Basic TV Technology

Basic TV Technology is the essential basic guide to the fundamentals underlying all television and video systems, written for students and nontechnical professionals. You don't need to have a math or science background in order to understand this explanation of how the principal pieces of equipment work, what their functions are, and how they are integrated to form a complex video system. An understanding of this material will be necessary for you to succeed in the real world, where one person often has to perform many different roles and functions within a production. Armed with some basic technical background information, you'll be more effective at figuring out new applications and at problem-solving.

The fourth edition of Basic TV Technology has been updated to reflect the industry shift to digital video and includes new information on compression, television standards, LCD displays, HD, and equipment.

This book features the accessible Media Manual format, in which every topic is covered in two pages: one of explanatory text and one of figures.

Need more information on TV technologies, go to: http://www.insightmedia.info/newsletters.php

*Gentle introduction to video technology
*No science or math background necessary
*Includes abundant illustrations

The Atom & Electricity; Basic Circuits; Units of Measurement; Fields (Induction) and Noise; Abbreviations; Cathode Ray Tubes (CRTs); Need for interlace scanning; Blanking; Waveform Display; Charge Coupled Devices; An Introduction to Digital; Analog and Digital; Color System; How the Eye Sees Light; Digital Encoding Ratios; CODECs; Composite Encoding; Color CRTs; Plasma Display Screens; LCD Screens; Analog Sync Generators; Vectorscope; PAL; Combining Sync and Camera Flow Diagrams; Video Switchers; Switcher Applications; Production Switcher Flow Diagram; Switcher Transitions and Special Effects; Special Effects Keys--Luminance Keys, Chroma Keys; Composite Versus Component Video; Color Difference Component Video; Digital Special Effects; Digital Interpolation; Analog Videotape Recording Technology; Analog Video Recording Standards & Formats; Other Tracks and Lockup; Time Base Error and Correction; Larger Analog Sync Problems & Solutions; Other Advantages of TBCs & Frame Synchronizers; Digital Videotape Recorders; Digital Video Servers; Disc Based Recorders; Editing Analog Videotape; The Editing Process; Types of Edits; Editing Methods-Manual editing and Control track counters; SMPTE Time Code Editing; Off/On Line Editing; Editing by Computers; Problems of Traditional Editing; Non Linear Editing; Video, Spatial, Temporal Compression; MPEG Compression Standard; Computer Graphics for Video; Character Generators; Creating Imagery & Effects; The Digital Studio; Open Architecture vs. Dedicated Equipment; Drawbacks of Open Architecture Equipment; HD TV; ATSC HD Broadcast Standard; SDTV; Audio for Video; Surround Sound; Professional and Consumer Audio; Combining Audio Components; Microphones, Mixers, and Loudspeakers; Sound Recording for Video; Digital Audio Workstations; Further Reading; Glossary