Television – How It Began
Television, more commonly known as TV, is a technology allowing transmission of full motion pictures to receivers. It is a system employed for watching broadcasts. These days television sets are everywhere in the western world and are becoming increasingly popular in less developed nations too. It’s estimated that by the middle of 21st century every residence will probably have at least one tv set.
The concept of using tv for enjoyment occurred reletively late in the development of technology. The primary use of TV was initially more beneficial for telephones.Did you know that Alexander Graham Bell, who was the inventor of telephone,created a working picture phone in 1880? There were quite a few technologies evaluated and created in the late 1800s such as radio broadcasts, telephones, use of electrical power as well as personal photography.
The most important enabling technology for TV was the cathode ray tube which was created in 1876. It used electricity pushed through a vacuum tube for generating light on a glass front. In 1926, the first broadcast of an image over remote distances occurred in London. This was attributed to John Logie Baird, a Scotsman, and Charles Jenkins, an American.
The initial television broadcast was basic as compared to this modern day era. There would be merely a moving slideshow of stick figures or photographs. Nevertheless it proved the technology and was a vital step in the development of full motion. The first electronic system with motion camera and broadcast abilities was exhibited by Philo Farnsworth in 1927.
The technology of television went on to improve with the passage of time but at a slow speed. Bell Laboratories and RCA actively invested to develop the total transmission and receiving system for commercial gain. The first success for RCA was in New York in 1939 when it successfully broadcast the President’s speech in black and white.
The complete development of television was temporarily prevented as a consequence of World War 2 although there was news broadcast. After the war, there seemed to be tremendous interest in television from the public very keen for fresh things.
The second major progression was the creation of color television in 1960s. This was a revolution that transformed the modern world and the viewers could observe shows, documentaries, musicals and news broadcasts for the very first time as if they were right there in front of them.
With the availability of colour TV, the black and white quickly started to disappear. The impact of watching television started to be sensed. The most important contribution of television to humankind is its relative ease of bringing distant folks together using satellite uplinks. Cable and satellite television rapidly allowed networks to increase their reach throughout around the globe. The high definition TV standard with more than double the amount of lines at 1125 was approved in 1980s.
Then came the video recorder(VCR). This came about in the late 1970′s and was a revelution in that it enabled a person to actually record TV programs to replay and watch at a later date. Initially, there were several formats but the main two were VHS and Beta Max. VHS eventually won out and became most popular choice.
Soon after the video recorder came the camcorder, a step up from the old home made cine films. Gone were the days where you had to set up a huge screen in your living room to show your home movies. Now you could shoot your home movie, pop the cassette straight into the VCR and bingo! your own home made movies right there on your TV screen.
Things moved pretty swiftly after this with the advent of the DVD player/recorder, similar to a compact disc but for pictures.
Nowadays, you’ll find HD TV’s, 3D TV’s, Blue Ray DVD’s, digital TV and no doubt the boffins are already busy inventing something else to take their place in the not too distant future!