TRK12 in Flight

[peter scott]

Probably filmed on the planes of Dakota.

Peter

[ppppenguin]

I'm susprised Baird didn't do airborne TV reception as a stunt at some point. Or perhaps I've overlooked it in the books I have.

As for flying the sending end, in WW2 the Germans experimented with a TV guided bomb. Quite an achievement to pack an entire iconoscope channel into a small space. Never got used in service. Now imagine trying to use intermediate film for that application.....

[peter scott]

I'm susprised Baird didn't do airborne TV reception as a stunt at some point. Or perhaps I've overlooked it in the books I have.

As for flying the sending end, in WW2 the Germans experimented with a TV guided bomb. Quite an achievement to pack an entire iconoscope channel into a small space. Never got used in service. Now imagine trying to use intermediate film for that application.....

Yes, Jeffrey, you overlooked it! http://www.earlytelevision.org/baird_air...ystem.html

Peter

[Mike Watterson]

They used film cameras and in satellite processing and film scanning in spy satellites. Earlier ones ejected the film which might then get lost or captured. The plot of Ice Station Zebra isn't entirely fictional. A satellite spy film was lost over northern Norway.

Miniaturisation is amazing now, with micro mirrors in DLP (including mechanical sequential colour on the cheaper ones!) and the mechanical 300 dpi display used in eink based ereaders such as the Kindle, Kobo, Nook and a couple of others. Sony had the first one and now only sell "Digital Paper" rather than ereaders.

Baird's intermediate film camera was the best technology they did and survived at least another thirty years in revised form.

[ppppenguin]

Intermediate film was used well into the space age. The idea of flying a photo lab into space seems crazy but if the alternative was a 1960s or 1970s vintage TV camera and videotape recorder you can easily see which was an more practical option. The film would have had a much better dynamic range too. Of course the film and chemicals run out.

[Mike Watterson]

The satellite spy film was very high resolution. Not possible till recently with electronic cameras. The scanning was very slow (relatively) to match the low data rate of the encrypted transmission. Seeing detail was the issue rather than dynamic range. Even ordinary 35mm can be equivalent to 4K. Also it would have been still photographs, not cine. The scanning and slow transmission was simply a better way to send the spy photographs home than the earlier ejection scheme.
These would have been low earth orbit, probably trans polar, satellites that would gradually loose height and burn up in the atmosphere so exhausting the film & chemical stock probably wasn't important.

Now the spy planes and spy satellites may be replaced by the X-37B?

There may have been some science based space missions using intermediate film and then slow scan high definition transmission?
I'm not sure how the Russian maps of the far side of the moon were done or if some early Mars missions used it. It's certainly only in the last ten years that consumer digital cameras have surpassed good 35mm stills.

[LENINGRAD T2]

The TRK12 was supposed to be a hit at the world fair in New York in 1939. Meanwhile, sales of a very expensive TV were low. It cost more than the car. In October 1939, there was already war. Perhaps placing the TRK12 on board the plane was a last resort advertising gimmick. Most of the models produced were sold only after the war. It is interesting that during the fair some TV sets were used as monitors, bypassing the receiving system. Perhaps a TV was installed on board the plane, which received a signal from a camera, for example.
Adam

[peter scott]

The initial price of the TRK12 was $600 which equates to £135 in 1939 so not so very different to the £126 initial price of and HMV900 in 1936 although by 1939 the HMV900 had dropped to £84 and there were sets with bigger screens and radios available for £60. By September 1939 19,000 television sets had been sold.

Peter

[peter scott]

The initial price of the TRK12 was $600 which equates to £135 in 1939 so not so very different to the £126 initial price of and HMV900 in 1936 although by 1939 the HMV900 had dropped to £84 and there were sets with bigger screens and radios available for £60. By September 1939 19,000 television sets had been sold.

TRK5 was $295 and TRK9 was $450.

Peter

[LENINGRAD T2]

The situation in GB and US in 1939 may have been similar and the prices of televisions as well. However, the difference was not in TV sets, but in TV globally. There have been regular television broadcasts in GB since 1936. Society was familiar with this technology. At that time, in the US, television was operating on an experimental level. Regular broadcasting of programs did not begin until 1939. Americans needed time to understand the value of television. The TRK12 was the most expensive model and therefore did not sell well. At that time, there were other RCA models on the market, even under $ 200, which improved the sales statistics. DuMont also entered the market with its offer. I wonder how many TV sets there were in GB in 1939 and how quickly they were replaced by newer models after the war. Since we are moving in the pre-war period, I still have a question how many Marconi 705 models were produced and how many could have survived to this day.

Adam