CBS EVR Format 1968

[Homer J Simpson]

"Completely portable, weighs just 60lbs"

[MK14]

For 1968, that is very good.
If video tape recorders and later technology, had never happened or was delayed a lot.
They could have had huge rental places, which rent out those video cartridges, with hundreds or different programmes and films (50 minutes), etc to watch.
I guess they could have increased on the 50 minute limit, and made it colour, later, if it had taken off and other technology had not surpassed it.

If they had used colour film, they could have increased the run time to 3 x 50 minutes = 150 minutes = 2 hours 30 minutes (for black and white).
By using selectable RGB filters, via a manual or automatic, switch over mechanism. Hence tripling the run time.

[vk6zgo]

For 1968, that is very good.
If video tape recorders and later technology, had never happened or was delayed a lot.
They could have had huge rental places, which rent out those video cartridges, with hundreds or different programmes and films (50 minutes), etc to watch.
I guess they could have increased on the 50 minute limit, and made it colour, later, if it had taken off and other technology had not surpassed it.

If they had used colour film, they could have increased the run time to 3 x 50 minutes = 150 minutes = 2 hours 30 minutes (for black and white).
By using selectable RGB filters, via a manual or automatic, switch over mechanism. Hence tripling the run time.

So, ultimately, it is a glorified telecine machine!
Studio Video Tape Recorders had been around for a decade or more by 1968, so it was pretty much a "dead end" technology for its intended purpose, because of the development effort going on to develop a marketable home VTR.

Sony already had the "Umatic" cassette format unit on the cusp of production.(it came out in 1971).
It was quite large, & the VCRs were "huge".
Although intended for home use, the size & cost limited that market, & the format went on to be used widely in Broadcast equipment.
Unlike Beta, this was very widely licensed, & the ones I remember were from Philips.

There were small reel to reel VTRs for "rich" people to use at home available, (Philips brought one out in1963), & Beta VCRs were only 8 years away from introduction to the market.

That said, there is no mistaking the achievement in compressing a "telecine" into such a small unit.

There were many interesting ideas earlier in the '50s & '60s, one of which used a electron beam to record video on a "deformable" layer on a film.
This was then readable using a light beam to get the video back.
I think it would have needed a laser to get sufficient resolution.

[helius]

It works like a telecine, but using a proprietary film format that would need to be specially printed (naturally by CBS). The two parallel tracks are an interesting idea, but doesn't seem very well thought out.
Only a few years later, in 1972, Kodak released its Videoplayer VP-1, which provides much the same set of features for standard Super 8 films (on Kodak Supermatic cassettes), additionally in color.

[MK14]

So, ultimately, it is a glorified telecine machine!
Studio Video Tape Recorders had been around for a decade or more by 1968, so it was pretty much a "dead end" technology for its intended purpose, because of the development effort going on to develop a marketable home VTR.

Sony already had the "Umatic" cassette format unit on the cusp of production.(it came out in 1971).
It was quite large, & the VCRs were "huge".
Although intended for home use, the size & cost limited that market, & the format went on to be used widely in Broadcast equipment.
Unlike Beta, this was very widely licensed, & the ones I remember were from Philips.

There were small reel to reel VTRs for "rich" people to use at home available, (Philips brought one out in1963), & Beta VCRs were only 8 years away from introduction to the market.

That said, there is no mistaking the achievement in compressing a "telecine" into such a small unit.

There were many interesting ideas earlier in the '50s & '60s, one of which used a electron beam to record video on a "deformable" layer on a film.
This was then readable using a light beam to get the video back.
I think it would have needed a laser to get sufficient resolution.

You're right. There were many other things, especially the things in the pipeline, which were to come out, at later dates. Which made this thing, (probably), almost obsolete, before it even got released (assuming it got released, because I don't recall ever hearing about it).

I'm very impressed with the way it could handle the fact that the cartridges, were basically an open tape/film reel, with some kind of partial envelop surrounding it. Making it into a cartridge.
I.e. The automatic tape lacing. So you just put the tape (film) cartridge inside the machine, and it would auto lace.

Because I'm use to reel to reel tape recorders, from that era (1968), which had to be manually laced up, and un-laced (when removing the tapes). Which was a bit of a pain, but not too bad, as you soon got use to it.

Although cassette tapes, were soon (i.e. in the 1970s) to become popular, and replace the old reel to reel tape recorders, in most applications (not all, as I think hi-fi buffs, stuck to them, for many, many years after, because they preferred the quality of real (excuse the pun) reel to reel, tape recorders.
If I remember things correctly, but I'm not 100% sure. Maybe it was like valves/tubes vs transistors, where there were hi-fi buffs, who insisted one or other was better.
Later cassette tapes, with high quality formulations (i.e. NOT iron oxide, e.g. Chrome), Dolby noise reduction and high quality hi-fi decks, went a long way to improving the quality of cassette tapes.