video-magazine-1990-07

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= SONY Hi8. ANOTHER STAGE | ey All around you there's texture, Stepping up to Hi8 is as easy as exposure system that puts you at the Priority or Shutter Priority modes with pattern and detail. All around picking up the Sony Handycam® speeds up to 1/10,000-second. pinnacle of creative control. With 27 e The CCD-V101 even gives you you are scenes of drama, impact and CCD-V101 camcorder. With 410,000 shutter speeds, 16 apertures, and 8 beauty. And you'll see it all with pixels, its precision CCD sensor achieves gain settings, you take full command. hands-on control of picture revealing clarity on the Sony video resolution that's high, even in light Or take it easy with four automatic Hi8™ system. Thanks to an expanded that’s low...as low as 3 lux. And the exposure modes. Portrait mode puts brightness, color and hue with its Cus- luminance signal and high-density powerful array of shooting, editing, the focus on your subject with shallow metal tape, Hi8 gives you more than and playback capabilities puts all-out depth of field. Sports mode tracks the tom Preset Mode. What's more, this 400 lines of horizontal resolution. versatility in the palm of your hand. action with deeper depth of field and camcorder hears as well as it sees. A Taking video to a new elevation. fast shutter speeds. Or choose Aperture built-in stereo microphone and superb The versatility starts with an hi-fi stereo recording preserve the sounds of nature in their natural state.

HE ASCENT OF VIDEO And when the time comes to edit adds the finishing your tapes, you'll find the CCD-V101 at touch. Then use the the cutting edge. Frame-by-frame wireless remote to ‘advance and reverse, Index Search and Edit Search™ functions help you find view your Handycam your place. The Flying Erase™ head gives you smooth insert edits and scene handiwork. SS transitions. S-Video inputs and outputs keep the picture pure. Two-page digital So even if your most challenging superimposing, even during playback, climb is a flight of stairs, come on up to Sony Hi8.You'll see the most stun- ning vistas in video.

FEATURES PROGRAMMING HOME EDITING: VIDEO’S FINAL FRONTIER 36 VIDEOTESTS Turning jumbled scenes into entertaining tapes. By Lawrence B. Johnson 40 DEPARTMENTS FALL VIDEO PREVIEW: WILD THINGS 44 Daring new designs add style to a hi-tech season. By Brent Butterworth 48 THE LOST PICTURE SHOW Not all classic Hollywood movies make it to video. Here’s why. By Frank Lovece 52 HI-DEF HORSE RACE As developers race to be first with the best, high-definition TV may be 57 only four years away. By Martin Levine 68 FREE AT LAST 70 We field test the Steadicam JR, a liberating new accessory that gives 28 camcorders freedom of movement. By Ty Harrington 6 REVIEWS The Little Mermaid, In Country, Harlem Nights, She-Devil, ue Cover: Back to the Future Part Il, The Godfather and Patton on disc, more KIDVID / The making of quality programs 10 Editing essentials in- DIRECTORY / The latest releases on tape and disc 12 clude two VCRs, a TV, | a controller and plenty 20 of raw footage. SONY SLY-575UC VHS VCR, Canon A1 Mark Il Hi8 camcorder, Magnavox VR9970 VHS VCR, 22 Photograph by Sony KPR-53EX20 projection TV. By Berger-Braithwaite Labs 25 Jay Brenner. CHANNEL ONE / Video's fuzzy new focus 35 Video Magazine FEEDBACK / Letters from readers Volume XIV LATE NEWS / Zenith and Panasonic camcorders, caption decoders, more GAZETTE / Jack Lemmon, The Little Mermaid’s Jodi Benson, more 126 Number 4 AUDIO INPUT / Adding sonic boom to itty-bitty rooms READER FORUM / Format furor: which one’s the best? NEW PRODUCTS / Pioneer LD-S2 laserdisc player, Mitsubishi audio tape deck with video displays, Canon camcorder, Sony Watchman, more Q & A/ Technical queries answered OFF THE AIR / Sky Cable—and the death of broadcasting ky The VIDEO Magazine (ISSN 1044-7288) is published monthly by Reese Communications, Inc., 460 W. 34 St., New York, NY 10001. Second-class postage paid at New York, NY and additional mailing Audit Bureau office. © 1990 Reese Communications, Inc. All rights reserved. © under Universal, International, and Pan American Copyright Conventions. Reproduction of editorial or pictorial content in any manner is prohibited. Single copy price $2.50; $2.95 in Canada; £2.50 in U.K. One-year subscription (12 issues) $15.; Canada, $21 U.S.; foreign, air mail, $40 U.S. Address subscription orders, change of address, correspondence and inquiries to: VIDEO, Box 56293, Boulder, CO 80322-6293. Change of address takes 60 days to process: send old address label, new address, and zip code. All material listed in this magazine is subject to manufacturer's change without notice, and publisher assumes no responsibility for such change. Printed in the U.S.A. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to VIDEO, Box 56293, Boulder, CO 80322-6293. For microform copies of issues or articles, write to: Serials Acquisition Dept., University Microfilms, Inc., 300 North Zeeb Rd., Ann Arbor, MI 48106. 4 VIDEO JULY 1990

Make your next video soar to even greater heights. With the Panasonic® AQ@1960 SVHS Editing VCR. By bringing exceptional resolution of SVHS anda host of professional editing capabilities to your table. For starters, the AG-1960 SVHS Editing VCR delivers over 400 lines of resolution. And it’s upwardly compatible with VHS. But that’s not all that makes it so special. Because the AG-1960 lets you arrange videos into any sequence you desire. With professional editing capabilities like insert and assembly editing, and audio dubbing when coupled with a Panasonic AG-A95 Editing Controller. To speed up the editing process, the AG-1960 incorporates a jog/shuttle dial, auto digital tracking and an innovative High Response Mechanism. Which dramatically reduces its fast forward and rewind times. And brings up images from “stop” in less than three seconds. So if you're ready to do more than just play and record, put a Panasonic AG-1960 SVHS Editing VCR on your table. For more information, see your Panasonic Professional/Industrial Video Dealer, or call: Eastern Zone: (201) 348-7620 Central Zone: (708) 981-4826 Southern Zone: Dallas Region: (817) 685-1117 Atlanta Region: (404) 925-6841 Western Zone: Seattle Region: (206) 285-8883 Los Angeles Region: (714) 373-7275 Panasonic Professional/Industrial Video For additional information, circle No. 91 on Reader Service Card.

CHANNEL ONE 1990 Buyers Guide with Comparison Chart Video's fuzzy new focus Includes: 10' Dish Video manufacturers are making one thing perfectly clear—the major e Echostar 4000 with Decoder technical advance in this year’s new models is “fuzzy logic,” a form of The Ultimate Satellite Receiver computerized intelligence that reaches decisions through the same Houston Tracker 10 with MTS! complex reasoning process used by humans. So far, fuzzy circuitry has e Programmable UHF Remote © been added to camcorders and TV sets. In the camcorder arena, Sanyo/ Fisher and Canon are using the feature to humanize autofocus opera- ¢ 100 Video & Audio Selections ¢ tions, while Sony and JVC are applying it to TV picture performance. ¢ Fully Computerized Auto Tracking ¢ For obvious reasons, some manufacturers of high-tech video record- Full On-Screen Graphics Display ¢ ing and display devices, designed to reproduce as precise and realistic Crystal Clear Reception video images as possible, are downplaying the term fuzzy logic in favor © MTS Stereo! ¢ of “artificial intelligence.” We don’t really care what it’s called, as long as there isn’t anything ERCPLLENCT myDESION, e(Call for Price! ¢ fuzzy about the results: If the new process is more hype than substance, Satellite System Owners: let’s move onto better things; if it’s a true advance in the direction of improved and more versatile performance, huzzah and hooray. If it does prove beneficial, we can think of several areas where video products could be improved with a dab of the human touch. Such as? Such as home editing equipment, a segment of the video arena crying out for more complex and sophisticated products and processes. e Speaking of huzzahs and hoorays, let’s hear three cheers for RCA, which is entering its influential brand name in the lively laserdisc lists. RCA was burned badly back in the early days of video, when its CED videodisc format failed to gain consumer acceptance. Consequently, the firm is adopting an extremely low profile as it quietly re-enters the disc market with a laser player. But we think it’s a great move. Not only will it help assure the continued growth of laserdisc, it will give RCA more credibility as a supplier of high-performance, high-end video products. e Our March cover story, “Format Face-Off,” touched a nerve with our always vocal readers, and the response was a record number of letters. Some agreed with our format findings, others didn’t. But we felt the outpouring of passionate opinions deserved more than the conventional letters-to-the-editor approach. The result is our first “Reader Forum,” a new department which will appear whenever reader response to articles or issues justifies. Keep those cards and letters coming. 1-800-327-0046 Art Levis In Calif. 1-800-327-2345 Editor-in-Chief Office # 805-652-0255 Fax # 805-652-2190 2316 Channel Drive Ventura, Ca. 93003 ‘UJSE[ZOUDPOD/N4IOUPOADHODIDKSOUISyWPOPJDU! 6 VIDEO JULY 1990

VID FEEDBACKEDITED BY BRIAN CLARK magazine President and Managing Director, Cola crusader Jay Rosenfield In Mark Fleischmann’s review of Indiana Editor-in-Chief, Art Levis Jones and the Last Crusade (May '90), he Managing Editor, Stan Pinkwas did not review the Diet Coke commer- Technical Editor, Lancelot Braithwaite cial at the beginning of the tape. I too Senior Editor, Kenneth Korman zap out all commercials in anything I Associate Editor, Brent Butterworth watch, and especially resent them on Assistant Editors, Brian Clark, purchased tapes, but this commercial is Stephen Cusick very clever and a great demonstration of Contributing Editors: Bob Angus, Mavis Dolby’s Pro Logic surround sound. I Arthur, Bob Barlow, Ivan Berger, Warren have used it to demonstrate my Pioneer Berger, Bob Brewin, James Caruso, Steve VSA-1000 AV amplifier to friends. But I Daly (Directory), Mark Fleischmann, Ty still prefer Coke Classic. Harrington, Lawrence B. Johnson, David Lachenbruch, Martin Levine, Frank Ralph A. Brown Lovece, Gordon McComb, Marianne Meyer Bountiful, Utah (Kidvid), Timothy Onosko, Martin Porter, Murray Slovick, Greg Solman, Roderick Neon monstrosity Woodcock Editorial Assistant, Lily Schwartzberg David Lachenbruch’s article on flat tele- Just For the Sound of It: The Indiana Jones Diet vision (“Off the Air,” April ’90) was in- Coke commercial merits a surround sound demo. Art Director, Lonnie Heller teresting, but is he aware that the Bell Associate Art Director, Kristina Juzaitis Art Assistant, Luis Ramos, Jr. Labs demonstrated a flat TV display Tips from a teacher Production Manager, James LoGrasso Production Assistant, Janet Barrett back in 1918? It consisted of an array of Typesetting, Janet M. Holland large, high-voltage neon tubes, and used “Tips From Top Pros” (May ’90) is inter- Vice President, Circulation the Nipkow scanning wheel, a distribu- esting, but how meaningful is a feature and Special Projects, Rena Adler tor and thousands of tiny wires. It was a composed of conflicting advice from Newsstand Sales Director, Gerald Levine large uni—atbout 22 inc—hcoempasred pros with seven-figure budgets to non- Circulation Assistant, Elizabeth Moss to the two- and three-inch systems pre- pros with four-figure budgets. Financial Officer, Albert Mineo sent in 1910. As a bright light flickered in | I’ve been teaching an adult educa- | a young Herbert Hoover's face, the cam- tion course in video production for Business Manager, Janette Evans era fed his image into the neon mon- Assistant to the President, Leslie Dionicio about five years, and while my creden- strosity. Carl Anderson tials are not nearly as impressive as those Publisher, Eric C. Schwartz of your pros, I try to give sound practical National Advertising Director, Lachenbruch replies: Anderson is right, but advice. My advice to non-pros is: 1) de- | Linda DeRogatis he has placed the demonstration of the first Marketing Director, Luanne Rao flat TV screen about nine years ahead of its velop your skills by using your equip- | East Coast Sales, Dina Redding-Berrigan, ment as often as possible. Experience is Annette Y. Schnur actual time. Developed by Dr. Frank Gray the best teacher. 2) Be sensitive to what Classified Sales, Mary Au of Bell Labs, it was about two feet square. It Midwest Sales, Milton Gerber, Carolyn consisted of 100 neon lamps divided into ten works well or not well in your own pro- Bowman ductions as well as professional ones. 3) West Coast Sales, Cynthia Gallivan vertical sections of glass tubing joined to Shop carefully and buy the best basic West Coast Advertising Assistant, Sharon form a continuous tube. The camera was a equipment your budget permits. Low- Millikan flying-spot scanner which cast a bright priced feature-packed equipment often beam as it scanned objects. The first public sacrifices quality in the finished product. Ad Coordinator, Christine Barbieri demonstration was on April 7, 1927. A televised speech by Herbert Hoover, then 4) Read Video Magazine as well as pub- National Editorial & Sales: 460 West 34 lications for video professionals. 5) And Street, New York, NY 10001;, 212-947-6500, Secretary of Commerce, was carried by last, but not least, take all conflicting | 212-947-6727 (fax) wire from Washington, D.C., to New York advice from pros (or anyone else) with a Midwest Sales Office: Gerber/Kamikow, City. The 50-line pictures were transmitted large grain of salt. 60 Revere Drive, Suite 915, Northbrook, IL 18 times per second. The pictures were rec- | Ralph Leinoff 60062; 708-291-8900, 708-291-8905 (fax) West Coast Sales Office: 1453 Third Street, ognizable, but HDTV it wasn't! Neponsit, N.Y. Suite 490, Santa Monica, CA 90401; 213-393-5057, 213-393-5538 (fax) Address correspondence to Feedback, Video For the record Japan Representative, Call Publisher Magazine, 460 West 34 Street, New York, NY 10001. RCA's CC520 camcorder (“Videotests,” REESE June '90) is priced at $1,349, not $1,199. COMMUNICATIONS @ INCORPORATED JULY 1990 VIDEO 7

| LARIIPEGMEOXHEPXWPERAPENOOSROSVFHIMEIAEEEDNRMNYNMCEATEENDLOSRTISC IN SIGHT AND HEARING. The instant you see it, you’re helpless to turn away. digital sound clarity and Dolby® Surround-Sound” The Pioneer combination Compact Disc/LaserDisc You'll also hear your music as never before as you Player. With a 60% sharper picture than videotape, it'll play it on CD. take you far beyond anything you’ve ever witnessed on the face of your television. But, whatever you do, don’t attempt to describe You'll hear things you never knew existed as you your first encounter with a Pioneer combination experience movies and concerts with incredible Compact Disc/LaserDisc Player to anyone. Even your loved ones won’t believe you.

Call 1-800-421-1404 for the dealer nearest you. For additional information, circle No. 7 on Reader Service Card.

TSIUTPLEESRIONMPVOIDSEEO LATE NEWSEDITED BY BRENT BUTTERWORTH A stand-alone color titler with true GENLOCK, deluxe keyboard, expansion port and the ability to interface with PCs... for $599.95. VIDEO EFFECTS TITLER MFJ-1480B ... $599.95 The MFJ-1480B Video Effects Titler (VET) lets you superimpose color titles over a camera image or add titles to existing video footage while editing. Each page will display eight lines of 28 small or 14 large characters in upper and lower case with each line and page in one of 15 colors. The VET retains up to 30 pages of titles in memory, has direct page access, scrolling and auto centering. ; And because it is expandable, the VET is never outdated. An external port lets you plug in creative add-on cartridges coming from MFJ that permit special effects, more fonts, flashing, special logos, other languages and more! An optional RS-232 interface (MFJ-1481, $169.95) i tana lets you interface with personal computers. With Zenith’s First 8mm: The VM8000 joins the company’s line of VHS and VHS-C camcorders this fall. some programming you can superimpose animated graphics, stored text and countless other effects from an IBM, Apple, Tandy, Commodore and other PCs. You're only limited by your imagination. SUPER VIDEO PROCESSOR: Zenith joins 8mm camp with diminished hearing are discrimi- with new camcorder nated against because they must pay up to $200 for stand-alone caption decod- MFJ-1452 ...$299.95 Prompted by the growth in 8mm cam- ers. Addressing the House Telecom- corder sales, Zenith is adding an 8mm munications Subcommittee, Linda Bove You can correct poor videos of weddings, sporting of Sesame Street, who is deaf, said events or the kids at dance recital and make great machine, the VM8000, to its fall line. through a signing interpreter that hear- copies for everyone! The MFJ-1452 is the most The company will continue to sell VHS ing-impaired people pay for features they || sophisicated (and fun) Video Processor available and Compact VHS camcorders. The today. Why? Because you get complete control of VM8000 is a basic model, sporting such don’t want, too, such as mute buttons. contrast. You can expand or compress whites to save faded or contrasty videos and increase or features as a flying erase head, an 8x decrease blackness of videos that are over or under zoom lens and 3-lux sensitivity. exposed. You can convert film negatives to positives With 8mm leader Sony recently edg- | Panasonic rolls out for recording or viewing. You can invert chrominance and invert luminance for special ing past RCA and Panasonic to take the a loaded subcompact effects. You can use the enchancer and a white number-one spot in camcorder sales, ‘blob’ becomes a face with individual eyelashes! The split screen feature gives side-by-side video industry insiders expect Zenith to | As subcompact camcorders multiply, so unenhanced/enhanced comparison. You can correct weak colors, color shifts and brighten faded videos. be only the first of many companies en- do the tiny machines’ features. Case in A brightness control improves too dark or too light scenes and allows fading in or out. A luminance tering the 8mm market this year. Insid- point: Panasonic’s new PV-40. The meter helps you accurately set brightness level. ers are also speculating that Hitachi, palm-sized VHS-C camcorder’s chic Famous Guarantee RCA and GE will soon show preproduc- chassis conceals a digital image stabi- All MFJ Video products come with a double guarantee. Order tion models of new 8mm camcorders. lizer, which could help eliminate the from MFJ and try it. If you're not delighted, just return it within 30 shaky images typical of ultra-mini cam- days for a full refund, less shipping. No hassles. And MFJ's One Caption decoders may Year Unconditional Guarantee become mandatory assures you of continued service. Bills under consideration in both houses Call toll-free and charge the products you need to your VISA of Congress would require closed-cap- or MasterCard, or send a check or tion decoders on all TV sets sold in the money order, plus $6.00 shipping. U.S. The Electronic Industries Associa- tion opposes the measures, saying they ee‘BJFU‘EJ/PI/OBUODIONFPOUDJAIDOJOBSWHSIYDOPJDUY Call. Free Catalog would stick consumers with a $20 fea- Palm-Sized Powerhouse: The PV-40's unique fea- ture most people don’t want. tures make it one of the most capable compacts. 1-800-647-1800 Several major producers and TV MFJ Enterprises, Inc. stars, including Richard Dysart of L.A. 921 Louisville Rd./Starkville. MS 39759) Law and Geoffrey Owens of The Cosby Show, take an opposing view. They say 10 VIDEO JULY 1990 that 24 million hearing-impaired Ameri- cans and 13 million elderly Americans

corders. The features list goes on—one- Qwi ckEdit™ Lenmar Enterprises, Inc. shot recording (which records five-sec- 13626 S. Normandie Ave. ond-long still video pictures), strobe, 8x Gardena2,13.C5A32.900294994 zoom, 1/4000-second shutter speed and and a digital superimposer. VIDEO EDITING SYSTEM USES VCR WIRELESS REMOTE NEC’s retreat ¢ Simplifies the editing of video tapes with professional results Citing excessive competition and a satu- | « Memorizes 100 scenes rated market, NEC has announced that | * Compatible with all videotape formats it will discontinue its U.S. TV, VCR and | audio lines within the next year. The |||| QE101 Suggested List $249.95 company will continue to offer its Tur- boGrafx videogame system and two- piece IDTV projection set, and expects to re-enter the home theater market | eventually. If you already own NEC vid- | eo or audio gear, don’t worry —the com- | pany will continue to support its parts | and service network. Nintendo competitors ac9iNFRSCoin5odeenarr.fdracoivcldrtie.emicaroetniaoln, step up activity The Eyeopener Although Nintendo has dominated the videogame market for the last few years, \"The Eyeopener is such a great idea, and so simple, that I actually whacked my. competing hardware and software forehead with the heel of my band in disbelief when Ifirst tried it. Believe me if | makers have begun staking out their you own a camcorder, you need The Eyeopener.\" own territory. Harry Somerfield / Entertainment Equipment Consultant, NEC will go up against Nintendo’s Syndicated Columnist, Television Producer GameBoy this fall with a hand-held ver- \"The Eyeopener, a clever little problem-solver from Opsin\" sion of its TurboGrafx video game, David L. Miller /Modern Photography | which uses the same credit-card-sized NOW KEEP BOTH EYES OPEN WHILE VIDEOTAPING cartridges as its big brother. The mini TurboGrafx will feature a backlit, 2.6- Wit‘ h both eyes open, you can FU.OSR.EIPGATN. P4A,7L2E9N,T6S48 PENDING. !k inch color LCD screen with 236-by-312- relax and videotape in comfort | pixel resolution, along with a video in- | put jack, making it also suitable for use ...No more strain from squeezing | as a portable video monitor. The price should be around $200, and NEC may one eye shut. later market a TV tuner that will work with the hand-held machine. With both eyes open you can &. ; see again! You can walk around, Nintendo’s been a hit largely be- oe cause so many great games have been | pick out your next shot, and be created for it. But fans of the Turbo- aware of what is going on around ) Grafx and Sega’s Genesis may now get you ...Your vision isno longer their fair share, too. Tengen, a leading limited to the view-finder image. software developer, has begun releasing its games in versions for each leading The Eyeopener eliminates videogame system. The company’s new | Klax game will be the first released binocular rivalry and allows you | for four systems: Nintendo, TurboGrafx, to clearly see both the viewfinder Genesis and Atari's Lynx. image and your surroundings Taping time marches on simultaneously. | Anyone who’s ever missed a thrilling 3; The Eyeopener straps on all video $9.95 plus $1.00 for shipping. conclusion because their T-120 VHS Z| cameras, adjusts to all users, weighs Send check or money order or tape ran out will love BASF’s new T-130 CALL TOLL-FREE 1-800-869-8154 cassette. The new tape adds a half-hour of recording time at the EP speed and olefstshethwanay 1/c4omopulnectee,lyanwdhernetrnaocttsinouuste. VISAOrd- eMrasstsehricpapredd -wiAtmheirnic2a4nhoEurxsp.ress FaCRiS4cNooadineoenrr.dfacdoivld.rtieemicraoetniaoln, ten minutes in SP. The company says Made of tough, flexible material, The Eyeopener iiss vivrirtually unbrreeaakkaable. OPER! Oe11P8Sr0I7NaN.tICNrCeOekgRPoPOkRwAyTES.D, #106 | the longer tape will cost the same as a good T-120. BASF also has a ten-hour T-200 cassette in the works— enough to tape every episode of Twin Peaks. JULY 1990 VIDEO 11

GAZETTEEDITED BY KENNETH KORMAN y Making up is hard to do Jack Lemmon was looking for a shell to crawl inside, and when he found it, it was made of latex. In the family drama Dad (MCA Home Video), Lemmon’s portrayal of a frail 75-year-old was enhanced with two hours’ worth of daily special-effects makeup by Dick Smith, who was nomi- i for an Oscar for his efforts on the m. “You create a shell and crawl into it,’ says Lemmon of his acting philoso- phy. “Once I got the makeup on, I could crawl inside that, and I didn’t have to worry about altering the voice and the walk. My voice naturally went down a little—I don’t think I could re-create that now. I didn’t have to work at being old, I just was old. If the makeup didn’t work, the whole thing would not have worked.” Now 65 years young, looking tanned and fit and searching for challenges, Good Old Boy: Daughter Annie (Kathy Baker) and revitalized father Jake (Jack Lemmon) in Dad. Lemmon should have little to worry about. But his first look in the mirror be,” Lemmon says. “I was trying to mea- Jodi Benson with full Dad makeup on caused him a sure up, to make him proud of me. Be- makes a splash twinge of anxiety. ‘They do it in fore he died, we were able to go off patches, and it shrinks and wrinkles. It together to Europe for six weeks, and we is, to an extent, what I will look like one talked about things we never talked day. My first feeling was shock, total about before.” “My friends tell me she looks just like shock, but then I was overjoyed because Lemmon also has a son, actor Chris me,’ says actress Jodi Benson of Ariel, I thought it was brilliant.” Lemmon, with whom he says he is “ter- the Little Mermaid in Disney’s animated His father’s bout with cancer tibly close,” but it has taken a Dad-like musical of the same name. But the re- brought about real-life changes similar effort. “It’s no help if your old man is a semblence is no coincidence. Benson, to those which occur in Dad. “I was al- movie star. The hills are littered with who provided the voice of the film’s title ways close to him, but hadn’t realized it the corpses of relationships that have character, was videotaped performing was not as full a relationship as it could gone sour.” —Jami Bernard International Incident. Sony officials were more Saga For Sale: Cary Grant in the 1939 Gunga Din. than a little dismayed to find that the owner’s manual for the company’s SLV-70 VHS VCR uses December 7 — the infamous date of Japan’s 1941 attack on Pearl Har- bor—as an example when explaining how to set the timer. After receiving a complaint from a customer, Sony issued an official apology. Says a company spokesman: “It would be irrational for anyone to think that a company that does 25 percent of its business in the U.S. would do anything like that intentionally.” Blanks for the Memories. Competition is tough ‘among blank tape manufacturers, but American Elec- tronics and Entertainment has found an original way to attract buyers. The company is packaging two blank 12 VIDEO JULY 1990

| Dream of Disney: consisting of nothing but so-called inter- Jodi Benson (above) both provided the voice ruptions. and inspired the look Located on Manhattan’s Upper for Ariel in The Little West Side, Gallen’s headquarters looks Mermaid. like several generations of toy and an- tique stores piled high on top of each the songs, and Disney animators later other. Here he prepares programs and And now a worddrew the character while watching the catalogs new acquisitions. tapes. “T started doing this after I went to from our sponsorA six-year veteran of Broadway mu- the Museum of Broadcasting to see sical theater, Benson thought the tapes some of the toy commercials from my would be “for the archives or something, Does your prized high-end VCR repre- childhood and discovered they didn’t have them,” Gallen explains. “At first I but they used them as reference tapes,” sent liberation from the relentless flow she says. “Ariel’s personality and looks of commercial messages on TV? New got everything on 8mm and Super-8, but as people found out what I was doing, I are very close to mine—she’s feisty, re- York-based collector Ira Gallen begs to began to hear from retired producers bellious, cocky. My friends kept nudging differ. As founder and president of a pro- and directors who were happy to let me have their work on 16mm and 35mm me, saying ‘She has your face! She has duction company and archive called film.” your eyes! It’s amazing.’ She’s taken on a Video Resources, he has amassed be- Gallen’s tapes are broken down into. categories, including two collections of little bit of me, and I have to say, it’s an tween 15,000 and 20,000 commercials, beer commercials, two of classic car honor.” public service announcements, station spots and eight volumes of what he calls “kids’ commercials,” devoted to toys Benson is just beginning to realize break IDs and other between-the-cracks and related products. The toy spots are the significance of the proje—cwhten broadcast material dating from the '40s closest to Gallen’s heart and, not sur- prisingly, to those of many of his custom- you sign on with Disney, you've signed to the ’70s. And he has marketed 24 ers. “I find that everybody remembers on for life. “It’s been a whirlwind, dream | spellbinding hour-long videocassettes the ad for ‘Mr. Machine,’ ” he says, “and that a lot of women in their thirties and experience to work with this corpora- early forties want to see the ad for ‘Mys- tery Date’ again.” tion,” she says. “This could be a classic Despite his vast holdings, Gallen that’s around for 50 years, and my voice continues to search for certain ads that have eluded him thus far. “I’m still look- will be immortalized, like Snow White ing for 35mm technicolor copies of the Chiquita Banana commercial,” he ex- or Cinderella.” plains. Video Resources can be reached The 29-year-old actress believes that at 220 West 71 St., New York, NY 10023. Tapes are $24.95 each, and an illustrated women her age have a special need for catalog is $3 postpaid. fairy tales like The Little Mermaid. —Bruce Eder “There’s too much reality in my life and on the streets of New York to just recon- firm it on the screen,” she says. “Ariel is 16 in this movie, and that’s such a fragile time. It’s all about growing up and reaching a dream, and that’s a timeless Fond Memories: Toy commercials are the favorite theme.” —Jami Bernard among Video Resources’ vast collection of spots. MGM/UA T-120 tapes with an additional cassette of a tion mode” delivers 40 minutes of video per disc and 450 | pre-recorded classic movie for its $19.95 “Triple Packs.” Available titles come from the Turner/RKO library and lines of resolution. The machine, which won't be avail- include King Kong (1932), The Magnificent Ambersons, able until fall, will be priced somewhere in the $35,000 Gunga Din, Back to Bataan, Fort Apache, The Big Sky and Every Girl Should Be Married. to $40,000 range. Start Saving Your Pennies. Panasonic intro- Still in the Game. In response to the needs of a duced what it calls “the world’s first commercially available” rewritable laserdisc recorder at the National physically impaired 12-year-old in Oklahoma, Nintendo Association of Broadcaster’s convention in April. Intend- ed for professional video and broadcast applications, the has developed a game controller that employs a “puff machine has two recording modes: The “normal” mode and sip” tube in place of standard controls. The Hands records 60 minutes of full-motion video per disc with 400 lines of horizontal resolution, while the “high-resolu- Free controller requires no arm or hand use and a mini- mal amount of head and neck dexterity, and is compatible with all NES software except the Zapper and Power Pad series. The basic unit is available directly from Nintendo for $120, plus shipping and handling. Call 800-422-2602 for more information. ad JULY 1990 VIDEO 13

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GAZETTE Baby Makes Three: “The makeup I intended to use was Mary Stuar: Masterson egg white,” says Harvey, now head of the portrays an unwed teen- drama department at the University of Houston. “I had hoped to put on elabo- age mother in rate makeup that would flake so it Immediate Family. looked like I had been in salt water. Be- cause of time restrictio—nswe shot whole sections in as little as a day—I used regular greasepaint, and darkened the eyes. The best-laid plans,” he sighs. Location shooting hardly ate into the film’s $30,000 budget. “The state of Utah let us use the pavilion without charge. For the scene in the department Masterson’s children,” she says. “I think all these is- ‘Immediate’ sues are brought up in the movie, but success not in a didactic way. To me that is the key, because if you're going to reach ev- Although she has appeared in such quality films as Francis Ford Coppola’s erybody, you have to just present the in- Gardens of Stone and the underrated At formation and let people make of it what Close Range, Mary Stuart Masterson re- gards.her performance in Jonathan Kap- they will.” —Shari Roman lan’s Immediate Family (RCA/Columbia Lost ‘Souls’ Home Video) as her finest work. But rediscovered roles of this caliber are very hard to It’s not that drive-in audiences in 1962 Monster Mash: Director Herk Harvey saved money by come by, at least according to Master- couldn't recognize a good horror movie casting himself as a ghoul in Carnival of Souls. when they saw one. It’s just that indus- son. trial filmmaker Harold “Herk” Harvey's store, the railroad station and the bus “There aren’t that many parts, in low-budget Carnival of Souls fell into the station, we simply said, ‘May we shoot a hands of a distributor who absconded film here?’ And they said ‘Yes’.” The general, for women,” she explains. “You with all the money. The actors, who had scene of the car going off a bridge into either have to take your clothes off or be the water was shot in Harvey’s home- a peripheral character —the girlfriend, deferred their salaries, were never paid, town of Lawrence, Kansas. “They told the sister. And if you are the star you and the picture was left to rot in me I could do that as long as I’d repair have to be a hero who jumps out of chopped-up form and relegated to ran- the bridge. So we tore the bridge up a planes and goes into the jungle with a dom late-night TV showings. bit, dropped the car off it, retrieved the machine gun.” As Immediate Family’s car, and they handed me a bill for Lucy, a pregnant and unwed teenager But good horror movies have a way $12.—5bea0ms, labor, everything.” who gives up her child for what she of finding their audience. With the help hopes will be a better life, Masterson of a successful comeback last year at —dJami Bernard found a role she could really sink her New York’s Film Forum 2 revival house, teeth into. “It’s kind of nice to play a hu- Carnival of Souls became a hit on the man being,” she says wryly. art-house circuit and is now available on cassette from VidAmerica. Masterson was also pleased with the way the film explores a variety of sensi- Filmed partially at an eery, deserted tive subjects. “Lucy’s decision to bring carnival in Salt Lake City, Carnival is the baby to term has a lot to do with about a church organist (Candace Hill- current political issues —big ones like igoss) who begins to lose touch with re- ality after surviving a watery car crash. abortion, the welfare system, medicare She is fascinated by the abandoned car- and the lack of aid for people who don’t nival, and stalked by a chalk-white have enough money to take care of their ghoul (played by director Harvey). 18 VIDEO JULY 1990

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AUDIO INPUTSTATE OF THE ART Adding sonic booms to itty-bitty rooms BY IVAN BERGER surround sound amp for review, I de- wife’s desk. This arrangement places New surround sound systems can help cided to take the small-room challenge. both roughly at ear level (when we’re transform the video viewing/listening sitting up in bed) and a reasonable dis- experience from a humdrum living room A narrow aisle separates the bed tance away. affair into a vibrant theatrical experi- from bookcases and night tables lining ence. However, what if that living room The rear speakers are a/d/s L-300C is not a spacious area with a range of both sides of the room, and from a desk mini speakers. One goes on my night ta- sonic options? What if it’s not even a liv- and dresser (with TV set on top) at the ble, the other on my wife’s bookcase, ing room, but a cramped little New York foot. My bedroom audio/video system is putting them also at ear level. But the apartment bedroom scarcely larger than a modest one, consisting of a Pioneer rear speakers are beside, not behind, us. LV/CD player, an NAD 27-inch TV and That means each of us is far closer to the bed itself? Harsh reality intrudes, a pair of aging Advent mini speakers. one speaker than the other. As a result, that’s what, and the task of installing a (I’m between bedroom VCRs.) When sounds that are supposed to, come from decent audio/video surround system I’m not testing an amplifier or receiver behind do not quite do so. Another ob- takes on new and more challenging di- with this system, the Advent speakers vious problem is that each of us hears mensions. I know, because we're talking are hooked directly to the TV set’s am- the nearer surround speaker far more about my bedroom. My living room isn’t plifier outputs. than the farther one. I’ve tried aiming yet ready for surround treatment, so the speakers straight up, to move both when Technics sent me its SU-AV55 Positioning the front speakers for apparent sound sources a bit farther off, surround is no problem: The right one but the surround sound effect works best bi goes on top of the electronic gear (LV when the speakers face in at us, and at player, product being tested, etc.) to the eacn other. right of the TV, the left one atop my Clearly, my bedroom surround sys- tem isn’t perfect. But, it’s more adequate than the physical setup would suggest, especially when it’s used to play Dolby Surround LV discs. On those discs, sound sources that are supposed to be behind us actually seem to be somewhat off to one side. But they're still coming from well off-screen and definitely aren’t coming from in front of me. Ambient sound—crowd noises, cave reverberations and the like —come through nicely, making me feel I’m in the midst of the action. Only when I’m listening critically, forcing my- self not to be sucked into the onscreen action, do I become conscious that there’s no sound to the rear. Even then, I feel I'm part of the crowd, albeit slight- ly on the periphery. Getting the best effect takes very careful adjustment of the surround delay time. The greater the delay between front and rear speakers, the greater the surround effect. In any setup, the sound reaching your ears from the speakers is delayed by about one millisecond for each foot of distance between those speakers and your ears; since the sur- round speakers are closer than they are Ivan Berger is Technical Editor of Audio Magazine. RMIIGTICEH 20 VIDEO JULY 1990

in a theater, some additional delay must The SU-AV55 has no center chan- widely spaced main speakers. If the TV be supplied by the surround decoder. Be- nel or subwoofer outputs, but there are cause not all setups are the same, the ways around both problems. To achieve has only one mono speaker, the center- decoder’s delay is usually adjustable. better bass, the amp includes a Digital Sampling Bass (DSB) system. This con- ing is even more effective. The Technics amp adjustments al- verts all frequencies below 160 Hertz to digital signals, drops the frequencies an When I listen to music in surround, low a range from 15 to 30 milliseconds of octave, then converts low-bass signals back to analog and mixes them with the I set the front/rear balance far more to delay in the Dolby mode. With my bed- original signal. room setup, I had expected that the the front than for Dolby Surround mov- short distance between listeners and the If the original doesn’t include much rear speakers would call for the maxi- bass below 80 Hz, the DSB system will ies. For stereo music, I use the Dolby mum delay. In practice, I found about 25 to 28 milliseconds bes—twith the full 30 ‘Used judiciously, setting, even though an A/V Stereo mode milliseconds delay, the rear sounds seemed too distant from the front ones. a little surround is intended for music, while the Dolby The balance between front and rear goes a long way, Surround mode isn’t. Unfortunately (at volume takes careful adjustment, too. Otherwise, the front channels simply even in mono.’ least on the amp I used), A/V Stereo swamp the rear ones or, worse still, the add it; if your speakers attenuate low generates no right rear signals, only left rear channels drown out the front. The bass that is in the original signal, DSB front/rear balance setting I use varies a will give those speakers a bit more bass rear ones. bit with the program material and with to chew on. The DSB output can be var- There’s also an A/V Mono position. the listening audience (my wife likes a ied, so speakers are not overloaded with frequencies they can’t handle. If the This doesn’t even come close to making bit less rear volume than I do). original signal does include low bass and If it becomes necessary to set a ster- the speakers reproduce it easily, the cir- the sound source sound like stereo. But cuit can be switched off. eo system’s left/right balance control off used judiciously (a little surround goes a center, it generally means something's a “Centering” program dialog when bit off in the system— probably a loss of there is no center channel can be a long way, here), it makes me feel as if gain in one channel or an off-center lis- problem. I find it sometimes helps to turn the surround amp’s front channels I’m listening to a mono source in a larg- tening or speaker position. The front/ down and turn the TW, set’s speakers up, rear relationship is a different matter, simply because the set’s built-in speakers er, more reverberant room. however, and it’s often necessary to set are closer to the screen than the more the balance control off-center, due to or- As you’ve probably guessed from all dinary variations in listening position, the surround features I’ve been discuss- front and rear amplifier sensitivity or front and rear speaker efficiency. ing, the Technics SU-AV55 is very much Front/rear balance is easiest to set a video-oriented amp. The only audio- when it can be adjusted from the listen- ing position. Fortunately, the Technics dedicated jack sets are the tuner and remote includes balancing controls. But I'd also like some visual indication of the CD inputs, a pair of low-level surround front/rear balance setting, so I could re- store old settings if I'd changed them. outputs (to drive rear speakers with an other amp) and tape inputs and outputs. Off the other connections, the TV and video disc inputs have stereo audio jacks, plus a composite video jack apiece, while the CD input and the VCR 1 and VCR 2 input/output loops feature the above, plus an S-video out- put. Both composite and S-video out- puts (but no audio jacks) for connection to a TV monitor are also included. Another set of VCR 2 inputs is lo- cated on the front panel. Confusingly, the switch that selects either front or rear jacks is positioned just above the VCR 1 selector button. = will spot and completely eliminate Macrovision and all current copy protection and jamming. Giving you a crystal clear picture. 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READER FORMAT FUROR FORUM What's best, what's not? Our ‘Eyes-On’ comparison triggers a heated debate. ith so many formats compet- speckling, inclusions, crosstalk from warpage, etc. Their incidence on discs is ing for the hearts and minds of far greater and more aggravating than any problems I have experienced with video buffs, we were sure ‘‘For- videocassettes. Even more alarming, my mat Face-Off \"’—the eighth in discs have not lasted as long as my tapes. our series of “Eyes-On” evaluations— would trigger a spirited debate among Bob Stephens readers. But we were caught off guard by San Francisco, California the torrent of mail our March feature unleashed. Your reactions ranged from Congratulations on your “Eyes On” pleased to outraged, and included plenty of personal opinions about which format evaluation of video formats. It’s very in- delivers the best pict—umrakieng it clearer than ever that feelings still run as formative, and it’s amazing to think no strong as in the days when the playback lane stretched from VHS to Beta and one has done it before. Keep up the back again. |Hi8 |Sm: SNS; WS |||baa Wes US good work. David A. Bryant The feature reported the subjective reactions of a panel of Video Magazine Canton, Massachusetts editors to a test program displayed in each of the major viewing formats, in- to task for failing to hold another view- I am disappointed by “Format Face- cluding laserdisc. By rating the formats ing after a dirty video head was discov- Off.” After testing seven home video ered late in the test on the ED Beta formats and compiling the results, the for each of several deck. Here’s a selection from your com- staff discovered the ED Beta deck had components of clogged heads then chose to print the picture quality— ments, pro and con. results as tested, making ED Beta appear as a substandard format. That's like rac- resolution, color, I was gratified to see laserdiscs and Sup- ing a Ferrari with a flat tire against a brightness, etc.— the panelists de- er VHS come out on top in “Format Ford Taurus in tip-top condition, and cided that laser- rating the Ferrari second because it discs delivered the Face-Off ” since I have invested heavily couldn't stay on the track. I have used best picture, fol- ED Beta since it came on the market lowed by Super in both. However, your test for contrast and find it far superior to any home vid- VHS, 8mm, Su- perBeta, ED Beta, seems simplistic. You said you looked for eo tape format; so much, in fact, that it Hi8 and VHS. is a viable substitute for the 3/4-inch the difference between the blackest professional format in many instances. Some readers asked why we omitted Compact VHS. We did so because blacks and the whitest whites. But when Richard D. Bennette VHS-C tapes are too short to use at SP President, The Video Transfer speed for watching movies or taping TV it comes to contrast, more is not neces- shows, and because their specifications Ridgefield, Connecticut are identical to those for VHS. Readers sarily better. Ideally you want a good also wanted to know what tapes we I give “Format Face-Off ” a score of used. We watched the test programs on range of grays in between. This is why I zero, for its flawed, unfairly conducted test. Hi8 and ED Beta are designed to JVC's Victor SXZ120 for S-VHS, Max- prefer S-VHS over VHS. Its flatter, ell’s RX Pro 120 for VHS, Sony’s EL-500 serve mainly as camera acquisition sys- for ED Beta, Sony’s Pro X/L-500 for Su- more even contrast level appears more tems, and to re-record their own high- perBeta, Sony’s Hi8ME for Hi8 and resolution material using metal tape. TDK’s MP-90 for 8mm. All are at the lifelike. Of course, laserdiscs give the When recording from a lower resolution top of their class. oxide tape source, such as the one-inch best of both worlds. Thanks for an inter- In addition, several readers took us studio format you used, the results will esting article. Carl Orth be predictably bad. Carmel, Indiana The ED Beta deck was found to I find your estimation of laserdisc quality exaggerated. For six years I have been on an emotional roller coaster because of the wildly fluctuating quality control of domestic manufacturers. The real- ity—not the potential—of laserdiscs is that they have excessive video noise: IBPIFLZNHOOULOOBRMUTIRSEOET;: 22 VIDEO JULY 1990

have dirty heads after the test, yet you eNO. F ee mad tee didn't repeat the trials, and your moni- tor does not have resolution capabilities equal to ED Beta. I have cameras and decks for all the formats you tested. When I operate them properly, using the best available tape (Canon Metal Evap- orated for Hi8 and Ampex BetaCam SP for ED Beta), I show results that are daz- zling and virtually noise-free. Steve McDonald Eugene, Oregon I have been a Beta fan for years and I Why should | buy the new Pioneer cannot agree with your ratings. I have LaserDisc™ player? compared ED Beta to S-VHS, U-Matic and SuperBeta—and ED Beta excels in all your rating categories, particularly in regard to S-VHS. I have never seen Su- perBeta display better quality than ED Beta. I agree that laserdiscs are probably superior, but my experience is that disc quality is inconsistent. Dr. Joseph M. Edelman Baton Rouge, Louisiana I was surprised to see how poorly ED It plays movies with CD sound. With a Beta fared compared to other formats. picture that’s 60% The article states that the ED Beta ma- sharper than an chine had a clogged video head. This would explain the problems, but using ordinary VCR. Why buy anything else? an incapacitated machine in such a comparison is like road-testing several cars then mentioning that one of the cars was tested with a flat tire. Brenda D. Walden Video Horizons Productions Yucaipa, California It’s amazing that even with a clogged head, ED Beta placed first among VCRs on resolution, and beat VHS on color intensity, color constancy, color shift and color accuracy. I had ignored ED Beta as just another gimmick format like S-VHS and Compact VHS, but there is no telling what this format is capable of doing. William T. Clark Columbus, Ohio I'm a cameraman who works on feature WY) PIONEER’ LiewNe For more information FaiNRc6SCodnioeeanrrdf.racoivdldrti.eemicaoretniaoln, films and recently I’ve been trying out or a free catalog, We Bring The Revolution Home.” 8mm and Hi8 camcorders with an eye call 1-800-255-2550. ©1989 Pioneer LDCA, Inc., Long Beach, CA toward buying one. Although the 8mm picture is pleasing, there’s no way I would pick it over the crisper Hi8 pic- ture. If you honestly feel the “details ap- peared fuzzy” in describing Hi8, you must have done something wrong. This is exactly where Hi8 shines, and if Hi8’s success is retarded by your results, you are doing us a disservice. Wouldn’t you be thrilled to have a Hi8 version of Sony’s CCD-TR5 camcorder? , Mako Koiwai Topanga, California > JULY 1990 VIDEO 23

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Duane Howts Lexington, Kentucky Video Audio Mixing System Your article was most interesting, and CL-514 AC Adapter with BATTERY BLOWOUT! disturbing in the questions it raised. For purchase of MP-100 or MP-110. OTHER SIZES & MODELS IN STOCK example, I wonder to what extent the differences in picture quality, partic- VANTAGE VIDEO CASES CALL FOR PRICES ularly among the tape formats that NP-77 SONY-YPE ; ranked close to one another, might stem ee Sue from normal variations in the quality of Manufacturer’s 3-year warranty the tape decks that were employed. Might the results have been different if a SONY TR-55 Type $2495 NP-22 SONY-TYPE second set of VCRs of the same models Holster Case Extra power 1500mAmp battery fits had been used instead? Full Line In Stock - CALL! in the palm of your hand............ $2995 Philip M. Alden, Jr. Larchmont, New York JVC/PANASONIC-TYPE GRIP PACK I was stunned to see ED Beta score abys- 1400mAmp for new generation JVC mally against S-VHS and the laserdisc. 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EDITED BY BRIAN CLARK Llegiwoute ~NEW PRODUCTS C >SPECIALISTS a FOR MORE INFO: CONVENIENT FAX # Canovision 8 (201) 696-6531 (201) 633-1476 06 WE WILL MATCH OR BEAT ANY LEGITIMATE PRICE Canon debuts ultra-light 8mm camcorder TOLL FREE:.... 1 (800) 444-6300 Canon’s 8mm Canovision 8 EO6 camcorder weighs just 2 pounds (without bat- FCASaT nSEoRVnICE | tery), yet it’s packed with a number ofsophisticated features. Canon’s intelligent BEST PRICES! | auto-exposure system combines two-field metering with backlight detection to re- NEW MODELS tain image detail. A new 25-zone auto white balance is designed to reproduce EO6 E30 more lifelike colors. Aided by a half-inch, 270,000-pixel CCD image sensor, H680 | E640 through-the-lens autofocusing ranges from 0.6 inches at the wide-angle setting to 13 inches at the telephoto setting. The EO6 uses an f/1.8 lens that has a 6x zoom NEW IMPROVED with a range of 9 to 54 mm. HIGH RES. A1 A digital superimposer allows the layering of one image over another in any of Canon ist eight colors. The image can be reversed as well, so that a background is visible only through the outline of the superimposition. Scenes can also be tinted in any of 8mm Camcorder eight colors. The battery recharges in 80 minutes for 40 minutes of shooting. Canon A1/MK II Price: $1,549. 8mm CamcorderA1 For additional information, circle No. 150 on Reader Service Card. Hi-Band HI-FI STEREO gg 400 LINES Mitsubishi introduces audio/video first Smm-VHS & BETA JVC © HITACHI © PANASONIC & MORE! The world’s first audio tape cassette deck with a video output and onscreen pro- gramming belongs to Mitsubishi, thanks to its new M-T5010 deck. The onscreen SYNCHRO EDIT-DECKS menu displays follow the same form used in Mitsubishi's new home theater sys- tems. They confirm the use of Dolby B/C, various transport modes, tape speed, JOG SHUTTLE JOY CONTROL and other functions. A blank skip feature automatically begins fast forward after ten seconds if no signal is present. Variable intro-scan permits listeners to sample SOMMRLAVER selshotiecsicdcieclsdhiaelaitisto up to 59 seconds from each selection. Auto tape select calibrates tape equalization © VHS 4+2HI-FIMTSSTEREO........... from normal, metal and high-bias tapes. © SUPER VHS 4+2 HD HI-FI MTS FLY ERASE. . . Price: $699. SasaWe accept AmEx, Visa, MasterCard, and Discover. C.0.D. welcome, For additional information, circle No. 151 on Reader Service Card. We ship within 24 hours. FaiNRc9CSodnioaeernrdf.raciodvldtr.ieeimcaoretniaoln, All prices quoted include manufacturer's standard accessories & U.S. Warranty. All units are factory sealed. We are an AUTHORIZED DEALER for ALL NAME BRANDS WE SELL! 10 DAY EXCHANGE. S & HNON-REFUNDABLE! JULY 1990 VIDEO 25

: laaveaouta NEW PRODUCTS ( SPECIALISTS 1160 HAMBURG TPK., WAYNE, N.J. 07470 FOR MORE INFO: CONVENIENT FAX # (201) 696-6531 (201) 633-1476 WE WILL MATCH OR BEAT ANY LEGITIMATE PRICE TOLL FREE:.... 1 (800) 444-6300 FAST SERVICE @evoncere VHS: Eight-segment assembler automates og Pioneer introduces heavyweight disc player chores, placin 9 desired scenes in any order. H' Circuitry and digital auto- Pioneer’s Elite LD-S2 laserdisc player is a top-of-the-line deck that uses a fully dig- tracking ensure quality video ital processing system that includes digital time-base correction, Y/C separation and fuss-free playback. with video noise reduction and a color noise suppressor. JVC HR-S6600U Special effects are aided by an eight-bit digital field memory, and include mul- ti-speed play with strobe picture and still picture with sound. Some of the LD-S2’s S-VHS: Feature-laden deck offers the utmost in 68 pounds come from a doubly shielded structure designed to eliminate noise. scene-finding convenience. Full-featured remote with display dupli- The unit produces a video signal-to-noise ratio of 52 decibels and uses a 20-bit cates on-screen programming 8x oversampling digital filter. Two independent R-core transformers supply power capabilities. to separate audio and video circuits. The unit will be available in August. JVC HR-S 10000 Price: $3,500. S-VHS: Automatic assemble and insert editing with For additional information, circle No. 152 on Reader Service Card. eight-scene memory and preview mode for editing ease. Video-on-sound feature First 61-inch TV from Magnavox dubs video over arbeahes hi- fi tracks. Magnavox’s RL8570OAK rear-screen projection television is the company’s S-VHS: Title/date recording adds personal first 61-inch set. It has a 50-watt Dolby touch. Bargraph-style “tape time remaining’ Pro-Logic surround system by JBL and a display eliminates recording color picture-in-picture feature. The au- surprises. Synchro-edit dio system includes two 6-inch and two feature simplifies dubbing. 2-inch speakers, along with surround sound connectors. There are also two S-video inputs and stereo/video inputs and outputs. A personal preference fea- ture permits picture and volume con- trols to be preset. The set’s 160-degree, wide-angle screen has an improved pic- ture thanks to circuits that extend the chroma performance of greens by filter- ing out excess red light. Price: $3,395. For agditional information, circle no. 153 on Reader Service Card. -VHS: Optical scanner digitizes graphics for Watchman doubles as portable monitor peip aia Other digital tricks include Sony’s newest Watchman TV set, the FD-250, has a 2.7-inch r correction, fades, wipes, black & white picture tube. When used with a camcorder, the negative/positive, titles, and FD-250’s A/V input jack makes it practical to use as a field noise reduction. monitor. Connected to a VCR, it can be used to watch tapes. The unit weights 17 ounces without batteries. It measures a We accept AmEx, Visa, MasterCard, and Discover. C.0.D. welcome pocket-sized 4-1/4 by 7-3/8 by 2-1/8 inches, and comes with a shoulder strap. A retractable antenna (not pictured) rests on s {|C.0.eD. top of the unit. We ship within 24 hours. Price: $169.99. All prices quoted include manufacturer's standard accessories & U.S. Warranty. All units are factory For additional information, circle No. 154 on Reader Service Card. sealed. We are an AUTHORIZED DEALER for ALL NAME BRANDS WE SELL! 10 DAY EXCHANGE. S & H NON-REFUNDABLE! ‘J“SUBO|DPOLUEOOINFIOPU|DOHODADDJYEOW/YSJPOPJDU! 26 VIDEO JULY 1990

Sanyo VCR packs heavy feature lineup Mageeonta Sanyo’s VHR9670 VHS VCR packs a variety of features not usually offered to- ¢C \"§$PECIALISTS gether in mid-priced decks. The features include four video heads, hi-fi sound, a 181-channel cable-compatible tuner, a real-time tape counter, an Index Search sys- FOR MORE INFO: CONVENIENT FAX # tem to speed access to desired points on a tape, and a “go-to” function. This allows (201) 696-6531 (201) 633-1476 a user to choose an exact point to begin playing or recording by designating the spot in hours, minutes and seconds of elapsed tape time. An Index Scan feature WE WILL MATCH OR BEAT ANY LEGITIMATE PRICE fast-forwards or rewinds to the beginning of each recording, plays the tape back for five seconds and continues scanning until play is chosen. TOLL FREE:.... 1 (800) 444-6300 The 9670 also has onscreen programming, a one-year/six-event timer, auto FAST SERVICE channel programming and auto tracking. When the unit is in play and no signal is BEST PRICES! on the tape, a blue screen appears. A high-speed cue-and-review feature runs at 5x KYOCEF in SP and 15x in EP. Quick playback permits fast review with a noise-free picture. YASHICA . Four heads produce a clear frame in the pause/still, frame advance and variable slow motion modes. A 35-key infrared remote is included. Price: $449.99. 8mm FLYErase Head HI-FI STAND For additional information, circle No. 155 on Reader Service Card. GRS 707U Yamaha speaker designed for center channel LATEST SUPER VHS € The Yamaha NS-C70 loudspeaker is intended for use as a center channel in home OLYMPUS theater systems. It is magnetically shielded so it can be placed near TV sets with no loss of picture quality. With a frequency range of 70 to 20,000 Hertz, the speak- 990 UMER er can also be used in pairs. The front panel is set at a 15-degree angle, permitting a RATED #1! | variety of mounting options. Two four-inch drivers are housed in a cabinet that measures 17-1/2 by 5-3/8 by 6-1/4 inches. The speaker weighs eight pounds. We accept AmEx, Visa, pst and Discover. C.0.D. welcome Price: $119. We ship within 24 hours. FCaRSiN1cooadi1enoenrrrd.facdivold.itreecimeraotniaoln, All prices quoted include manufacturer's standard For additional information, circle No. 156 on Reader Service Card. accessories & U.S. Warranty. All units are factory sealed. We are an AUTHORIZED DEALER for ALL Camcorder has a head for dates NAME BRANDS WE SELL! 10 DAY EXCHANGE. Nikon’s VN-850 8mm camcorder has a feature that allows it to memorize two S & H NON-REFUNDABLE! “birthdays” and one event date. The birthdate (or any other date that’s important) setting shows the current age in years and months. The event date setting shows the elapsed time since an event was last recorded. An infrared remote control per- mits the videographer to be a part ofaproduction. When the camcorder is used for playback through a monitor or a VCR, the remote can reset the tape | counter, start playback rewind, fast forward, reverse/forward frame | pause, slow motion and record. The camcorder’s f/1.6 lens has an 8x power zoom, and a CCD image sensor with 270,000 pixels. Subjects can be recorded in light as low as two lux. A flying erase head facilitates editing, as does edit search and high- speed scene-search functions. With the auto-lock cover closed, everything is automatic. An open cover reveals manual controls for focus, white balance, backlight and six shutter speeds. Price: $1,400. | For additional information, circle no. 157 on Reader Service Card. JULY 1990 VIDEO 27

WHS) [liciFi DA PRO 4 HEAD/HIGH SPEED REWIND/HIGH QUALITY PICTURE/AUTO PLAY PLHEOVENLE SHARPNESS L-REC LEVEL-R COMMOMDAEND Niveilae Ves VIRI+ PHoNEes (fi *) STEREO VIDEO CASSETTE RECORDER s Sony VHS hi-fi VCR Turn the dial clockwise and the tape tures, such as hi-fi stereo sound, auto tracking with manual override, auto re- Sony’s recently released SLV-575UC is moves forward; counterclockwise, and it peat play and a recallable data screen particularly noteworthy because it is’ the moves in reverse, with the speed con- least expensive VHS hi-fi VCR to offer a trolled by how far off center the user with counter, tape remaining, tuner/ shuttle dial and a host of automatic op- turns the dial. The speed choices are erating sequences. Yet it is very easy to 1/5x, normal, 2x and cue/review; the source, function, speed and date/time use and exhibits exceedingly good audio information. The timer is very flexible, and video performance in its class. center position provides a still picture. with one-shot, daily, weekly, Monday- The automatic sequences include re- to-Friday and Monday-to-Saturday op- The shuttle dial makes it very easy wind/timer record, play/rewind/stop/off tions. Two nice extras are high-speed re- to get to a particular spot on a tape. and go to zero/play. To top it all off, the wind and—in a first for consumer machine is very handsome, with all of its VCRs — self-cleaning tape heads. controls except the shuttle dial hidden A second set of line input jacks in in a front compartment. the front compartment makes it easy to The deck includes many useful fea- copy tapes from a camcorder. A dedi- Solly DATA bidirectional—2x Control S input Counter Digits: Preset Method: 5—hrs:mins:secs. automatic plus add/ olV-570U0 Suggested Price: Rapid Search: Remote: VHS VER $599 SP—7x, EP—21x, lock- IR wireless with Program Start erase from scan se- Weight: ing type using switches for TV or VIR Locator/Index/Cue: quence PCVHIIODNTEGOST:EST 14.3 pounds dedicated buttons on commands and VIR index scan and search; 28 VIDEO JULY 1990 remote 1/2/3 command modes; auto/manual index Broadcast Tuning Dimensions: buttons for power, TV/ write, manual erase Range: 3-7/8 x 17 x 14-1/2 Cue & Review 2 to 13, 14 to 69 inches (h/w/d) (Search): VTR, volume up and Auto Functions: SP—7x, EP—21x, non- down, channel up and rewind, repeat, play/re- Cable Tuning Range: Power Requirements: locking using fast for- down, audio monitor, wind/off, go to zero/ A-8, 2 to 13, A to W, 120 VAC, 60 Hz ward and rewind index, index mark, in- stop, go to zero/play, buttons on machine or dex erase, input select, go to record start/play, W+1 to W+58, A-5 to Power Consumption: remote, or using shuttle record mode, data rewind/power off, re- A-1, W+59 to W+84 32 W dial screen, counter reset, wind/eject/power off, 10-digit keypad, enter, rewind/play, AFT: Tape Format: VHS Swing Shuttle Dial timer clear, timer re- Speeds: cord, menu; up, down Linear Audio: switchable with manual Tape Speeds: bidirectional—1/5x, 1x, left and right cursors; mono fine-tuning record—SP, EP; play— 2x, cue/review execute, function mem- Sr LP cr ory, pause/still, record Hi-Fi AFM Audio: Timer: Fast Forward/Rewind (2 buttons), slow minus, 8-program/1-month and Video Heads: 4 Time: slow plus, direction stereo 3-3/4 min. for T-120; rocker, x2, play, high quick timer (OTR) Slow Motion: 1-3/4 min. for T-120 in speed rewind, reverse Tuning Method: bidirectional—1/5x on high speed rewind search, rewind/review, frequency synthesis Special Features: VCR shuttle control; mode fast forward/cue, for- self-cleaning heads, still variable—1/5x-1/30x on ward search and stop Channel Selectors: frame, bidirectional remote Remote Pause: programmable scan on VCR; scan plus direct frame advance, sepa- Speed Play: access on remote rate eject, counter memory (through menu), channel lock, auto channel change J

Reel Fast: VIDEOTEST NUMBER 545 tates point-and-shoot operation. These Sony's SLV-575UC special features include auto/manual ex- VHS VCR rewinds a posure (iris) with onscreen meter in ‘Canon Al Mark IIT-120 tape in less than manual mode, two-zone auto/manual fo- cus with one-shot capability, a two- two minutes. H18 camcorder line/l6-character titler, a self-timer, an interval timer, record (edit) search, in- Like its predecessor the Al, Canon’s Al sert editing and Y/C output. We found Mark II may be held like a traditional only a few omissions: inputs for stereo camcorder, or like a 35mm still camera line audio and fixed positions for indoor | for better stability. Duplicate run/stop and outdoor white balance. Otherwise, | and zoom controls make operation we're content with the feature package. | equally easy in either style. The Mark Description. From the side grip | II’s improvements include an image sen- | forward, the Al is more like convention- SWING SHUTTLE | sor with more pixels for greater detail, | al camcorders. The grip has a red run/ | and a new type of tracking autofocus pause button, a wide-angle/tele button that follows the main subject even if it and a battery eject slider. As on many moves off center. The auto iris tracks current camcorders, the battery is an ex- cated rear-panel recording output dis- | along with the AF for taping subjects posed part of the grip. A compartment penses with the onscreen displays; only | against lighter backgrounds. | for the clock battery hides under the the monitor output provides onscreen | Other improvements include a jack main battery. Just above the support menus. If you’ve been spoiled by a top- for external stereo microphones (but not strap’s rear attachment point sit mini notch VCR with all the bells and whis- stereo audio line in); a telemacro focus jacks for a stereo microphone and DC tles, Sony’s new mid-priced machine tange forE shoooting fromx as close as two |out to power the mic. shouldn't disappoint you. feet; S-video input so it can be used as | The front of the left side has the manual focus ring and the zoom lever. A Description. The SLV-575UC is either the recorder or the player in edi- knob on the lever pulls out to release the macro lock. The camera control black and displays no front-panel con- | ting; and two additional action-freezing panel holds buttons on the top edge for forward and reverse search in record | trols except the shuttle knob. To the shutter speeds, 1/4000 and 1/10000-sec- mode, and title and date imprinters. Un- knob’s left is a large display area. Further ond. Carried over from the earlier model derneath these are controls for fade, manual exposure, auto/manual/locked left sits a compartment, the door of are the convenient control layout and continued on page 31 which swings down to reveal a head- the LCD readout on the top panel, the phone jack and buttons for power and | IR remote control, and the 24-hour de- eject on the back wall along with the | layed start timer which, among cam- continued on page 30 | corders, may still be unique to the Al and the Al Mark II. Absent Features: SP—40.8 dB; This camcorder is packed with an audio dub, video dub, EP—36.2 dB overwhelming array of high-end fea- | insert edit, visible fast Audio Frequency tures, but its automatic circuitry facili- | forward and rewind Response: Accessories: hi-fi—20_Hz-20 kHz, +0.1/-2.3 dB; linear (-3 remote control with bat- dB)—100 Hz-10 kHz, teries, stereo audio/ SP; 100-4 kHz, EP video cable, 75-ohm antenna cable, antenna Hi-Fi Dynamic Range: transformer 88.9 dB RESULTS Linear Audio S/N: 46.8 dB Horizontal Resolution: | 240 lines Audio Distortion: hi-fi—0.3%, linear—1.1% Video S/N, Unweighted: RATINGS SP—45.7 dB; EP—41.9 dB Picture Quality: very good/excellent Video S/N, Weighted: SP—51.7 dB; Audio Quality: EP—50.3 dB very good/excellent Chroma AM S/N: Operational Ease: Keep on Movin’: SP—48.0 dB; very good/excellent EP—39.4 dB Overall Performance: | The At MkIl’s auto- very good/excellent Chroma PM S/N: | focus tracks subjects in | motion. JULY 1990 VIDEO 29

THINK The remote control provides all GLOBAL these options except headphone vol- ume, sharpness, manual record level control, edit switching and tracking ad- justment. Instead of a shuttle dial there is a direction rocker, and buttons for 2x and slow motion with stepped options for speeds from 1/5x to 1/30x. Cue and review search is accomplished with the fast forward and rewind buttons, while dedicated buttons lock the search in ei- ther direction. A ten-digit keypad pro- vides direct access tuning and clock/ Would you buy a computer, a fax or a disk player timer adjustments. that operates in the USA only? Then why would you settle for a VCR without A user can access some remote con- international capacities? trol functions only through menus, using Our VCRs have all the bells & whistles of other lux- ury VCRs, but in addition they will play PAL or buttons for menu, execute, function SECAM tapes from overseas, as well as your American NTSC tapes, on most standard Ameri- memory and four-direction cursor con- can TV sets. trols. The main menu offers a list of sub- One day soon Global Video Communication will be menus: auto menu, auto repeat, timer as common as sending letters. set/check, mode set, tuner preset, func- Make sure that your next VCR is prepared for the 90’s to handle tapes from all over the world. tion memory, clock set and demonstra- Call the exclusive manufacturers of Global VCRs: tion. Using these options is simply a ‘BJJ|‘ZUBPDOLUO/OI/FNOUDPDAHOODIDOWBWYISJPOPJDU! matter of selecting one and pressing exe- Instant Replay, 2601 S. Bayshore Dr., Ste. 1050, Miami, FL 33133, Ph: (305) 854-8777 Fx: 858-9053 cute, or following onscreen instructions. A few, like timer and clock, require responses on the keypad. The dedicated function memory button executes one selected sequence like play/rewind/pow- er off or rewind/eject/power off without having to go through the menu. Ease of operation is very good to excellent. SONY Vis VCR | mand Sony Beta, 8mm and VHS VCRs, Performance. The SLV-575UC de- respectively. However, the SLV-575UC livers a horizontal resolution of 240-plus lines with an unweighted video signal- to-noise ratio of 45.7 decibels at SP and continued from page 29 can be set to respond to any of these 41.9 dB at EP. It plays but does not re- command modes. cord at the LP speed. The weighted vid- The remote has buttons for power, eo S/N is 51.7 dB at SP and 50.3 dB at cassette hatch. Below the hatch are input select, record mode, data screen, EP. The chroma AM S/N is 48.9 dB at jacks for video and stereo audio line in- counter reset, volume up and down, SP and 39.4 dB at EB and chroma PM put 2, a switch for command mode 1/2/3, channel up and down, audio monitor, S/N is 40.8 dB at SP and 36.2 dB at EP. and rotary controls for left and right hi-fi index, index mark, index erase, timer All the SP measurements excep: record level, phones level and sharpness. clear, timer record, a ten-digit keypad chroma PM S/N are outstanding. At EP The sturdy horizontal surface cre- and enter. they are average, except for weighted ated by the open door holds buttons for Further back are tape transport con- video S/N, which is very good. Picture high-speed rewind, stop, pause/still, re- trols, with buttons on a silver back- quality is very good/excellent. cord, rewind/search, play, fast forward/ ground for play, high-speed rewind, reverse search, rewind, fast forward, for- Hi-fi audio frequency response is 20 search, edit, timer record, quick timer, ward search and stop. up and down normal/slow tracking, Hertz to 20 kilohertz, +0.1/-2.3 dB, auto/manual tracking, TV/VTR, input | Operation. Setting up the with a dynamic range of 88.9 dB and to- select, SP/EP, and channel up and down. SLV-575UC is easy. Simply connect the tal harmonic distortion of 0.3 percent. The rear panel has a large ventilated power, antenna and TV RF cables. Use Frequency response on the mono linear bulge, the power cord, input and output the monitor output jacks if you want to track is 100 Hertz to 10 kHz at SP connectors for VHF/UHF/cable, and a see the onscreen displays. Using the and 100 Hz to 4 kHz at EP, with an S/N channel 3/4 RF output selector. To the VCR is equally easy, but the compart- of 46.8 dB and a total harmonic distor- right of these is a control S input jack, ment must be opened to load a tape or tion of 1.1 percent. Audio quality is very followed by three columns of video and perform any functions at the machine. good/excellent. stereo audio jacks for line input 1, line The basic transport controls are similar Conclusion. The Sony out and monitor out. The line out video to those on audio cassette decks. SLV-575UC rates very good to excellent The other controls are well-labeled overall with similar ratings on audio, jack carries a signal without onscreen video and ease of operation. Its long list displays, for using the SLV-575UC as a and easy to use. The quick timer button of features is a big plus, especially the playback deck when editing or dubbing. activates the recorder for half-hour in- automatic functions and the shuttle The remote control is medium-sized, crements up to eight hours. The shuttle dial. The suggested price of $599 makes with a switch to determine whether it dial operates in playback or record it the least expensive VCR to have will command a Sony TV or VCR and a modes to find a precise spot on the tape many of these features, so it is an ex- second switch for VTR 1/VTR 2/VTR 3 at any of four speeds in either direction. ceedingly good value. We recommend it command modes. These modes com- It is very useful for accurate editing. highly. r] 30 VIDEO JULY 1990

| 410, 000pixels: - | Sell-Timer:o. 7 Lene: | 11.4, 10x. seen | continuous aug - ‘separate eject,aio te | power zoom with tele- | wind, 24-hour timer macro and wide-angle a Balance: | AbsentFeatures: macro ranges | | 0.7-inch CAT ie sports finder and indi- | | cators for counter, tape | T _| end, no cassette, low | awuittoh‘|tmraancukaalfmixoeddeTT m:| battery, dew, date bat neepasheelelt e, time,program mer and on setae ~ a Shutter kiseaie, 1/10000, 1/4000, 1/2000, 1/1000, 1/50 1/250, normal (1/60 continued from page 29 CAN TV & VIDEO IMPROVE exposure, auto/auto tracking/manual fo- cus, AF macro/one-shot AF, shutter YOUR CHILD'S GRADES? speed, white balance and auto/manual Apparently so, as a number of researchers using ‘closed captioned’ tele- vision report. operation. Canon focused its ergonomic design You may never have seen captions, but they are hidden in more than 190 hours of TV programs every week and in over 2000 of the most popular on the Al’s rear. The recorder is angled home Video movies. When captions are decoded the dialogue appears so that it’s almost perpendicular to the camera. The cassette hatch (with view- on the screen (much like subtitles) so the viewer can read the script as it is ing window) is at the rear, left of center. spoken. The right part of the recorder projects sideways to form a grip, as on a 35mm Closed captioned TV & Videos are being used by a number of progres- still camera. sive schools and Universities. Instructors now recommend that students should watch all TV & Video programs at home ‘with captions because At the back of this grip are a second .“consistent reading of television will exhilarate their reading abilities, set of wide-angle and tele buttons posi- result in greater retention and improve comprehension...” tioned under the user’s thumb. A second run/pause button sits on top, under the So if you want to give your child a head start at school, here is how you index finger. The power slider occupies can turn those passive TV hours into active learning sessions: the space between the front and rear grips, and can be reached from either A new VCR with the unique capacity to decode and display closed cap- grip. The headphone jack sits above this tions, formerly exclusively available to schools, can be bought now for switch. use at home. This is good, old home education with a Television Age Twist. Call the exclusive manufacturers of Educational VCRs: Part of the rear grip swings aside to reveal buttons for line/S-video in/out, INSTANT REPLAY, 2601S. Bayshore Dr., Ste. 1050, Miami, FL33133, Ph: (305) 854-8777 Fx: 858-9053 Hi8, title/date adjust, timer, plus, minus and shift. One touch of the timer button followed by plus or minus gives a choice of ten- or 30-second self-timer, or two- second recordings every ten, 20 or 60 seconds. Two touches of the timer but- ton followed by plus or minus sets the continued on page 88 FaiC1ScRNodnia3eoerndrfr.aciodvldtr.ieimecoarentailon, JULY 1990 VIDEO 31

VIDEOTESTS Ad Attacker: During playback, a push of the hi-fi VR9970's frame ad- vance button cuts out recorded commercials by skipping forward 60 seconds. Magnavox VHS VCR easy. The deck has all common auto- Description. The black VR9970 is matic functions plus repeat, which re- just 14-1/4 inches wide and looks disarm- The VR9970 is the first Magnavox to plays video segments that have no blank ingly simple with a display area at the far have a jog/shuttle dial. It is a stylish, pe- right above buttons for power, stop/eject tite machine with a long list of features, spots. and VCR, and indicators for stereo and including four video heads, stereo hi-fi The new deck uses a frequency syn- SAP. A dark green door covers the cas- audio, a flying erase head for clean tran- sette hatch and the infrared sensor. The sitions, many non-digital playback ef- thesis MTS tuner capable of SAP re- door allows IR signals from the remote fects, synchro edit, audio dubbing and cording—an unusual feature for a VCR. to pass through. video dubbing. A real-time counter plus SAP is recorded on both hi-fi and linear index and time search systems make get- tracks. Channel! search is another un- Filling the recess below are a head- ting to specific locations on the tape common VR9970 feature. It cycles phone jack, rotary controls for the head through the preset channels, pausing phone and manual hi-fi record levels, an briefly on each until the user selects one. auto/manual hi-fi switch, and buttons for input, audio and video dub, record, Other noteworthy features include dou- ble-speed play, half-speed play, and an rewind/search, fast forward/search, eject button and seven programmable buttons on the remote. continued on page 92 Magnavox Power Consumption: search, play, rewind/ on/play (no tab), play/ frame, frame advance, Chroma PM S/N: 23 W search, fast forward/ rewind/eject (no tab), double-speed play, sep- SP—39.2 dB; LP—34.0 vR9970 search, stop, channel rewind/stop, off at end dB; SLP—36.4 dB VS veR Tape Format: VHS up and down, pause/ of rewind and eject with arate eject on remote, still, frame advance/in- power off counter memory, audio Audio Frequency DATA Tape Speeds: stant search, slow, slow dub, video dub, insert Response: Suggested Price: SF, LP, SLP speed up, and down, Linear Audio: mono hi-fi—20 Hz-20 kHz, $850 2x, record, 1/2x, jog/ edit (audio/video dub), +0.1/-2.8 dB; linear (-3 Weight: Video Heads: 4 shuttle, channel and Hi-Fi AFM Audio: stereo AFT, channel lock, auto dB)—75 Hz-10 kHz, seven programmable channel change SP; 75 Hz-5 kHz, LP; 9-1/2 pounds Slow Motion: functions; hidden but- 75 Hz-4 kHz, EP 1/2x, and 1/5x to 1/30x tons for clock/counter, Tuning Method: Accessories: Dimensions: variable from remote memory, clear/reset, frequency synthesis remote control with bat- Hi-Fi Dynamic Range: 3-3/8 x 14-1/4 x 11-5/8 only program, duplicate 82.3 dB inches (h/w/d) channel up and down, Channel Selectors: teries, coax antenna Cue & Review (Search): 10-digit keypad, index, programmable up/down | cable and synchro edit Linear Audio S/N: Power Requirements: add/delete, standby scan on VCR; scan 37.5 dB 120 VAC, 60 Hz SP—Tx; SLP—21x OTR, OTR, time cord search, repeat, tracking/ Audio Distortion: Fast Forward/Rewind V-lock up and down, plus direct access on RESULTS hi-fi—0.4%; Time: remote linear—1.6% 2-1/2 min. for T-120 speed and input Horizontal Resolution: Preset Method: 240 lines RATINGS Remote Pause: Counter Digits: auto program plus add use synchro edit 5—hrs:mins:secs. Picture Quality: and erase Video S/N, good/very good Remote: Program Start Loca- IR wireless with jog/ tor/Index/Cue: Broadcast Tuning | Unweighted: Audio Quality: shuttle dial: slide switch index with auto, and Range:2 to 13, 14 SP—49 dB; LP—38.4 very good for learn/use; indicators time search to 69 dB; SLP—38.7 dB for jog/shuttle, channel, Operational Ease: learn and error: ex- Auto Operations: Cable Tuning Range: | good/very good posed buttons for VCR |} tewind, repeat, tracking, power, eject, VCR/TV, 2 to 13, A to W, AA to Video S/N, Weighted: Overall Performance: OSD, monitor, channel good/very good BBB, A-5 to A-1, 5A SP—54.6 dB; LP—48.3 and 65 to 94 dB; SLP—47.9 dB Timer: 8-event/1-month Chroma AM S/N: SP—46.8 dB; LP—40.2 Special Features: flying erase head, still dB; SLP—39.5 dB

VIDEOTESTS VIDEOTEST NUMBER 547 Hughes’ Next: coder. Among the more conventional Sony's KPR-53EX20 Sony 53-inch features updates to the features are a sleep timer, a turn-on tim- Hughes Sound Retriev- er, 12-hour channel block, onscreen dis- monitor/receiver al System: separate plays and remote adjustment of sound modes for stereo SRS, and picture. The largest of Sony’s rear-projection mono SRS and normal stereo. Description. The KPR-53EX20 monitor/receivers, the 53-inch squeezes a 53-inch picture into a rela- KPR-53EX20, incorporates the Sound of SRS for mono sources, and an SRS off tively small cabinet that’s just 3-1/8 Retrieval System (SRS) from Hughes position for conventional reproduction. inches wider than the picture. The cabi- Aircraft Company. The set excels in both picture and sound. Sony’s projec- Other features include three video/ tion system uses liquid-cooled, optically stereo audio inputs (one with S-video coupled tubes, a mixture of glass and as- capability), a monitor output with a pheric acrylic lenses, a multilayer lens fixed audio level, a variable-level audio coating and a single first-surface mirror output (with SRS) for feeding a hi-fi sys- to produce very bright, evenly illumi- tem, and two RF inputs, with a loop- nated pictures. through output for feeding a cable de- Shading compensation circuitry au- tomatically corrects for slight color and brightness differences between the three picture tubes. New phosphors maintain whiteness and brightness over time, and high-voltage regulation prevents changes in picture size and focus as brightness changes. On the sound side, the SRS re-cre- ates the ambience and spatial cues lost in normal stereo reproduction. Human ears respond to sound differently than microphones. The SRS selectively boosts and attenuates frequency and phase information in recordings to com- pensate for these differences. The sys- tem re-creates the original environment, like surround sound, but without rear speakers. New with this set is a version Soll 3-inch tweeter for each for power, auto program, RF Inputs: output, headphone jack, Response: channel add, erase, muting, an- 2, with loop-through external speaker con- line out—20 Hz-20 kHz KPR-OSEN20 output for cable con- nectors +0.5/-2.8 dB; speakers— Projection 1V Type of Tuning: tenna/aux, sleep, TV,. verters 70 Hz-20 kHz, -6 dB frequency synthesis video 1, video 2, video Accessories: 3, 10-digit keypad, enter, Video/Stereo supplied—remote con- Audio S/N: Method of Tuning: display, SRS, MTS, pic- Audio Inputs: trol with batteries and line out—78.8 dB; 3, input 2 in front com- antenna adapter; op- speakers—66.2 dB DATA programmable scan on ture plus and minus, partment tional—VHF/UHF splitter, set, scan plus direct AV and Y/C cables Total Harmonic volume plus and minus, Internal Audio Distortion: Suggested Price: access on the remote Amplifier Power: RESULTS line out—0.8%; channel plus and minus, stereo, 22 watts per speakers—4.2% $3,299 Preset method: clear, timer/clock, off/re- channel Horiz. Resolution: 700 lines RATINGS Weight: 298 pounds auto program plus add peat, AM/PM, video, Special Features: and erase audio, minus/left, plus/ S-video input, video/ Snowiness; Lumi- Picture Quality: Dimensions: stereo audio output, nance S/N: 55.4 dB excellent 54 x 46-1/4 x 34-3/4 Broadcast Tuning right, and preset; also auxiliary stereo audio inches (h/w/d) Range: 2 to 13,14 to 69 controls for Sony VCRs output, SRS, single mir- Chroma AMSIN: 62.7 dB Audio Quality: tor, new blue and green excellent Power Consumption: Cable Tuning Range: and laserdisc players: phosphors Chroma PM S/N:62.4 dB 230 W 125 channels—A-8, 2 VTR 1/VTR 2/VTR Operational Ease: 3NVDP source switch, Absent Features: Accuracy of Colors: excellent | to 13, A to W, W+1 to video/stereo audio tuner very good/excellent Screen Size: 53 inches W+58. A-5 to A-1, buttons for power, TV/ Overall Performance: VTR, channel plus and Audio Frequency excellent Speaker Size: W+59 to W+84 minus, rewind, play, fast two-way coaxial with Remote Control: forward, stop, pause, re- cord and record safety one 8-inch woofer and IR wireless with buttons JULY 1990 VIDEO 33

net is shipped with the mirror reversed has priority over video input 1, a video ing input, output and power connec- so the set can fit through standard door- ways. The bezel is matte black. Centered and stereo audio monitor output suita- tions; selecting cable/normal, auto below the screen is a covered compart- ble for feeding a VCR or a second moni- stereo and speakers on/off; and adjusting ment with input jacks for video and ster- eo audio, slide switches for speakers on/ tor, and a variable-level stereo audio convergence of the red, green and blue off, auto stereo, cable and test/normal; output suitable for feeding a hi-fi system. images using the horizontal and vertical rotary controls for horizontally and ver- tically centering red and blue images; The remote control operates the TV centering controls. A built-in crosshatch and buttons for volume plus and minus, and any Sony VCR or laserdisc player generator allows easy registration and channel plus and minus, and TV/video. selected by a source switch near the checking. A power button and LED indicators for front. The next two rows comprise but- stereo broadcast and timer activated oc- All other setup operations can be ac- cupy a raised area that projects through the compartment door. tons for operating these devices: power, complished from the remote control, in- The area below the compartment is TV/VCR, channel plus and minus, re- cluding autoprogramming the scan bare but for a ventilation grille. At each wind (search), play, fast forward sequence, and setting the time, the tim- side, a grille covers an eight-inch woofer (search), stop, pause and record. and a concentric three-inch tweeter. It er and channel block. The rest of the all stands on a short-wheeled pedestal The third row has recessed buttons operations are common to most remote- finished in high-impact, simulated black for auto program, add and erase. The controlled TVs except that direct access wood vinyl like the remainder of the lower buttons are power, muting, anten- tuning selections require pressing enter cabinet. na/auxiliary sleep, TV, video 1, video 2, to activate the channel change. The video 3, a ten-digit keypad, enter, dis- only refinement we might suggest is a The reversible mirror fills the top plays, SRS, MTS, video (menu) audio slightly brighter stereo beacon on the back part of the cabinet. Below the mir- (menu) minus/left, plus/right, reset, and eae panel. Ease of operation is excel- plus/minus button pairs for picture, vol- ent. ror sits a panel with three F-connectors ume and channel. There’s also a group Performance. The KPR-53EX20 for VHF/UHF (cable) in, loop-through output to a cable converter and auxilia- of buttons for the timers: clear, timer/ delivers its rated 370 footlamberts, mak- ry in. A separate recessed panel holds block, off/repeat and AM/PM. ing it easy to view even in a brightly lit line level inputs for video and stereo au- dio inputs | and 3, an S-video input that Operation. The one assembly task, room. Its high-voltage regulation lets it reversing the mirror, is simple; only a go from bright scenes to dark ones with- Phillips screwdriver is needed. Handles out changing size. The screen has an un- on both sides of the mirror make it easy usually large vertical viewing angle of 45 to manipulate without getting finger- degrees so the picture remains bright prints on the delicate surface. After the whether you're sitting or standing. mirror is in place, setup consists of mak- continued on page 90 fe es THE VE=10! April 1990. “Ifyou VIDEO, February 1990. “Conclusion. VIDEOMAKER, March/April 1990. AN EDITOR § The VE-100 is more accurate than other © ne gives you VITC Editors we've tested. With this unit “The VE-100 is incredibly accurate. Using itis it's easier to mark edit-in and out points. relatively painless and the unit will work with almost lly Audio and Video quality are excellent.” any VCR-Camcorder combination.” thing.” (1 200 cuts-100 seer -100 is a pure editor, allowing you to about the edit-in or edit-out point of a scene? remely accurate edits. Unlike many No problem, just go back to that point and 7 Accurate to within 3 fram ditors, the VE-100 is compatible with make the change. Rewind the tape, and © Audio mixing includin yall VCR's having infrared remote. preview your edits before final assembly (you fade in/ follow instructions have you editing can watch in “fast forward” to save time). n hour or two. After hook-up, the Now you're ready to make the Final (J Compatible with all syste 00 learns the infrared code, and then the Mastered Tape, and during this step you can 147 New Hyde Park Road, Franklin Square, } ofyour recording deck. You then (616). fade the audio, or add audio from an external ke aworking copy, and you're ready for source. Within a short time you'll be showing Distributed in Canada by OF button editing’. Change your mind off those professionally edited tapes! 34 VIDEO JULY 1990 For additional information, circle No. 14 on Reader Service Card.

__ STATEOF THE ART BY RODERICK WOODCOCK Slow speed penalty imperceptibly speeding up or slowing down the VCR’s capstan speed to syn- Mud on the tracks i I have a lot of VHS tapes made at chronize the forward tape motion with | I have about 100 Beta tapes that “the EP speed, and during playback I the rotation of the video heads. Auto- | %% have grown a fungus. Friends have find that the tracking control requires matic tracking controls use circuits to | advised me to copy the tapes right away, constant adjustment. Some of my tapes measure the signal levels coming from won't track at all without traces of noise the tape and adjust accordingly. but I can’t. The tapes won’t play even appearing in the picture. Would one of for a second without clogging the heads the newer VCRs equipped with digital But even automatic tracking VCRs on my VCR. Head cleaners are of no auto tracking solve this problem? can’t correct for tapes made on older, use. Is there any way I can clean the mil- misaligned VCRs, or for tapes stretched dew off the tapes? They’re of great value Philip Cavallo or shrunken because of bad storage con- to me; some are irreplaceable. Chicago, Ill. ditions. The real solution would be a VCR with “dynamic tracking” video R. O'Leary Honolulu, Hawaii heads that move up and down to reflect | / There is a way to clean your tapes, § This is a bigger problem with slow the changing angle of video tracks under f)~ but it’s time consuming and may | prove futile. Moreover, even if you clean ©. speed recordings because the tracks a variety of conditions. This feature ap- | the tapes enough to get watchable im- ages, you may be putting your VCR’s are one-half or one-third as wide as peared on Philips’ discontinued Video heads at risk from imperfect cleaning. However, if your tapes are valuable, it those on tapes made at the standard 2000 VCR, which was sold in Europe, may be worth a try. First, buy an inex- pensive Beta rewinder, one that can also speed. Rotating the tracking knob, or and on Panasonic’s costly NV-8950 in- fast forward tapes. Take it apart so you can touch your tape as it moves through pushing the plus or minus buttons, com- | dustrial VHS deck, introduced in 1983. the mechanism. You should be able to adjust it so that the tape runs past a cou- pensates for tracking misalignments by | No similar VHS deck has appeared. ple of external rollers. Next, replace the DC power supply, which usually uses 12 “The Video\" volts in inexpensive rewinders, with a | nine-volt adapter. (Radio Shack sells WITNESS THE FORBIDDEN DANCE one with a variable polarity feature.) THEY TRIED TO BAN. The lower voltage will slow the tape down. Lambada Buy a large chamois from an auto MOVE TO THE ROMANTIC, SENSUAL supply store and cut it into little squares RHYTHMS OF THE TROPICS. you can use once then discard. Gently apply these pads to both sides of the tape Lambada as it runs through the rewinder. For a cleaner, try isopropyl alcohol. Don’t use SAE WHAT THEY COULDN'T SHOW water. You’ll need to do some experi- IN THE MOVIES! menting to learn how to handle the tape, and you may need to try other SEND $39.95 cleaning agents. Finally, don’t forget to as @)PEVI@)NIDAO DISRa® take the cassette shells apart and clean any fungus on the reels. If you get your ' SOUTHEAST VIDEO tapes in playable shape, immediately dub them onto new cassettes. 7648 SOUTHLAND BLVD., SUITE 100 ORLANDO, FLORIDA 32809 Video Magazine welcomes your questions. | Please include a phone number. Letters may ORDER NOW AND GET FREE SAVE $10 - CHARGE IT! A VIDEO INSTRUCTIONAL be edited for clarity and space. Address eae queries to Q & A, Video Magazine, 460 SECTION ON HOW TO DO THE VISA | West 34 Street, New York, NY 10001. LAMBADA! 1-800-762-6925 FSiac9CRNooi2neadenr.frdacovdildri.teemciraeotniaoln, JULY 1990 VIDEO 35

INNZI SNONI 36 VIDEO JULY 1990

BY LAWRENCE B. JOHNSON HOME EDITING VIDEO'S FINAL FRONTIER Decks, dubs, cuts and effects: turning jumbled scenes into entertaining tapes. urning balloons and chocolate cake into a keepsake birthday video requires more than a hot hand with a camcorder. It calls for creative editing, or “post- production” in professional parlance. What follows is a basic guide to getting it all together: the gear you need to transform raw footage into a polished produc- tion, the basic methods you'll use to edit and tips for avoiding the common pitfalls of do-it-yourself videography. Whether you’re cutting out a few bad shots or producing Emmy-winning shows, the basic components you'll edit with are two VCRs: one for playback, the other for recording. Your camcorder can work as the playback deck, but this has drawbacks. It does produce a reliable picture free of tracking errors, because it’s the same device that recorded the original tape. But when it comes to coordinating the starting and stopping of the playback and recording machines, most camcorders can prove a bit unwieldy. Let’s assume, therefore, that you'll do your editing on two VCRs. Linking them together offers many options and many ways to do things wrong. So let’s get it right... The best way to patch most VCRs together is to use the audio and video con- nectors on the back of each deck. Run cables from the outputs of the playback deck into the inputs of the recorder. Using F-connectors— the quick and dirty method— degrades the picture quality significantly. If your VCRs have S-video jacks, you can use an S-cable for the video line. Lots of decks now have such editing features as built-in controllers, audio and video dubbing or insert, synchro edit, automatic insert, character generators and special effects. They're all useful, but the only one that’s an absolute must is a flying erase head for the recorder. This head rides along with the video heads on the rotat- ing head drum. Its “flying” position lets the head erase all of a video scene from a tape. Without this feature, you'll get a rainbow or moire pattern when you insert a new scene into existing footage, because a conventional erase head leaves a little piece of the old scene in or misreads the two scenes’ control tracks. The technical challenge of video editing begins when you try to start and stop the two VCRs at the same time. Some transports get the tape rolling faster than others; if the recorder starts before the player is rolling, the result is a glitch at the edit point. If you don’t have a matched pair of the handful of decks that can synchronize these actions, there are three ways to solve the problem. The least accurate is to practice with your decks until you get used to their pre-roll times (the time it takes to get the tape up to speed). Another is to use decks made by the same manufacturer. A third is to use an outboard editing controller such as Azden’s VE-100, which memorizes JULY 1990 VIDEO 37

HOME EDITING the recorder’s pre-roll time and compen- starts and stops the recording deck auto- The two decks will begin producing your sates for differences. matically. Edit controllers can even be video automatically. It may take a while, found in some new camcorders, such as but it’s a lot easier than riding herd on ASSEMBLY REQUIRED RCA’s CC520 and Minolta’s Master Se- two decks. This brings us to the yin and yang of ties V-20, each of which can memorize INTERESTING INSERTS editing techniques: assemble versus in- edits for up to six scenes. Insert editing, as the phrase suggests, sert. Assemble editing is the straightfor- ward stringing together of scenes, one With an editing controller, you mark involves placing new material into a pre- after another, until the sequence adds the in (or starting) and out (or ending) viously edited tape. Using this tech- up to a finished video. The trick here is points of scenes in the sequence you nique, you can break up long, wide-shot to make sure edit “splices” are clean. want them to appear, using buttons on scenes with titles, stills or close-ups. It’s the device. Many controllers let you re- indispensable for spicing up dull home Here’s the basic technique. Cue the organize the scenes after the edit points videos. And the only piece of special tape in the recorder to the last good are memorized. Once your edit is pro- equipment you need for basic insert edi- frame. If your deck has a jog/shuttle dial grammed, you can usually preview it be- ting is a recording VCR with a flying or frame advance, cue the tape to one fore making the final tape. When you’re erase head. frame past the actual connecting point, ready to make the edit, hit the button then back up to overlap a single frame. for “assemble” (or a similar command). Since you can’t see what you're re- Keep the deck in record pause while you're doing this; hitting stop will almost : diting skills grow, so should your editing studio. surely result in a glitch. Locate the next d t_ mean your bank balance has to shrink scene on the playback deck, then put proportionately. Once you assemble a basic editing suite, the playback deck in pause. Now hit manyof the extras are surprisingly inexpensive. Most of both pause buttons, starting the play- : listed below cost less than $100, but all can back deck just slightly ahead of the re- te more watchable videos. Some simply corder. iting a little easier. Others may prove as indis- as your favorite VCR. Decks with synchro edit can stream- hileswho keep their edits simple will probably line this cumbersome process. Basically, tedin Sima’s new mini-editor/enhancers. The synchro edit capability allows the play- back deck to start the recorder automat- scenes in or out in three seconds, switches ically when you release the player’s pause button. Because there’s no com- en two sources, and includes a variable-level video mon standard for synchro edit, you must ancer and bypass switch. The Ed/it 2 adds an audio use decks from the same manufacturer microphone. The Ed/it 1 lists for $129.95, the ‘or $179.95. Both can be found (probably for con- to take advantage of it. In some cases, you can match VCRs from manufac- bly lower street prices) at video and camera stores. turers that use the same suppliers for Gre home videos usually start with detailed plan- their decks’ components. For example, 1e problem is, how can inexperienced the synchro edit on Panasonic VCRs know what to plan for? Star-Maker Video works with many Magnavox and Philips hone 708-310-9545) has the answer: a vid- VCRs that have synchro edit —all are on kit comprising 14 laminated cards and a made by Matsushita. But bewar—eyou t pen. The reusable, 9-by-14-inch cards include can only be sure that two decks’ synchro cene planners, storyboards, an equipment checklist, edit functions will work together if the footage logs, edit decision lists, graphic edit summaries manufacturers specifically say so. ndtwo slates — enough planning power for most ama- An edit controller, whether an out- teurs and many professionals. The board unit or one built into the VCR, complete set costs $49.95. Other kits can make assemble editing easier and _and separate cards are also available. more accurate. Most of the outboard Because storyboards require a pro- consumer editing controllers available an Sh : ducer to visualize and think through today memorize the infrared commands | each scene, they can be the most im- emitted by each VCR’s remote control, then use those commands to start and portant element iin planning a video. stop the decks. With built-in controllers, But when you ‘re anxious to start shoot- the VCR with the controller functions ing, fillingin all those squares can as the playback deck; another VCR become tedious and messy. To ease (which must be of the same brand, and Planning Power: — | thep1ain:of planning, Lake Compuframes (phone equipped with a synchro edit feature) The Video Production |914-941-1998) created tractor-feed storyboard paper that functions as the recorder. The controller Kit leads home pro- ducers through the fits standard computer printers. By setting up a word planning process. © processor to create columns that fit the forms, a home producer can print out scripted storyboards quickly and 38 VIDEO JULY 1990

The key to good assemble edits ts to make sure the ‘splices’ are clean. cording over, you must find the spot on cleaner insert edits. Automatic inserting sound should fit the scene and break the edited tape where you want the in- requires the same steps as above, except neatly with it. serted scene to end, then reset the re- that when you reset the recorder’s coun- corder’s counter to zero. Now rewind ter, you also hit a button to enter that To make an audio dub while editing, point into the deck’s memory. Recording connect a different audio source —a mi- the edited tape past the point where you will automatically stop when the coun- crophone or a CD player, for example— want the insert to begin, then advance ter reaches zero. to your recorder’s audio inputs. Zero the recorder’s counter where the end of the the tape to the actual starting point and Instead of simply sticking in new dub will be, as with insert editing. If press pause or record/pause. On the scenes, you may want to replace only the playback deck, cue up the scene to be audio or video portion ofa scene. In this you're adding music, you'll need to start inserted and put the machine in pause. case, you have two options: dub in the the music at the same time as you re- Release the pause on both decks, again new material during editing, or use the lease the pause on the VCRs; unless starting the playback deck just slightly audio and video dubbing function if your you're using synchro edit, this means ahead of the recorder. When the coun- recording deck has them. No matter you'll need a helper. If you're adding ter on the recorder reaches zero, hit the how you perform the dub, the key to narration, monitor the scene being re- recorder’s pause button. getting the audio and video to work to- corded to get your visual cues. You can gether is continuity. In most cases, blend the original audio with music and If your recording deck has an auto- matic insert function, you can achieve continued on page 112 Editor’s Little Helper: Sima’s Edjit 2 switches and fades video and audio. turn any Commodore 64/128, Apple II or IBM XT-com- patible (with CGA graphics card and color composite neatly. The paper comes in four styles, 500 sheets for output) into a video graphics tool that rivals the best consumer gear. The program creates borders, back- $42. grounds and clip-art style graphics in 16 colors, and includes a text generator with 13 font and size choices. Pro cinematographers start their scenes with a slate —the familiar black chalkboard with a striped clap- The graphics can be scrolled, wiped or spiralled at per on top. Slating cuts confusion at the editing table several speeds, positioned anywhere on the screen, strung because it labels each tape segment with scene numbers, together to form sequences, and saved to disk. If you’re take numbers and other pertinent information. With using the software with an IBM PC, though, make sure slates to refer to, the editor has less chance of using the you have a color composite output —the program does wrong scene, and the producer can keep accurate notes not produce color through the RGB port. Most software for use during post-production. One of the many slates dealers carry the Epyx line, but in case yours doesn’t, the on the market is the VideoBoard, available from Casper company’s phone number is 415-368-3200. Productions (Box 217, Superior, WI 54880) for $24.95 plus $3.50 shipping and handling. Once your sharp titles and tight edits are on tape, you'll want to add a soundtrack that’s as lively as your Character generators with a wide selection of fonts images. An easy way to spice up the sound is to blend and sizes cost hundreds of dollars. But you may have a the original sound with music and narration, using an terrific CG sitting right on your desk: your personal com- audio mixer. Solidex’s Magicdub VM2000 accepts four puter. For $49.95, the Epyx Home Video Producer can stereo inputs and two microphone inputs, and includes a hand-held mic. Its suggested price is $79.95. Lots of oth- er mixers, with lots of different features, are available at prices from around $50. For less than the price of two CDs, Wilderness Pro- ductions (phone 916-577-3008) will supply sounds to run through that mixer —two hours of non-copyrighted back- ground music, from classical to calypso. A two-hour VHS mono tape costs $20 plus $2.90 shipping and han- dling. The company also offers three stock footage tapes. The first includes various titles; 50 video segments fea- turing landmarks, sports and other scenes; animated graphics; test pattcrns, including ten-second countdown, multiburst and color bars; and 30 minutes of music. The second tape substitutes slogans for the titles; the third tape comprises wedding music and titles. This is not am- ateur stuff—Wilderness Productions has produced network and cable TV programs. Each VHS tape costs $12.95 plus $2.90 shipping and handling. —Brent Butterworth JULY 1990 VIDEO 39

BY BRENT BUTTERWORTH WTHiIlNGtSFall Video Preview JVC SUBCOMPACT With the new VHS-C GR-AX7, Daring new designs JVC brings simple lines and a fami- HORNS OF PLENTY add a dash of style liar control layout to the ultra- to a hi-tech season. mini camcorder field founded by Video accessories seldom look sty- Sony's TR5. JVC gave the cam- lish, but Remex’s new Bi-Klon If you think there’s little new going on in corder smoother lines by building video broadcasting system fits in video, you'll find plenty of surprises this the microphone, tally light, and with the most sophisticated interior fall. Video products boasting unusual autofocus and white balance win- designs. The Bi-Klon, priced at new shapes and uses are on the way. dows into a gently sloping front $180, includes two horn-shaped With manufacturers paying more atten- panel. The GR-AX7 boasts 6x tion to matters of style, their new prod- power zoom, digital superimposi- units, one for a signal source— ucts flaunt an ergonomic savvy video tion, 4-lux sensitivity and a trigger such as a VCR or a laserdisc player gear has long lacked, as well as innova- alarm. in a living room—and a second tive applications of leading-edge tech- unit which connects to a TV set in nology. VIDEO BOOM BOX another room, such as a bedroom. The living room Bi-Klon transmits Some manufacturers are taking ex- Although Sony’s curvaceous audio and video signals (via radio treme steps to whip their ideas into FD-555 Mega Watchman suggests frequencies in the largely unused shape: Witness Hitachi's folding cam- a Deco influence, the portable en- gigahertz range) from the signal corder, which shoots like a conventional tertainment center offers modern source to the bedroom Bi-Klon, camcorder, then twists, for carrying, into conveniences like a sleep timer and which demodulates the signals so a shape resembling a hardcover book. Sony’s sound expansion system. that a TV set can display them. Others are taking a subtler route. JVC, The unit combines a 4-1/2-inch The bedroom Bi-Klon also converts for example, is introducing one of its black & white TV, an AM/FM infrared remote control commands most graceful camcorders—a subcom- stereo receiver and a cassette to RF signals, which it beams to pact VHS-C model—to compete player. the living room Bi-Klon. The living against the new breed of miniature room unit then converts the RF shooting machines such as Sony’s TR5 signal back to IR and sends the and Panasonic’s PV-10. commands to the deck. The unique IR-RF-IR capability allows As boxy exteriors and no-frill de- users to control a living room VCR signs go the way of eight-track tape, and or laserdisc player from a bedroom cutting-edge design sweeps the video in- or any other room they may choose. dustry, here’s an exclusive preview of next season's wildest new things: 40 VIDEO JULY 1990

HI-FI PERSONAL VIDEO JVC hasn't limited its design ener- gy to camcorde—rist’s also introducing a portable VHS hi-fi TVCR with controls integrated into a curving front panel. The HR-P1 combines a three-inch LCD color monitor with a speaker, a stereo audio output, four video heads and onscreen function dis- plays. The HR-PI's stereo headphone jack lets viewers enjoy the audio glory of Dolby Stereo-en- coded movies from a laptop-size unit. HITACHI’S NEW TWIST The Hitachi VM-CIA behaves like a normal VHS-C camcorder during tap- ing, with the grip, zoom, controls and the viewfinder all in traditional spots. But when the shooting stops, the camera/grip section folds flush with the re- corder to create a 2.2-pound, 2-3/4-inch-thick package. As the halves merge, power automatically shuts off and a cap slides over the lens. The new camcorder uses amorphous heads (made of a metal and glass com- pound) designed for low noise and enhanced durability. The VM-CIA’s up- to-the-second features include twin-beam autofocus, a dual-time clock and wide-angle/tele macro lens. PANASONIC’S FIRST LASERDISC PLAYERS HIGH-END, LOW BULK Combi players usually look pretty bland, but the LX-200 has an interesting Tthoe ctrianmy GhRi-gSh5-0e5n:d cSaupnaebielitHieSs Cinto eraphic touch: the first Panasonic logo ever seen on a laserdisc player. The company plans to introduce the LX-200 this fall as one of its first two laser hi-fi stereo camcorder, JVC set combi players. Although it’s Panasonic’s lowest-priced model, the LX-200 in- many controls into an unusually cludes such advanced features as an S-video output, an optical audio large lens barrel. With shooting op- output, 8x oversampling and auto reverse (Panasonic’s term for automatic tions like 1/15000-second shutter side changing). A high-end Prism model, the LX-1000, will include all the and auto fade to any of eight col- LX-200’s features, along with jog/shuttle control, time-base correction and ors, the GR-S505 reaches for new Multi-Stage Noise Shaping (MASH) audio circuitry. To ensure clear separa- levels of performance. A four-page, tion between signals, the LX-1000 incorporates digital Y/C separation and a eight-color digital superimpose fea- separate transformer for its audio circuitry. ture, a manual iris option, animation and trigger alarm round out the extensive capabilities list. » JULY 1990 VIDEO 41

A VOTE FOR INTEGRATION Mitsubishi's new integrated remote control combines a smooth, invit- ing look with extensive control powers. Buttons on the remote’s face and under | its sliding front panel operate all Mitsubishi Home SONY VIDEO PRINTER Theater System components. | While Sony’s new video printer keeps a low design profile, its end product— It can also be high-resolution, four-color prints —is pretty dazzling. The CVP-G500 pro- programmed to duces three-by-four-inch prints from any NTSC camcorder, VCR or TV control other tuner in about 70 seconds. When the desired scene appears on the monitor, manufacturers’ the user simply hits the “print” button. devices. An LCD keeps the user posted on con- FULL-SIZE FASHION trol status, and a pushbutton edge GE’s styling focus rises to the sur- light illuminates face in the CG650 full-size VHS control legends. camcorder. Inside, the machine Mitsubishi carries compulsory features like includes the fully automatic operation, a self- remote with timer and low-light operation. But its A/V receivers, to wrap the CG650’s standard-issue and sells it as a internals, GE sculpted a new, aero- separate compo- dynamic-looking chassis. nent. 5 MAKING A GREAT VIDEO INCLUDES QUALITY SOUND TOO! b(yolulaer=lani-)e-Womanl(erge)©)alelalomicme)anlalice|ic=vei(e)ar-\\manl=y-lallace mtar-lali@e)(ecoMe) em-l Bielal]eice even those you don’t want. And, when shooting from a distance, you won't pick up the Ve)(ex> m0) 1010] mr-10]6)[-1018 Azden, the leader in quality audio for video, manufacturers a full line of microphones to make your sound as good as your video. Here are our best-selling models. aono y Top of the line ECZ-660 HS-7V headphone ECZ-770 mini WMS-100 wireless |y ‘we € WMS-Pro. zoom mic. with boom mic. zoom mic. system. hint A VHF wireless Uni-directional mic Add narration as you For small camcorders. 49MHz unit with clip-on qwhn i Weii/ system with over 300 —_allows you to zoom in record. Picks upsome . Zoominonsubject's mic. 125 ft. range. 2 | in meee (@i@\\ ft.rangeand amazing on subject's voices, ambient sound for voices. Slide Switch to .frequencies— choose W‘ N clarity. Comes with 2 mics, 2 frequencies, reducing side noises. — “presence”. Or muonsieto; r. ccuhtanfi;glteer.pattern, low cleanest scoiudrencclduai.ntry. 2 positions— narrow headphone to Improved a ih i Yi shoe mount. and wider. sound. Also available with 2 Ith i\" rs mics as WMS-200. q PSail yaly tesl ) Ww4B)2. Ket) minacoure Nanas147 New Hyde Park Road, Franklin Square, NY 11010 (516) 328-7500 ID(Ia)of}0)(cro [am Olxar-(el- Me) Olam<P @Orelfelele-lilel) For additional information, circle No. 15 on Reader Service Card.

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THE LOSIBY FRANK LOVECE PICTURE SHOW Not all classic Hollywood movies make it to video. Here’s why. Hollywood is running out of movies. ers are fine but less well-known star ve- current hit Enemies, a Love Story. His The well is running dry. Studios will one hicles (William Holden in the ghost day reach in and come up empty. And comedy The Remarkable Andrew, 1942). intriguing Willie and Phil (1980) and the the sun will someday go supernova. Some are cult classics (Paul Mazursky’s acclaimed Next Stop, Greenwich Village The King of Marvin Gardens, 1972). Oth- The fact is, countless classics have ers are contemporary or genre classics (1976) are both MOV because, he says, yet to come to video— including such “in the days before video, no one made seeming naturals as Flamingo , Missing Link: Star vehicle Wife vs. Secretary is one deals for [the video rights to] the music Road (1949), The Last Picture | of many major films unavailable on tape. Show (1971), Annie Get Your such as Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979). in a movie. Those two movies Gun (1950) and Children of Paradise (1944), all major films MOV movies show up frequently on feature music by [jazz stars] in the cinematic canon. All are .late night TV, though often in a heavily Claude Boling and Dave Bru- highly marketable, but all are edited form that scarcely merits our at- beck. Until they go back and MOV (missing on video). tention. Some of these movies play the renegotiate, there’s no video “You're always scratching your | theatrical art-house circuit —at least release. It’s that simple.” (Next head,” admits Ralph Tribbey, what little there is left of it. But mostly, Stop, Greenwich Village was vice president of marketing at anyone wishing to see Buster Keaton’s available through CBS/Fox, MGM/UA Home Video, “say- The Cameraman (1928) or the Jack Lem- ing ‘Geez, why wasn’t this out mon/Ernie Kovacs caper comedy Opera- but is now on “moratorium.”) before? How come that wasn’t tion Mad Ball (1957) is out of luck until As for his semi-auto- out before?’ ” these movies reach video. biographical Alex in Wonder- A variety of forces conspire “Three of my movies are not out on land (1972), Mazursky says he’s cassette, though I’d like them to be,” la- “tried to buy it back from to keep important movies out ments Paul Mazursky, director of the MGM for many years to get it of video stores. Complications | out on cassette. I’ve talked to a involving the rights to music or | guy who makes videos, who the original literary works on + said he could sell 20,000 of which many films are based often cause them in a second. But MGM is headaches for those trying to secure a no longer owned by the people video release. In other cases, video la- 1 who made the movie. They bels can’t find a complete, undamaged don’t feel that connection to the movie, copy of a particular film. And sometimes so it’s sitting there someplace,” he says a film’s owner simply lacks the resources tightly, “where no one can see it.” or the will to market it properly on tape. But sometimes it’s the filmmakers But new pricing strategies— which put who delay a video release. “When you many films in the hands of collectors for release a movie to video,” explains Larry very little cash —as well as ever-growing audiences for both classic and obscure Estes, vice president of programming movies, bode well for the future of MOV and acquisition for RCA/Columbia, titles. “you're supposed to have a legal docu- ment from everyone who participated For film buffs and collectors, classic for the literary rights, music, that kind of missing movies are the Holy Grails of thing. If you don’t get those licenses up video. Some MOV films are acknowl- front, you have to go back and get them at the time of the video. And some- edged classics (Gable, Harlow, Loy and times,” he understates, “that takes quite Stewart in Wife vs. Secretary, 1936). Oth- a while.” A movie studio now generally buys all ancillary or “aftermarket” rights— 44 VIDEO JULY 1990

which include video, cable, broadcast Disappearing Acts: TV, airline, and “non-theatrical” (col- Lust For Life (left) re- lege and art-house) screenings—from a cently surfaced on tape, film’s production company. Sometimes but Paul Mazursky's an independent production company Alex in Wonderland strikes a video deal before a movie is (above) and Buster even made. This is why Media Home Keaton’s The Camera- man (below) are still Entertainment is releasing Enemies, a missing on video. Love Story on cassette even though 20th Century Fox released it to theaters. Berlin refused to negotiate for the video release of his music. (Since his death, But before the video boom of the CBS/Fox has been actively negotiating with Berlin’s estate on the latter two.) 1980s, video rights were not a concern. Films developed and owned by the big TROUBLESOME TUNES studios themselves usually lead to prob- “Music clearances tend to be a lem-free video releases. But when out- side material was used, such as a play or nightmare,” acknowledges Tribbey. “I a book on which a movie was based, or think if you had to list the number-one songs by composers outside the studio problem, that’s probably it.” Tim Clott, executive vice president of Paramount | system, a video release can get very Pictures’ video division, agrees. “We complicated. have had a lot of problems with music,” he says. “But for the most part, the mu- Underlying literary rights long held sic publisher—sw”ho own the rights to words and music, though not actual re- up the video release of Picnic (1955), cordings by specific perform—e“rhasve Joshua Logan’s adaptation of the ac- become much more realistic about this claimed William Inge play, which stars marketplace in the last year or two.” William Holden, Roz Russell, Kim No- vak, and Cliff Robertson in his movie Since copyright laws and standing debut. And music clearance problems music-industry agreements generally al- are why such Irving Berlin musicals as low anyone to pay a royalty and record a MGM's Annie Get Your Gun and Fox’s song, video companies can delete a per- On the Avenue (1937), Alexander’s Rag- formance by a holdout and replace it time Band (1938), Tin Pan Alley (1940) i with one by a similar recording. For ex- and That Night in Rio (1941) are una- ample, Foreigner’s song “Urgent” was vailable though they were studio replaced by a cover version for the home productions — the curmudgeonly video release of Desperately Seeking Sus- an (1985). The original Silhouettes ver- sion of “Get a Job,” which plays over the end credits of Trading Places (1983) was also replaced on video with a remake. More often, however, problematic soundtrack songs are simply replaced by JULY 1990 VIDEO 45

LOST PICTURE other, previously recorded songs—a dis- The Rocky Horror Pic- mal compromise caused by recalcitrant performers and cheapskate studios. ture Show (above), The Sometimes, however, a particular High and the Mighty (right) and Flamingo song is too integral or a particular per- Road (below). former too distinct to be replaced. Other times it just isn’t worth the effort. In owned company— Batjac on the former, these cases, a movie’s video release can languish. Wayne-Fellows on the latter two—and John Sayles’ Baby, It’s You (1983) the rights reverted back to him. And as went unreleased for several years, pri- a result, says Tribbey, “the John Wayne marily because of the Frank Sinatra and Bruce Springsteen recordings on its estate can do with these three films soundtrack. “Finally,” says Paramount’s as they please. We've tried to negotiate Clott, “Amy Robinson, who co-pro- duced the movie, and John Sayles got for them as a package, because we've al- behind this and went back to Spring- steen and some of the other people and ready released [the Wayne westerns] said, ‘Let's be real about what the poten- tial is for this movie! Let’s come up with The Alamo, They Were Expendable, Red some realistic prices.’ ’ Paramount ne- gotiated rights for most of the music, he River and The Horse Soldiers, and I think says, but “in a few instances, with Sayles’ we'd do a good job marketing them. But permission, we replaced som—ebut only where he felt it was appropriate. There This is the case with the John | we haven’t been able to reach a deal.” were some things he just felt very Financial considerations often keep strongly about, and we agreed with Wayne films McLintock! (1963), distrib- him.” uted theatrically by United Artists, and classic films MOV. Some movies, such as Hondo (1953) and The High and the the cult classic musical The Rocky Hor- The Last Picture Show, however, re- Mighty (1954), distributed by Warner ror Picture Show (1975), still play suc- mains MOV despite years of effort by RCA/Columbia Home Entertainment. Bros. Each was produced by a Wayne- cessfully in theaters; the producers see The label is “close to” finalizing its video release, says Estes, “but we're not by any video release as competition. (U.S. vid- means finished getting that one ready to come out.” Negotiating rights to Hank eo release, at least; the film is available Williams’ music has been the primary sticking point, “but it’s a lot of other in Japan —ironically, in U.S.-compatible stuff, too. The movie is almost wall-to- wall with radios turned on and classic VHS.) Other films have evergreen lives television shows. A lot of things need to be taken care of.” Other movies cur- on the “non-theatrical” circuit. Buster rently held up over music rights include American Pop (1981) and Heavy Metal | Keaton’s brilliant The Navigator (1924) (1981). and Seven Chances (1925) are unavail- Another kind of problem arose with able on video since Keaton’s widow and the fall of the old-fashioned studio sys- tem in the 1960s and ’70s. The Holly- the late Raymond Rohauer, her business wood studios, formerly start-to-finish movie factories, became less production | partner, chose to hold out. But with the companies than distributors. This meant that outside, independent revival houses dwindling, Rohauer’s suc- producers had a new financial stake in the aftermarket, and cessor, Alan Twiman, may decide to give began to lock horns with the studios’ video arms. Keaton’s genius the full video exposure Missing Musical: Betty Hutton in Irving it deserves. Berlin's Annie Get Your Gun. Other times, a film doesn’t physi- 46 VIDEO JULY 1990 cally exist in a usable for—mit’s esti- mated that half of all the movies made are irretrievably lost or damaged. “We had Flamingo Road scheduled for April, but the source material is just so bad,” Tribbey says sadly. The [master] negative’s not in good shape, and the [master] print ele-

ments have been stretched to the point announced and it got a mediocre re- wood’s vaults, there will always be MOV where you can’t get the film to lay down sponse from the field. We waited awhile, titles. But that’s okay—we'll always have properly.” A video transfer was at- and for whatever reason it’s now more tempted, he says, “but it just wasn’t ac- attractive to the consu—mmaeybre,” he something to look forward to. As Estes ceptable. I seriously doubt we’re going to admits, “because it’s ten dollars less than puts it, ‘people keep on buying and before.” see that one out.” (TV stations that run That sort of repricing has, in fact, re- renting classics year after year. That’s the movie have 16mm prints, which are far from optimal for home-video dupli- juvenated the classics market. Virtually why they're class—ibeccasuse people al- cation.) Other times, original film ele- every video label is re-releasing its ments exist in good shape, but are film library in remastered and re- ways want to see them.” ] incomplete: Roman Polanski’s The Fear- packaged versions at sell-through prices less Vampire Killers is unavailable on tape in the under-$20 realm. They’re also in- —O EE because MGM/UA has yet to put to- ventively promoting collectible titles. TECH TIP gether a definitive edition. (Both 98- MGM/UA, for instance, reaped and 107-minute versions of the movie great goodwill with its ‘‘Viewer’s Choice” Poll, which brought the long- By the numbers exist.) In the vast majority of cases, how- awaited release of Vincente Minelli’s 1956 ever, movies are MOV because video | Lust for Life, starring Kirk Douglas. The If you're recording a program longer companies don’t see a market for them. same company is doing a ‘“‘Retailer’s than two hours, you may want to use the “We have a lot of titles like Arizona Choice” poll later this year, and, in June, Bushwackers (1968) and Aaron Slick from a cult-comedy promotion that brings to SP mode as long as possible, then switch Punkin Crick (1952) that may not really video such classics-of-their-kind as The to EP, since most VCRs automatically have a marketplace,” says Clott. “And Americanization of Emily (1964), The play back at the correct speed. To calcu- there are origination costs in mastering Loved One (1965) and Smile (1975). late exactly when to make the switch, and creating packaging and all that. double the program’s length in minutes. Other companies, too, are bigger Next subtract the length of the tape in There are a lot of movies that probably than ever in the classics game. MCA has may not end up on video.” meters (246 meters for a T-120, 327m for its Gene Shalit’s Critic’s Choice line; a T-160). Divide the result by 1.3. This That’s a shame, since, to take just RCA/Columbia has introduced a line will give you the time (in minutes) to these two examples, the routine western called Columbia Pictures Classics. And spend in EP. Subtract this time from the Arizona Bushwackers boasts a James Cag- CBS/Fox and others release a steady ney narration — his only work on film be- stream of library titles. But with perhaps program length to calculate the time to tween his retirement in 1961 and his tens of thousands of movies in Holly- spend in SP. Doug Bowers return in 1981— while the largely un- Kent, Wash. memorable Aaron Slick is interesting as Dinah Shore’s last movie musica—alnd ARENA RAN for Dick (Bewitched) York as her leading man! Almost every movie, in fact, has The Secret toJe(olyanverere ke something of interest to someone: Ob- Sm ooth Moves... : — (mma sessive fans have latched onto the al- most surreally schlocky movies of Ray Dennis Steckler (The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies, 1963), let alone James Cagney and Dinah Shore. But, notes Jamie White, president of the independent video label Lumivision, “studios need to sell a huge minimum amount of a title to make anything back. I just wish they would sub-license some of their smaller titles to companies like us, who can make it selling just 3,000 units. Then everybody makes some- thing and these titles get out.” White’s suggestion makes sense; in fact, RCA/ Columbia has sub-licensed titles in the * View with the buitt-i past to mass-merchandise specialists such as Goodtimes Home Video. With- oversized mo out that arrangement, no less than Jack Lemmon’s movie debut, in the delightful George Cukor comedy It Should Happen to You (1954), would have been un- justifiably MOV. Fortunately for movie buffs, the vid- eo marketplace is changing. The recent- ly released Frank Sinatra musical Pal FN9ciSaRCoionade3enrr.fdacodivld.rtieemicraoetniaoln, Joey was originally cleared and set for video in 1987. But, says RCA/Colum- bia’s Estes, “It didn’t get the attention from retailers we thought it would. We JULY 1990 VIDEO 47

BY MARTIN LEVINE neDEE After years of speculation, announce- HORSE RAGE ments and political infighting, all the As developers race to be first with the ground rules are finally in place for the best, HDTV may be only 4 years away. United States TV industry to make a quantum leap to the next generation of television. And in one form or another, it appears Americans will be watching high-definition TV within four years. At the end of March, the Federal Communications Commission said it ex- pects to choose an advanced television stand—aeritdher full HDTV or a so- called Enhanced Definition TV system that would serve as a transition toward HDT— bVefore June 1993. “The com- mission’s primary goal in these proceed- ings is to assure the development of a technically excellent advanced televi- | sion service,” stated the announcement. In effect, the FCC is saying that if there’s a working HDTV system available by 1993, that will be its choice. If not, it will consider EDVT— but not before. The announcement has shaken up the pecking order among proponents of | advanced television systems. But by most accounts, it was long overdue. And | it has everyone involved gearing up for | the last lap in what has been a marathon process. “The happy thing is [the FCC] de- cided we’re not going to settle for sec- ond best,” says one executive who’s closely involved in HDTV work. “The decision puts practicality back in the process and sets some deadlines.” Yet these hopeful developments ob- scure a potentially more important point: The U.S. is moving to the fore- front in the worldwide development of advanced television systems. Many Americans may still end up watching high-definition images on TV sets made in Japan, but crucial decisions regarding broadcast pictures and sound quality are being made in the U.S. And this repre- sents a startling change. | Just three years ago the so-called MUSE HDTV system proposed by Ja- pan’s public TV network, NHK, was considered a heavy favorite to win in the U.S. as well as in Japan. But time and Twin Peeks: Zenith created this HDTV image (left) by quadrupling the information in a standard TV image (right). Martin Levine is the former editor of Con- sumer Electronics magazine. He now writes about high technology for several na- tional publications and daily newspapers. 48 VIDEO JULY 1990

Two Ways to Win: Zenith engineers test Spectrum Compatible picture (left); Thom- son’s Joseph Donahue (below) checks out pro- totype wide-screen monitor by RCA. | technical advances by rivals have assigned to each channel in the NTSC | eroded its lead. “MUSE is based on system. But since any HDTV system 1970s technology,” asserts Dr. Peter Bin- chosen for the U.S. will have to perform gham, vice president of technology for over the airwaves for terrestrial recep- Philips Consumer Electronics Company tion, NHK engineers have been scram- | anda key figure in the Advanced Televi- bling to develop compressed versions of sion Research Consortium that unites MUSE that will perform as well as its Philips, Thomson Consumer Electron- | newer competitors —and still meet | ics, NBC and the David Sarnoff Re- bandwidth criteria here and in Japan, | search Center. ‘It works, but it’s | where broadcasters, noting the Ameri- | spectrally inefficient.” can emphasis on broadcast reception, | “The Japanese started sooner and are pushing for a similar approach. quire more than six megahertz for HDTV alone, are dead. If Zenith’s or may be ahead as far as direct-broadcast “Will the Japanese be foolish enough any of the other proposed simulcast sys- tems actually work outside a develop- satellites are concerned, but terrestrially to spend time, resources and effort on a ment laboratory by the FCC’s deadline, I think the United States may be system with no base beyond the Japa- then the U.S. will move directly to ahead,” adds Richard Wiley, chairman nese domestic market? I don’t think so,” HDTV. If not, then some form of EDTV might fill the gap while simulcast-ori- of the Advisory Committee on Ad- argues a stateside executive with a ma- ented developers eliminate the bugs from their systems. vanced Television Systems, a private in- jor Japanese consumer electronics man- The FCC decision has also forced dustry group that will oversee tests of ufacturer. “We're not going to spend a HDTV engineers working on systems for the U.S. to focus on simulcast systems proposed HDTV and EDTV systems for lot of money until we know where the that will squeeze a full HDTV signal into six megahertz. There are six re- | the U.S. and report its findings to the U.S. market is.” maining developers seeking FCC ap- proval—the Advanced Television | FCC. Wiley points out, for example, | that MUSE is an analog system, while NARROWING CHOICES | many ofits U.S. rivals are likely to incor- That day is fast approaching. Manu- porate digital signal processing. facturers of TV sets and broadcast MUSE was also conceived as a di- equipment, and anyone else whose fu- rect-broadcast satellite HDTV system, ture is tied to the fate of U.S. advanced | and its developers were not constrained television broadcasts, now know that so- | by the narrow six-megahertz bandwidth called augmentation systems, which re- JULY 1990 VIDEO 49

‘We can have receivers on the market in late ‘93 or early \"94.\" Research Consortium, NHK, the Massa- tical, “because it appeared it would take hotly contested — resource, simulcasting more than six megahertz to broadcast is an attractive approach politically as chusetts Institute of Technology, Far- HDTV.” Still, he adds that the consor- well as technologically. oudja Laboratories, Zenith and Production Services, Inc. All but Far- tium won’t scrap its work on augmenta- It consumes less bandwidth space oudja have at least experimented with tion until it develops a working than the augmentation systems, requir- simulcasting in recent months. But simulcast system. ing at least nine megahertz, that were in while NHK has developed one form, of vogue only a year ago. And at some point— MUSE that fits within six megahertz, it With one exception (see sidebar), all perhaps 50 years from now, when reportedly lacks the resolution of its si- HDTV receivers completely replace mulcast competition. And the Research the simulcast systems envision broadcas- NTSC sets — broadcasters theoretically Consortium is far from having a working ters transmitting two versions of their could end NTSC broadcasts and open system, say consortium insiders. programming: an NTSC or NTSC/ that portion of the broadcast spectrum EDTV signal over one six-megahertz to new stations or uses. Bingham concedes that Philips be- channel, and an HDTV signal over a lieved simulcasting would prove imprac- second six-megahertz channel. And In addition, signal processing tech- with bandwidth space a scarce —and nology allows simulcast systems to ex- ploit the unused bandwidth that HDTV's Production Services, Inc. isone of only six HDTV sys- separates active TV channels without Dark tem developers with a shot at gaining the approval of the interfering with them. “That is a practi- Federal Communications Commission, yet the company cal benefit to the simulcast systems,” Horse is a virtual unknown even to its competitors. says Wiley. “Of course, this depends on if it works.” The privately funded Tucson-based company has op- erated in relative obscurity, in large part by choice, but if Starting later this year, everyone should begin to find out. In part through its system works, PSI may score the greatest underdog the Advanced Television Test Center in victory since the 1969 New York Mets stunned baseball. Alexandria, Virginia, and possibly in Canada in cooperation with the Cana- PSI co-founder Richard Gerdes, an analog circuit de- dian government, Wiley’s advisory com- mittee will begin testing eight proposed signer with a 30-year background in video, insists his systems from the six remaining devel- system can do what other developers say is impossible: opers. The tests are tentatively sched- uled to begin in October and finish by squeeze a full-blown HDTV signal and a conventional the end of 1991. By then, the prospects NTSC signal within the same six megahertz frequency for simulcast systems in general, and Ze- channel. Not only would this meet the FCC’s mandate nith’s in particular, should be clear. that a U.S. HDTV system maintain compatibility with _ NTSC, but it would do so using only half the spectrum Zenith’s Spectrum Compatible sys- sought by other developers. tem uses a 787-line progressive-scan process that effectively doubles the “We use a new modulation technology to add infor- number of horizontal and vertical lines, for roughly four times the picture detail mation to the spectrum without interference,” Gerdes of NTSC. By skimping on resolution says. “We alter the shape of the carrier and transmit the during fast-motion sequences, when pic- result of that altered wave shape.” He calls the technolo- ture details flash by too fast for the eye gy “waveform modulation” and says, “It’s as different to comprehend, the full HDTV signal is squeezed into a standard six-megahertz from AM and FM as AM is from FM.” channel. Just as important, since the PSI has already developed a commercial product HDTV signal doesn’t interfere with ad- jacent NTSC signals, the Spectrum using waveform modulation for NTSC broadcasts: an en- Compatible channel can occupy the cur- coder and decoder that allows an NTSC station to rently empty channels used to separate broadcast two channels simultaneously from one trans- NTSC stations. Zenith says it could bring this system to market using either mitter. “You could tune to channel 4A or 4B using the a 16:9 wide-aspect ratio or the conven- decoder,” Gerdes says. The FCC has already granted an experimental license for Channel 11 in Tucson, a Fox © tional 4:3 ratio of NTSC. Network affiliate, to begin testing the system. DOLLARS & MEGAHERTZ Gerdes expects to begin selling “a limited number” of But Zenith engineers express their decoders to the public about now, and to have consum- most compelling argument for Spectrum er-grade boxes in full production by the year’s end. Still Compatible in dollars and cents rather to be determined, though, is which company will manu- facture the black boxes and how PSI will distribute them. As with everything connected to HDTV, however, | PSI's waveform modulation has generated fierce disagree-_ ments. “They will have to rewrite the laws of physics for it to happen,” insists Wayne Luplow, the head of Zenith’s HDTV research program. “It cannot work wee a six megahertz bandwith.” To which Gerdes replies, just wait and see. —ML | 50 VIDEO JULY 1990