History of Television - Essay Example

History of television Name Subject Instructor Date Introduction The history of television does not refer to a single historical event. Rather, it comprises a series of events over time, beginning with the 19th century to the 21st century. In particular, the invention and evolution of television was contingent on multifarious inventions and development of other technologies like telegraphy, disk, photography, electricity, as well as motion pictures (Hamodi et al., 2014). The television of today could be summated to have emerged at around 1875 and 1890, and to have taken advantage of certain technological enterprise of the time to design an experimental television system during the 1920s, to public broadcast television systems during the 1930s, and to the digital TVs and Smart TVs of today (Gluck & Roca, 2008). During each of these stages of innovation, the invention and development of the television dependent on inventions made in other technologies, such as disks, radio, cathode ray tube and internet. Based on this background, a central argument in this paper is that the processes that characterised the invention and evolution of television are attributed to technological efforts of many individuals during the last quarter of the 19th century and into the 21st century. This paper explores the history of television, beginning with mechanical television and electronic in various countries like Britain, the United States, Soviet Union, Germany, and Japan, to the adoption of digital television and smart TVs globally today. Mechanical television Mechanical television was the first television technology. In particular, the Facsimile transmission systems pioneered the discovery of the television. The Facsimile transmission systems that displayed still photographs broke new grounds for the techniques for mechanical scanning of pictures during the early nineteenth century (Coopersmith, n.d). The facsimile machine was first introduced by Alexander Bain around 1843, before Frederick Bakewell made a demonstration of a working version in 1851. The initial practical facsimile system that functioned using the telegraph lines created and implemented by Giovanni Caselli in 1856 onward (Coopersmith, n.d). Later in 1973, Paul Julius Gottlieb Nipkow made a discovery of a disk. He discovered the scanning principle of television when he discovered a spinning disk that had a spiral pattern of holes, which allowed for scanning of various images. While Gottlieb Nipko may not have designed a working model of a television system, the changes in his spinning-disk led to the discovery of the "image rasterizer.” In 1900, Constantin Perskyi came up with the term ‘television’ in his conference paper that he presented at the International Electricity Congress in Paris. The paper acknowledged the existence of electromechanical technologies, such as that of Nipkow and the possibility of a television technology. Still, developments in amplification tube technology only emerged in 1907 following Arthur Korn and Lee de Forest’s discovery. The invention made the television design practicable (Marshall, 2011). In 1909, Georges Rignoux demonstrated the instantaneous transmission of images in Paris in 1909. He used a matrix of 64 selenium cells that were each wired to a mechanical commutator to serve as an electronic retina. A form of Kerr cell was used to modulate light and a succession of varied angled mirrors, which were linked to the boundary of a rotating disc that scanned and reflected the beam to display images on screen. He also used a detached circuit to regulate synchronization. Additionally, an 8 by 8 pixel resolution in his demonstration sufficiently transmitted each letter of the alphabet. Sequentially, it transmitted an updated image severally each second (Abrahamson 1997). Later in 1911, Boris Rosing alongside his apprentice Vladimir Zworykin came up with a system that relied on a mechanical drum like mirror as scanner for transmitting images over wires to a cathode ray tube (CRT). Despite this, moving images was still impracticable in the scanner, as sensitivity was insufficient. Additionally, the selenium cell tended to lag. However, it became practicable in 1920 after amplification became possible (Abrahamson 1997). During this time, John Logie Baird, who was a Scottish innovator, integrated a Nipkow disk in the prototype of his video system. Accordingly, he came up with his own prototype in Trinidad while recuperating from an illness. Baird had as well begun working on the first colour television. In fact, in March 1925, he delivered the foremost public display of televised silhouette images, which this time round were in motion. The demonstration was delivered at the Selfridge's Department Store in London. Because human faces still had insufficient contrast to display on the rather primordial system, Baird decided to televise a dummy of a ventriloquist called "Stooky Bill,” which talked and moved. The face was painted with highly contrasting colours (Abrahamson 1997). In January 1926, Baird also delivered a public demonstration of his technology, which this time round transmitted an image of a face that was in motion in synchronicity with the voice on the radio. Historically, this could be considered as the very first television demonstration. The subject matter in the demonstration was Daisy Elizabeth Gandy, who was Baird's business partner. The system used Nipkow’s disk innovation to scan and display the images (Williams, 1975). A bright beam of light shone through a rotating Nipkow disk that was set with lenses, to project a bright speck of light that swept across Daisy Elizabeth Gandy, who was the subject. The light reflected from the subject was then detected by a selenium photoelectric tube before converting the light into a proportionate electrical signal, which AM radio then conveyed waves to a receiver unit that in turn subjected video signal to a neon light emanating from a second Nipkow disk that turn around in synchronicity with the first disk (Abrahamson 1997). The vividness of the neon lamp alternated proportionately to the vividness of each single part of the image. When the holes in the disk passed each at a time, the lines of the images could be scanned and reproduced. In all, the disk had 30 holes that produced an image with 30 scan lines. These were sufficient to distinguish a human face. Baird later, in 1927, broadcasted signal for more than 438 miles of telephone line. The following year, his company, the Baird Television Development Company, transmitted the first-ever television signal from London to New York. In 1929, Baird took part in the initial experimental mechanical television service in Germany. Later that year, he formed a partnership with Bernard Natan to establish France's first-ever television company called Télévision-Baird-Natan. Two years later, Baird pioneered an outdoor remote transmission of the Epsom Derby. Baird then in 1932 showed an ultra-short wave television. In 1936, his mechanical system picked 240-lines of resolution on British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) television broadcasts, although the mechanical system failed to scan directly the televised scenes. Rather, a 17.5-milimetre film was shot, which was hastily developed before sequential scanning when the film was still wet (Abrahamson 1997). Charles Francis Jenkins, an American innovator, also led the way in the invention and development of the television. In 1913, Jenkins published his works on motional pictures called "Motion Pictures by Wireless," although it was later in 1923 that he actually managed to broadcast moving silhouette images for observers. In June 1925, he delivered a public demonstration of the coordinated broadcast of silhouette images. Later that year, he also applied Nipkow disk to transmit the silhouette images of a moving toy windmill over a 5-mile radius from a naval radio station situated in Maryland, to Washington, D.C. where his laboratory was located. He used a disk scanner with inbuilt lenses, which had a 48-line resolution (Williams, 1975). Frank Gray and Herbert E. Ives, both working for the Bell Telephone Laboratories also delivered a public demonstration of mechanical television in April 1927. The television system relied on reflected light, and comprised large and small screens for viewing. The smaller receiver possessed a 2 by 2.5 inch screen, while the larger one possessed a screen that was 24 by 30 inches. Each of these sets was able to reproduce practically accurate yet monochromatic images that were in motion (Abrahamson 1997). Apart from the images, the sets did also receive synchronized sound. It broadcast images based on two paths. The first one entailed a copper wire connecting Washington and New York City, while the second one entailed a radio connection of Whippany, New Jersey. The scanner used for generating the beam possessed a 50-aperture disk, which turned at a speed of 18 frames each second. It captured one frame around each 56 milliseconds. It was the fastest, leading to the creation of the first world broadcast television station called W2XB (today WRGB) in 1928. The station transmitted from the General Electric premised in Schenectady, New York (Marshall, 2011). In the Soviet Union, the leading television originator was Léon Theremin. He had engaged in the development of a mirror drum-based television. Initially in 1925, he started with a 16-line resolution before advancing to a 32-line one and ultimately a 64-line one through the technique of interlacing. In May the following year, Theremin electrically broadcast before projecting near-synchronised images in motion on a 5-foot square screen. In 1927, Theremin attained an image of 100 lines (Williams, 1975). This became the highest resolution during the time, and remained unrivalled until 4 years later when RCA came with a 120-line resolution. As the disks could only have a small number of holes, and disks that surpassed a certain diameter were virtually unusable, the picture resolution on the mechanical television transmissions was comparatively low. It ranged between 30 lines to around 120. Still, the quality of the picture of the 30-line transmissions gradually became better because of the dynamic technical advancements. For instance, in 1933 the television transmissions in the United Kingdom using the Baird system were extraordinarily clear (Abrahamson 1997). In Japan, Kenjiro Takayanagi pioneered in the invention and development of television. In December 1925, he made a public demonstration of a television system that had a 40-line resolution at Hamamatsu Industrial High School in Japan. His television system used CRT display and a Nipkow disk scanner. However, his researches in developing the television came to a halt after the Japan lost World War II (Abrahamson 1997). Electronic television Electronic television was the second technological invention. During the 1930s, the emergence of all-electronic television, which consisted of image dissectors alongside cathode ray tubes and camera tubes, marked the end of mechanical systems as the prevalent television technology (Williams, 1975). Typically, the mechanical television strictly generated small images. They prevailed until the 1930s. Indeed, the very last mechanical broadcasts were in 1939. What this also shows is that the start of the television history was marked by two unique technological paths that innovators experimented. The first entailed fabricating a mechanical television system rooted in Paul Nipkow's technology of the gyrating disks. The second included fabricating an electronic television system based on a cathode ray tube that British innovator Campbell-Swinton and Russian innovator Boris Rosing developed in 1907 (Abrahamson 1997). In August 1931 during a Berlin Radio Show, a German innovator called Manfred von Ardenne presented a public demonstration of television that relied on a cathode ray tube for broadcast and reception. Despite the innovation, Ardenne was yet to come up with a camera tube. Instead, he used a CRT as a flying-spot scanner for scanning slides and films. Three years later, Philo Farnsworth developed a completely electronic television system that used a live camera. This formed part of the cameras that BBC used. For the first time, live scenes could be broadcast using cameras (Marshall, 2011). The process of transitioning to television broadcasting would have happened generally during the late 1930s and into the 1940s, if the Second World War would not have happened. Public television broadcasting had started in the United Kingdom and United States in 1936 and 1939 respectively. Therefore, the realisation of full investment in public television broadcasting did not happen until the late 1940s and into the 1950s. Later, the technology of television broadcasting and reception advanced ahead of the content, while the significant parts of the content remained by-products. The introduction of coloured television also followed (Abrahamson 1997). Towards the late 1950s, new forms of television programmes were developed in correspondence to significant advances in the creative use of television as a broadcast medium. The concept of coloured television was developed during the 1940s and 50s, and differed basically in the manner they were re-combined or integrated, although they used small pyramids containing phosphors placed on their outside faces (Williams, 1975). However, a major technological challenge for the introduction of the coloured television was the need to preserve bandwidth, which was also three times as much as that of the black-and-white standards. It also used extreme levels of radio spectrum (Abrahamson 1997). Despite the fact that all-electronic colour became introduced into the United States in 1953, its premium price along with the paucity of colour programming inhibited its wide adoption in the U.S. marketplace (Williams, 1975). The first-ever television transmission in colour was in January 1, 1954 during the 1954 Tournament of Roses Parade. Still, broadcasting continued in black-and-white. The sale of colour television sets picked during the 1970s, surpassing the sale of black-and-white television sets. In 1979 and into the 1980s, a majority of television stations had switched to broadcasting in colour (Marshall, 2011). Digital television and Smart TVs In the 1990s, the digital television emerged in the United States. In Japan, however, the consumer electronics companies like the NHK had pioneered in the development of HDTV, before American firms like the General Instrument pioneered in the possibility of having digital television signal (Gluck & Roca, 2008). The transmission of digital television began towards the later years of 2000s, and by the year 2010, governments globally set the deadline for the shutdown of analog transmission. The emergence of digital TV also led to the possibility of having smart television, hybrid television and mobile television towards the mid-2010s. A smart television is connected to the internet and characterises the combination of set top boxes and television sets with internet and an installed operating system. To date, leading television manufacturers like Samsung produce smart TVs for the high-end and middle-end customers (Hamodi et al., 2014). Conclusion Based on this background, a central argument in this paper is that the processes that characterised the invention and evolution of television are attributed to technological efforts of many individuals during the last quarter of the 19th century and into the 21st century. An exploration into the history of television reveals that the start of the television history in the 19th century was marked by two unique technological paths that innovators experimented. The first entailed fabricating a mechanical television system rooted in Paul Nipkow's technology of the gyrating disks of the late 19th century. The second included fabricating an electronic television system based on a cathode ray tube in the early and into the mid-20th century. Mechanical television was the first television technology. In particular, the Facsimile transmission systems pioneered the discovery of the television. It was based on the gyrating disks. The second invention was the electronic television, which was based on cathode ray tube, and had a better resolution. The third and present-day invention includes the digital television, which is presently evolving to the smart television. The major countries that were instrumental in the invention and development of television include Britain, the United States, Soviet Union, Germany, and Japan. References Abrahamson, A. (1997). The Invention of Television. Retrieved: Coopersmith, J. (n.d.). The changing picture of fax. Retrieved: Gluck, M. & Roca, M. (2008). The Future of Television? Advertising, technology and the pursuit of audiences. Norman Lear Center: Los Angeles Hamodi, J., Thool, R., Salah, K., Alsagaf, A. & Holba, Y. (2014). Performance study of mobile tv over mobile WiMAX considering different modulation and coding techniques. International Journal of Communications, Network and System Sciences, 7(1), 10-21 Marshall, P. (2011). Inventing Television: Transnational Networks of Co-operation and Rivalry, 1870-1936. Retrieved from: Williams, R. (1975). Television: Technology and cultural form. New York: Schocken Books Read More