I recently sent someone a Tonight Show from 1974 with all commercials and said he expected better quality because I said it was good Quality for 1974. The picture was not jumpy at all, it was abut a 3rd gen copy, there was no tracking problems, and no audio problems. That's Damm Good if you ask me for a 31 year old Original Broadcast. Anyone Else agree? And also let's remember this is before VCR"s. So I told the trader he is too much of a perfectionist and I have no interest in trading in the future.

i say that very dam good it's hard to get quialty like that good luck

i say that very dam good it's hard to get quialty like that good luck


Especially for a 31 year old Original Broadcast.

31 year old Original Broadcast... also let's remember this is before VCR"s.
I don't understand. If it's pre-VCR, how was the original broadcast recorded?

I don't understand. If it's pre-VCR, how was the original broadcast recorded?


I guess someone had connections with people who worked for NBC.

Meaning, it came from film prints and is not actually a recording of the original 1974 broadcast?

If that is the case, then age has nothing to do with it because there is no "original" tape which has been sitting around for 31 years deteriorating. At the very least, we don't know when the first tape that the prints were dubbed to was made. Maybe 10 years ago, maybe 6 months ago. Whoever has, or has access to the film prints, can presumably make a great looking 1st gen copy onto a brand new tape today. Therefore, a trader can *possibly* expect to find a better copy, depending on how hard they wanted to look. I don't know about this specific show you're talking about, but I sometimes see prints of old 70s shows with commercials for sale on eBay so they are out there in 2005.

I do agree with you that 3rd gen is pretty darn good for an original broadcast recording actually made in the 70s or early 80s, it's probably pretty hard to beat that. As an aside, seems that most of those that I've come across were done in Beta, not VHS.

I don't understand. If it's pre-VCR, how was the original broadcast recorded?


This is what I've always wondered about also, especially with sporting events from the early 70's late 60's - the era before vcr's.
Where do these games pop up from??

Too bad not a lot of game film was preserved from the old days - so when a real gem pops up from this period, it's a big find in the sporting world.

Comment on sports films, even the late 70s early to mid 80s NBA footage that is shown on ESPN Classic leaves something to be desired. I am amazed at the poor shape they are in b/c there are plenty of older footage taht is in great shape and this stuff was stored by the networks, go figure!

Tom

They had recordable video formats all the way back into the 1960s. It just wasn't Beta or VHS. In fact, several episodes of THE TWILIGHT ZONE and THE HONEYMOONERS were shot on video tape, not film.

As long as you can play it out to another newer format (VHS, DVD, whatever), it'll be fine. Cabling may be a pain, but it can be done, especially if you know how to splice things together and make your own little doo-dads. Cables have changed a lot too in the past 50-60 years.

Prior to video tape, you had kinescope (filming the live event from the tv, so your network could play it later in the day, using the kinescope as the "master"). Want to see a kinescope? Watch What's My Line? or one of those other B&W shows on GSN at about 1-3 a.m.

These things were all available to consumers, although it tended to only go to upper class or the very lucky. If you had enough money, you could buy it. They were not "limited" to studios or anything like that, not back then.

OTR was also recorded in the same way, either to wire, vinyl writers, or some form of audio tape (just not "cassette" or even "8 track" necessarily).

For a movie about video tape in the 1960s, see that film that was about the Hogan's Heroes star, and his porn fetish. It was a movie that came out within the past 5 years, should be easy to find on DVD, I forget the name of it. His friend worked at Sony (I think) and you get to see mock-ups of some very old gear in action.

Google these topics sometime, it's all very interesting stuff. :cool:

LS, the movie you're talking about is "Auto Focus". Good movie about Bob's fetish..

My best friend has a recording off-air from 1974 of The Questor Tapes - it's on U-Matic reel-to-reel videotape. U-Matics were among the earliest consumer VCRs - insanely expensive, not very pretty, and the recording material was equally expensive and unwieldy. So finding actual off-air recordings from that period is not impossible, but it is fairly unlikely - I know my friend hasn't been able to watch her tape in over 20 years, because no one we know still has a U-Matic deck. You see them every so often on eBay. I first worked with videotape in high school, in 1972 - the school district recorded a couple of Greek tragedies from PBS using 1 inch reel to reel, for use in our English program. :>

The first consumer Beta deck was introduced in 1975. No, LS, I didn't have one of 'em, although my oldest VCR - bought at a garage sale - is from 1980. The VCR I actually purchased in 1981 lasted 13 years before the heads literally fell apart. And stuff recorded on it still looks pretty good.

If the person who got the Tonight Show episode was told it was third generation from a 1974 broadcast, they should have scaled their expectations accordingly.

it sounds like you gave the guy a good deal i would be thrilled to get a bordcast that old with all the comm and everything ive never traded before but i collect old shows and let me say the guy was nuts your just not going to find mint tonight shows on every corner i wonder if the guy you traded with was the same guy i talked to about 10 years ago about some things i had. it sure sounds like it. if it was belive me he will never be happy with anything youu send him. if it wasant the same guy i shudder to think that ther is another one like him on the trading curicit

Suggested reading:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betamax
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U-matic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VHS
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinescope
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ampex

The show in question from 1974, if not filmed, was probably archived with an AMPEX. It would likely later have been transferred to a studio grade VHS, Betacam (NOT Betamax) or left to rot as is.