: A Non-technical Guide

Description

"Television Technology Demystified" is written for non-technical television production professionals. Journalists, program producers, camera persons, editors, and other television professionals need to know how equipment works, which performance levels are achievable, how to evaluate the technical quality of picture and sound, and other aspects of production; this book presents these and other essential concepts in a simple and non-mathematical way. Aleksandar-Louis Todorovic, a highly respected and well-known figure in the broadcasting community, has succeeded in making complex technology understandable.

Table Of Contents

1. Introduction
2. History of the development of television technology

Discovery of photoelectric effects

First theoretical projects

Scanning

John Logie Baird

Beginning of the first regular television transmittals
3. Light and the human eye

Character of light

Measurement of light

Primaries

Colour triangle

Additive and subtractive mixing
4. Generating a television picture

Optoelectrical conversion

Scanning

Interlace vs. Progressive scanning

Video signal parameters
5. Colour television

Generation of colour images

Displays

Transmission
6. Colour video signals

Primaries

Components

Composite signals
7. Analogue colour television standards

NTSC

PAL

SECAM
8. Digital television

What is the meaning of "digital"?

Analogue to digital conversion

Why a digital signal?

The international standardisation process
9. Digital compression as the key to success

Why the compression?

Basic approaches to compression

Video compression methods

Audio compression methods

Compression standards and levels

EBU/SMPTE task force

Essence, metadata, wrapper

File interchange formats
10. Television cameras

Basic operation principles

Optical block

Sensors

Processing

Camera quality assessment
11. Video tape recording

Development and early formats

Basic processes (rotary heads, modulation, signal processing)

Component formats

Digital formats

Video tapes

Tapeless recording
12. Video tape editing

Basic technical constraints

Linear electronic editing

Non linear editing
13. Server based operations

Newsroom operations

Media asset management and archives
14. Computer graphics

Character generators

Graphic stations

Virtual sets
15. Audio systems

Sound and audio signals

Microphones; Mixers

Other audio sources

Special effects
16. Television studios and OB vans
17. HDTV