Electronic dub editing was the norm when I started in 1974. Cutting and splicing of 2" tape was only a tale we often heard from the old timers. This is a great demo of the process.
Pfff sooo much litteraly cut & pasting stuff in a video tape and all without overlapping and distortion transition, that’s absolute insane, respect to those workers.
Bryan Bortz I'd say yes and no. Meaning yes for the end-user but no for whoever has to fix the damn things. Just like with automobiles. Cars today are much easier to operate and maintain, but you have to be a computer scientist to poke under the hood.
When the show you were cutting was due to be transmitted in a few minutes time, the adrenaline flowed rapidly. Mid week soccer is the one that comes to mind. You'd be cutting & joining the second half, while the first half was on the air. It was quite exciting really.
I watched some of those VT Christmas tapes. Being an American, there's a little bit of a culture gap, but they do mention "10-second cues" a lot when it came to sports programs. Is that how much time you had to spool back a moment in a match for "instant replay", or just mixing to a different camera/tape source?
@@eddievhfan1984 The early quad machines took about 7 seconds to "lock up" and produce a stable picture. So 10s was chosen allowing a safety factor. Therefore the scripts were marked with a point 10s before they were needed and the VT was run at that point. Sometimes it was a bit scary when machines took a bit longer than expected! Later versions of quad machines could lock up much quicker.
back then if a sequence in a Television Programme required a lot of editing (say for example a fight scene). it would be easier to record it on film several weeks earlier, then play the film sequence in 'as live' during the studio recording at a later date.
It's a good point, but it's maybe not clear that the director in the studio gallery is in a completely different part of the building from the videotape machines, and this film was made forty years before legislation banned smoking in the workplace. The BBC actually imposed a smoking ban in their premises a number of years before the legal ban came in.
This is where we separated the men from the boys. It took skill to operate these machines skillfully. I used to edit this way (physical editing) then later, electronic, bit yoy always must be careful of going down generations. I work on every machime Amoex made from rhe VR-1000 to the VPR series. The best machine made was the Ampex AVR-1. I was the only one who could splice camera masters when they broke or had physical issues.
It's a miracle anything got made at all back then. It must've been a pain to make a movie back in the day. Heavy ass cameras. Film. Long, painful editing. God forbid if you wanted some sort of graphics. Thank god for modern tech. Anyone can do what most of these people spent years learning.
Pico Not to mention how prohibitively expensive it was to produce even the crappiest low-budget film. A no-name film budgeted at $5 million dollars in the 1980s can be made for less than $300,000 today. For better and worse filmmaking is fully democratized today.
It's ironic that no one thought of the much simpler helical scanning until many years later. The quads were a beast to maintain- requiring constant cleaning, maintenance and careful adjustment.
This looks like a custom version of an Ampex VR-2000(B?). The transport controls are very non-standard. But the rest of the layout is very Ampex. Right down to the Mark Ten quad head assembly.
I wonder, when companies like Eventide started making broadcast digital delay units in the mid 70s, did the BBC get ahold of them rather quickly, and if so, would this have been used to simplify the edit process by acting as the audio delay store?
And if the splice wasn't made perfectly, or there was a crease in the tape, you'd hear it as it went thru the scanner. We called 'em zingers. Hard on the heads.
So, was that the actual director? Unions were very strict in those days, and could insist on a real actor who was a paid up union member? Interesting film.
I don't know with any certainty, but the label on the audio head stack (2' 35") has a date in 1967, so I imagine the film was made within a year or two after that date.
Yet in those days they were expected to produce at least 26 hour slot episodes of a TV show on film or tape a year..these days they do about 10 episodes and "everyone is exhausted"
The tape was 2" wide mainly because the Quadruplex recording method used 4 heads recording transversely onto the tape (as opposed to the helical scan methods of VHS, Beta, U-Matic, etc.) with full video bandwidth, as an audio-style transport (pulling the tape across a single head) would have severely limited bandwidth, use literally miles of tape for seconds of video, and/or require impossibly high tape speeds.
It's way too damn fidgety to try and cut the video and control tracks in one place, then move down to the edit point on the audio track so may inches away, make the cut there, then use a mess of splicing tape to join the two together, especially because a longitudinal cut (following the direction of the tape path) to accommodate the audio track has more of a chance of getting jammed in the tape transport and causing problems than a transverse cut (across the tape path). The least number of physical cuts you can make to a tape, the better, and especially avoiding longitudinal cuts at all costs.
The offset between the video head and the sound head was several inches, so it wasn't practical to make a physical edit which cut the video track and the audio track in different places. What we often did was to copy the audio onto a 1/4" sound recorder, and fiddle around with that to make a clean join or a sound mix in the audio where you wanted it, and then lay that back onto the spliced videotape. If you were doing a quick turn around edit for something like a sports programme, then the commentators would have been instructed to leave gaps in their commentary in suitable places, to allow an edit to be made without it cutting halfway through a sentence. All a bit of a compromise, but it mostly worked quite well.
I'd say some time between 1967 and 1968. There's a label on the audio heads dated 29/9/67, and note there is no colour video shown (the training film is film, hence colour) - Play School (the programme being recorded in the studio for most of this) apparently started being produced in colour in May 1968. No way this could have been "late 70's" which would have all been colour production (also look at the clothing, hairstyles, etc.).
Vegas Pro was a non-linear edit program, but in the 1960s there was no computers on Windows, no digital video files (like MXF or MP4), there was only linear edit using firstly cutter (50s-60s), then electronic edit was launched, (70s-80s) then non-linear edit computer systems (in 90s)
After wathing this, I will never again complain about video editing on my computer being difficult
with Kdenlive and Shotcut I will never complain again
Good lol, Because I Can Only Imagine The Fuck Ups Video Editors had to Go Through In These Days lol.
At least in those days people couldn't afford wasting their lives making the shit they make now.
Electronic dub editing was the norm when I started in 1974. Cutting and splicing of 2" tape was only a tale we often heard from the old timers. This is a great demo of the process.
for how long usually were studio/location recordings of various programmes generally kept for in those days?
Pfff sooo much litteraly cut & pasting stuff in a video tape and all without overlapping and distortion transition, that’s absolute insane, respect to those workers.
I've never fully understood just how insanely complicated things use to be.
Bryan Bortz I'd say yes and no. Meaning yes for the end-user but no for whoever has to fix the damn things. Just like with automobiles. Cars today are much easier to operate and maintain, but you have to be a computer scientist to poke under the hood.
When the show you were cutting was due to be transmitted in a few minutes time, the adrenaline flowed rapidly. Mid week soccer is the one that comes to mind. You'd be cutting & joining the second half, while the first half was on the air. It was quite exciting really.
I watched some of those VT Christmas tapes. Being an American, there's a little bit of a culture gap, but they do mention "10-second cues" a lot when it came to sports programs. Is that how much time you had to spool back a moment in a match for "instant replay", or just mixing to a different camera/tape source?
@@eddievhfan1984 The early quad machines took about 7 seconds to "lock up" and produce a stable picture. So 10s was chosen allowing a safety factor. Therefore the scripts were marked with a point 10s before they were needed and the VT was run at that point. Sometimes it was a bit scary when machines took a bit longer than expected! Later versions of quad machines could lock up much quicker.
Thank you for posting. Back to the days of beautiful analogue equipment.
As long as one didn't "electronically" edit. 2nd generation pictures in colour weren't as good.
It's kind of ironic how this video was shot on film first before being transferred to tape...probably easier to edit. lol
They directly records on this tabe from camera
back then if a sequence in a Television Programme required a lot of editing (say for example a fight scene). it would be easier to record it on film several weeks earlier, then play the film sequence in 'as live' during the studio recording at a later date.
The Australian version of 'Playschool' is still being produced in Australia, still going, after more than 50 years, with basically the same format.
It's a good point, but it's maybe not clear that the director in the studio gallery is in a completely different part of the building from the videotape machines, and this film was made forty years before legislation banned smoking in the workplace. The BBC actually imposed a smoking ban in their premises a number of years before the legal ban came in.
Or in another building completely, that may not even be a TV facility if it's an OB.
This is where we separated the men from the boys. It took skill to operate these machines skillfully. I used to edit this way (physical editing) then later, electronic, bit yoy always must be careful of going down generations. I work on every machime Amoex made from rhe VR-1000 to the VPR series. The best machine made was the Ampex AVR-1.
I was the only one who could splice camera masters when they broke or had physical issues.
Wow, that takes me back, well done that man..
It's a miracle anything got made at all back then. It must've been a pain to make a movie back in the day. Heavy ass cameras. Film. Long, painful editing. God forbid if you wanted some sort of graphics. Thank god for modern tech. Anyone can do what most of these people spent years learning.
Pico Not to mention how prohibitively expensive it was to produce even the crappiest low-budget film. A no-name film budgeted at $5 million dollars in the 1980s can be made for less than $300,000 today. For better and worse filmmaking is fully democratized today.
Videotape editing sure is harder than film since you can't see its frames through the naked eye.
It's ironic that no one thought of the much simpler helical scanning until many years later. The quads were a beast to maintain- requiring constant cleaning, maintenance and careful adjustment.
I think the _Play School_ presenters in this clip were Brian Cant and Julie Stevens.
mind blowing to the max. this is one helluva video
a few months later they were recording and editing Monty Python Flying Circus :O
This looks like a custom version of an Ampex VR-2000(B?). The transport controls are very non-standard. But the rest of the layout is very Ampex. Right down to the Mark Ten quad head assembly.
Good old days, when you actually made splices in the 2 inch tapes!
Soon a team of just 10 highly trained men can edit a video in mere days.
Its pity that I can't have this Ampex VR-2000. There is no space in my room.
brian cant was brilliant
God. The concept of rehearsing an edit.
I wish my job was editing tape
that time editing and Animating was only done by production house but now a kid also can edit a video at home by only using a laptop or computer.....
Ah, them's was the days... Good old Brian ! - VT Buzzers... 10 second rolls.... Where is the head cowling ??
I wonder, when companies like Eventide started making broadcast digital delay units in the mid 70s, did the BBC get ahold of them rather quickly, and if so, would this have been used to simplify the edit process by acting as the audio delay store?
A film about video tape editing. A film... About video tape editing... Not a video tape itself.
Correct
They probably didn't have any more tape machines left in the studio to record it on.
it's a good thing to have movie maker or equivalent used for video editing nowadays
I miss the good old days of cutting and glueing video tape - said no one ever!! What a tedious unfulfilling job that must have been.
And if the splice wasn't made perfectly, or there was a crease in the tape, you'd hear it as it went thru the scanner. We called 'em zingers. Hard on the heads.
Not at all. And the pictures were TX'd 1st generation!
The narrator sounds like Grand Moff Tarkin... just listen 😂
So, was that the actual director? Unions were very strict in those days, and could insist on a real actor who was a paid up union member?
Interesting film.
Great video
Any idea what year this was made? No copyright at the end.
I don't know with any certainty, but the label on the audio head stack (2' 35") has a date in 1967, so I imagine the film was made within a year or two after that date.
Its a wonder they ever got anything done!
Yet in those days they were expected to produce at least 26 hour slot episodes of a TV show on film or tape a year..these days they do about 10 episodes and "everyone is exhausted"
Was the two inch tape inferior to 3/4 inch or was it just wider because of the lower sensitivity/ability of the recording heads?
The tape was 2" wide mainly because the Quadruplex recording method used 4 heads recording transversely onto the tape (as opposed to the helical scan methods of VHS, Beta, U-Matic, etc.) with full video bandwidth, as an audio-style transport (pulling the tape across a single head) would have severely limited bandwidth, use literally miles of tape for seconds of video, and/or require impossibly high tape speeds.
Now you can do it all on your laptop!
Is there any reason you can't just cut the tape in a jagged pattern instead of a straight cut?
Why would you want to do that?
It's way too damn fidgety to try and cut the video and control tracks in one place, then move down to the edit point on the audio track so may inches away, make the cut there, then use a mess of splicing tape to join the two together, especially because a longitudinal cut (following the direction of the tape path) to accommodate the audio track has more of a chance of getting jammed in the tape transport and causing problems than a transverse cut (across the tape path). The least number of physical cuts you can make to a tape, the better, and especially avoiding longitudinal cuts at all costs.
Thanks for the explanation!
Phil- I should have been clearer. I meant why not cut the video and audio at different points rather than just straight across.
The offset between the video head and the sound head was several inches, so it wasn't practical to make a physical edit which cut the video track and the audio track in different places. What we often did was to copy the audio onto a 1/4" sound recorder, and fiddle around with that to make a clean join or a sound mix in the audio where you wanted it, and then lay that back onto the spliced videotape. If you were doing a quick turn around edit for something like a sports programme, then the commentators would have been instructed to leave gaps in their commentary in suitable places, to allow an edit to be made without it cutting halfway through a sentence. All a bit of a compromise, but it mostly worked quite well.
1964
I thought, they wouldn't edit the tape physically.
What year was this?
Probably late 70's
I'd say some time between 1967 and 1968. There's a label on the audio heads dated 29/9/67, and note there is no colour video shown (the training film is film, hence colour) - Play School (the programme being recorded in the studio for most of this) apparently started being produced in colour in May 1968. No way this could have been "late 70's" which would have all been colour production (also look at the clothing, hairstyles, etc.).
You're very right Aaron; It's from late 1967/Early '68.
I'm guessing 1969. Based upon the length and style of the gentleman's hair in conjunction with what the women are wearing.
I don't understand, why they not use Sony Vegas editor for edit video, for example? :)
xD
hm.. sony vegas pre-release lol
Vegas Pro was a non-linear edit program, but in the 1960s there was no computers on Windows, no digital video files (like MXF or MP4), there was only linear edit using firstly cutter (50s-60s), then electronic edit was launched, (70s-80s) then non-linear edit computer systems (in 90s)
And why didn't they invent internal combustion Engines at the same time they invented the wheel?
Lekestue!
Hell of job. ....
Thank goodness for NLE software!
Show?
Yeah this is overcomplicated as fuck. The future is nice.
NRK?
Phil S Lekestue was NRK's version of this, yes. Did you scan this film yourself? Do you still have it?
The editor doesn't use gloves? How careless is this?
No he doesnt, the tape wont give him any sicknesses, dont worry.
What year is this from?
As above, it's from late 1967/Early 68 not long before colour took over in the UK.