Re: Black and While programs on Color Tv
William Sommerwerck
> (THIS-TV) are black and white, while others are tinted, usually black
> and greenish white? Yes, the color programs are accurately colored,
> so it's not that the TV colors are off, and some B&W programs are
> actually correct. Is this in the film or is the tv transmitter wrong?
Filmed B&W programs are often transferred with a color camera or telecine
and transmitted as a color signal. The transfer equipment might not be set
up correctly.
It's also possible your TV's tracking is off, but you say some B&W programs
look okay, so that's not likely.
I occasionally watch this, and haven't noticed any unusual color casts in
B&W shows ("Bat Masterson", "Sea Hunt", etc).
I've noticed something similar on Blu-rays, both color and B&W. Scenes
appearing in the supplemental material have a different color balance or
cast, even though they're presumably derived from the same source. "North by
Northwest" and "Young Frankenstein" are good examples.
Allodoxaphobia
> How come some of the old B&W programs on the "Oldies Channel"
> (THIS-TV) are black and white, while others are tinted, usually black
> so it's not that the tv colors are off, and some B&W programs are
> actually correct. Is this in the film or is the tv transmitter wrong?
Could it be that these are programs/movies that were 'colorized' in the
very early days of that process -- which rendered ghastly results IMO,
and which have simply never been re-colorized with new techniques?
Jonesy
William Sommerwerck
No. No one would colorize an entire TV series, as the cost would be
outrageous.
The newer computer-controlled colorizings are excellent.
Michael A. Terrell
Jose...@dotcom.com wrote:
>
> How come some of the old B&W programs on the "Oldies Channel"
> (THIS-TV) are black and white, while others are tinted, usually black
> and greenish white. Yes, the color programs are accurately colored,
> so it's not that the tv colors are off, and some B&W programs are
> actually correct. Is this in the film or is the tv transmitter wrong?
Neither. The color burst has to be turned off for B&W programming,
so the color killer circuit doesn't create artifacts. Stations used to
be very careful about this, but over the years some just don't bother
anymore.
--
You can't fix stupid. You can't even put a Band-Aid™ on it, because it's
Teflon coated.
John Robertson
Also an artifact of NTSC - Never The Same Colour -
John :-#)#
--
(Please post followups or tech enquiries to the newsgroup)
John's Jukes Ltd. 2343 Main St., Vancouver, BC, Canada V5T 3C9
Call (604)872-5757 or Fax 872-2010 (Pinballs, Jukes, Video Games)
www.flippers.com
"Old pinballers never die, they just flip out."
William Sommerwerck
Not true. NTSC is neither inherently inaccurate or unstable.
In any case, I think this is digital, and doesn't used NTSC encoding.
Ian Field
"William Sommerwerck" <grizzle...@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:infp1h$k9v$1...@dont-email.me...
>> Also an artifact of NTSC -- Never The Same Colour
>
> Not true. NTSC is neither inherently inaccurate or unstable.
The UK PAL (Phase Alternate Line) inverts the subcarrier phase on alternate
lines so phase distortion during transmission cancells itself out - NTSC
doesn't and is inherently prone to drift, hence it was dubbed; Never Twice
the Same Colour.
Aparently the US military incorporated a swinging phase error in their GPS
satelites to stop all and sundry using it without the decoding key - it was
a British engineer that cracked it using a technique based on PAL
technology.
Andrew Rossmann
Jose...@dotcom.com says...
>
> How come some of the old B&W programs on the "Oldies Channel"
> (THIS-TV) are black and white, while others are tinted, usually black
> so it's not that the tv colors are off, and some B&W programs are
> actually correct. Is this in the film or is the tv transmitter wrong?
It may be the source material, too. These days, most everything is
digital, even what the stations play from probably comes off of a
computer.
You don't mention where you are. ThisTV is from Weigel Communications,
which is based in Chicago and broadcasts on WCIU (ThisTV is 26.5). One
of the technicians (hvs10trk) is a regular on this forum:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=815397
--
If there is a no_junk in my address, please REMOVE it before replying!
All junk mail senders will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the
law!!
http://home.comcast.net/~andyross
William Sommerwerck
>> Not true. NTSC is neither inherently inaccurate or unstable.
> The UK PAL (Phase Alternate Line) inverts the subcarrier phase
> on alternate lines so phase distortion during transmission cancels
> itself out - NTSC doesn't and is inherently prone to drift, hence it
> was dubbed; Never Twice the Same Colour.
Drift of /what/? I've wasted many hours explaining why NTSC is, overall,
better than PAL.
The US video distribution system never had much trouble with phase errors.
European systems did.
Geoffrey S. Mendelson
> Aparently the US military incorporated a swinging phase error in their GPS
> satelites to stop all and sundry using it without the decoding key - it was
> a British engineer that cracked it using a technique based on PAL
> technology.
Note quite. The GPS system did have the higher resolution data encrypted.
There were several systems to improve accuracy without the keys, such as
broadcasting it on FM radio subcarriers, differential units (multiple
antennas) and so on.
During operation Desert Storm (aka the First Gulf War), there were not enough
millitary GPS units to go around so President Clinton ordered the encryption
turned off.
It has stayed off except in a few limited areas, such as a small portion of
the area between Cuba and the US.
That's why there have been proposed replacement systems by Russia and the EU,
there is always the real possibility that the US will turn on encryption
again and everyone's "SatNav" will be useless. As in "about 100 meters,
maybe two hundred, maybe 100 meters ago, turn in some direction and go for
a while".
Geoff.
--
Geoffrey S. Mendelson N3OWJ/4X1GM
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to misquote it.
Michael A. Terrell
John Robertson wrote:
>
> William Sommerwerck wrote:
> >> How come some of the old B&W programs on the "Oldies Channel"
> >> (THIS-TV) are black and white, while others are tinted, usually black
> >> and greenish white? Yes, the color programs are accurately colored,
> >> so it's not that the TV colors are off, and some B&W programs are
> >> actually correct. Is this in the film or is the tv transmitter wrong?
> >
> > Filmed B&W programs are often transferred with a color camera or telecine
> > and transmitted as a color signal. The transfer equipment might not be set
> > up correctly.
> >
> > It's also possible your TV's tracking is off, but you say some B&W programs
> > look okay, so that's not likely.
> >
> > I occasionally watch this, and haven't noticed any unusual color casts in
> > B&W shows ("Bat Masterson", "Sea Hunt", etc).
> >
> > I've noticed something similar on Blu-rays, both color and B&W. Scenes
> > appearing in the supplemental material have a different color balance or
> > cast, even though they're presumably derived from the same source. "North by
> > Northwest" and "Young Frankenstein" are good examples.
> >
> >
>
> Also an artifact of NTSC - Never The Same Colour -
Sigh. The NTSC was created for B&W television.
Geoffrey S. Mendelson
> Sigh. The NTSC was created for B&W television.
Acronyms are always changing, for example:
GSM (French for mobile system group) -> Global System for Mobiles.
DVD (Digital Video Disk) -> Digital Versatile Disk
isw
"Ian Field" <gangprob...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
> "William Sommerwerck" <grizzle...@comcast.net> wrote in message
> news:infp1h$k9v$1...@dont-email.me...
> >> Also an artifact of NTSC -- Never The Same Colour
> >
> > Not true. NTSC is neither inherently inaccurate or unstable.
>
>
> The UK PAL (Phase Alternate Line) inverts the subcarrier phase on alternate
> lines so phase distortion during transmission cancells itself out - NTSC
> doesn't and is inherently prone to drift, hence it was dubbed; Never Twice
> the Same Colour.
But they traded color drift for high-brightness ficker; not necessarily
a good choice, since the early color drift of NTSC, being due to
equipment instabilities, was soon fixed by better gear, while PAL's
flicker problem, having been designed in, persisted.
Isaac
Geoffrey S. Mendelson
> But they traded color drift for high-brightness ficker; not necessarily
> a good choice, since the early color drift of NTSC, being due to
> equipment instabilities, was soon fixed by better gear, while PAL's
> flicker problem, having been designed in, persisted.
I have a PAL TV set that displays very bright white as black. Someday I'll
replace it. :-)
Bruce Esquibel
> Neither. The color burst has to be turned off for B&W programming,
> so the color killer circuit doesn't create artifacts. Stations used to
> be very careful about this, but over the years some just don't bother
> anymore.
Yeah but if they left the color burst on, it would present as a colored snow
all through the picture.
The OP is talking about a dominance of green, which I've seen too on
some B&W telecasts. I've also seen it there up to a commercial break, then
the next segment is normal.
I always figured it was something at the station rather than the print they
were using. Some peice of equipment in the chain that normalizes color or
something which needs to be turned off or bypassed for B&W shows.
-bruce
b...@ripco.com
William Sommerwerck
>> phase on alternate lines so phase distortion during transmission
>> cancells itself out - NTSC doesn't and is inherently prone to drift,
>> hence it was dubbed; Never Twice the Same Colour.
> But they traded color drift for high-brightness ficker; not necessarily
> a good choice, since the early color drift of NTSC, being due to
> equipment instabilities, was soon fixed by better gear, while PAL's
> flicker problem, having been designed in, persisted.
As far as I know, this is closer to the truth. The consensus has generally
been that Never Twice the Same Color was due to poor studio practices, not
problems inherent in NTSC. To give a small example... The early episodes of
"Barney Miller" were shot on cameras that were not properly aligned or
calibrated. This is easily visible.
Ian Field
"isw" <i...@witzend.com> wrote in message
news:isw-4E35A7.20165205042011@[216.168.3.50]...
Flicker is due to the 50Hz field rate, its only noticeable if you're used to
60Hz field rate.
Geoffrey S. Mendelson
> Flicker is due to the 50Hz field rate, its only noticeable if you're used to
> 60Hz field rate.
Which really is a design flaw, there was nothing that required it, and a 60Hz
rate screen is not really a problem with 50Hz lighting.
The need to be synced to the power line frequency was needed in the 1930's
when the 405 line system was developed due to arc lights being used for
studio lighting. By the time PAL was developed (early 1960's) arc lights
were long gone.
It was just done to be incompatible with the US.
The US got you back, the number one design criteria of ATSC was that it was
not DVB-T compatible.
Ian Field
"Geoffrey S. Mendelson" <g...@mendelson.com> wrote in message
news:slrniposp...@cable.mendelson.com...
> Ian Field wrote:
>> Flicker is due to the 50Hz field rate, its only noticeable if you're used
>> to
>> 60Hz field rate.
>
> Which really is a design flaw, there was nothing that required it, and a
> 60Hz
> rate screen is not really a problem with 50Hz lighting.
>
> The need to be synced to the power line frequency was needed in the 1930's
> when the 405 line system was developed due to arc lights being used for
> studio lighting. By the time PAL was developed (early 1960's) arc lights
> were long gone.
>
> It was just done to be incompatible with the US.
You can get tablets for that.
Michael A. Terrell
"Geoffrey S. Mendelson" wrote:
>
> Michael A. Terrell wrote:
> > Sigh. The NTSC was created for B&W television.
>
> Acronyms are always changing, for example:
>
> GSM (French for mobile system group) -> Global System for Mobiles.
> DVD (Digital Video Disk) -> Digital Versatile Disk
NTSC is still 'National Television Standards Committee' which was
formed to chose the best available technology from various proposed
systems. The name never had anything to do with color except for the
ignorant to make fun of the US TV standards, but I don't expect you to
listen to the truth. 'never the same color' was never a real acronym.
If it were, PAL would be 'Pathetic Analretentive Liars'.
Michael A. Terrell
Lobotomies work better, and only need to be done, once. :(
Michael A. Terrell
That would depend on the color demodulator used in the TV. A green
tint was a common problem in early TVs when the color killer failed, or
the burst was left on.
Ian Field
"Michael A. Terrell" <mike.t...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:ONSdnZZRI6i5TQHQ...@earthlink.com...
For those who want to delve into the theory its worth remembering that to
conserve bandwidth, the green signal is not included in the chroma carrier -
its reconstituted by subtracting the sum of the red & blue signals from the
luma to obtain a value for green.
The single most important feature being that the luma signal was not
modified so it maintained compatibility with B&W sets.
tlbs
>
> NTSC is still 'National Television Standards Committee' which was
> formed to chose the best available technology from various proposed
> systems. The name never had anything to do with color except for the
> ignorant to make fun of the US TV standards, but I don't expect you to
> listen to the truth. 'never the same color' was never a real acronym.
> If it were, PAL would be 'Pathetic Analretentive Liars'.
>
In joking, I always referred to PAL as, "Phase Always Loose" --
NTSC was, "Never True; Sh**ty Color".
There was one for SECAM, but I can't remember what it was.
Tom P.
near Albuquerque
William Sommerwerck
"Stupid Engineering Crap (Also Merde)"
stra...@yahoo.com
That was NTSC issue fixed in the '70s.
We were watching TCM last Sunday when they were running fragments
(because that's all that remains) of silent B/W movies some of which
were 'tinted' with the blueish or brownish look. They call it 'art'. I
call it crap but it was not a burst phase error. If there is no chroma
(the definition of B/W) the phase wouldn't mean a thing. The OP says
all other color is normal (though I have seen some TV's that were
dreadful when the owner thought it was great.) so perhaps he found one
of these tinted B/W films.
I can say the Samsung DLP and all the LCDs we have do excellent B/W.
G²
stra...@yahoo.com
> "William Sommerwerck" <grizzledgee...@comcast.net> wrote in message
>
> news:infp1h$k9v$1...@dont-email.me...
>
> >> Also an artifact of NTSC -- Never The Same Colour
>
> > Not true. NTSC is neither inherently inaccurate or unstable.
>
> The UK PAL (Phase Alternate Line) inverts the subcarrier phase on alternate
> lines so phase distortion during transmission cancells itself out - NTSC
> doesn't and is inherently prone to drift, hence it was dubbed; Never Twice
> the Same Colour.
That NTSC hue issue was fixed in the '70s and never showed up again. I
know 'Hue' controls that were never touched because it wasn't a
problem. What DID drift was SCH phase but this does not show up as a
color hue error. It shows up as small horizontal shifts (up to 180 nS)
at edit points. Early Sony machines were bad on this score but later
models corrected it. The RCA TR-800 was hideous on this issue. Set it
at 12 noon and you better check it by 12:30 and likely need to adjust
it by 1 pm. RCA never fixed it but the engineers at Action Video in
Hollywood sorted it out. Set it on Jan 1 and you might want to check
it on the 4th of July. Ironically, the chip used to fix the RCA
machine was invented at RCA.
> Aparently the US military incorporated a swinging phase error in their GPS
> satelites to stop all and sundry using it without the decoding key - it was
> a British engineer that cracked it using a technique based on PAL
> technology.
G²
stra...@yahoo.com
> "isw" <i...@witzend.com> wrote in message
>
> news:isw-4E35A7.20165205042011@[216.168.3.50]...
>
>
>
>
>
> > "Ian Field" <gangprobing.al...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
>
> >> "William Sommerwerck" <grizzledgee...@comcast.net> wrote in message
> >>news:infp1h$k9v$1...@dont-email.me...
> >> >> Also an artifact of NTSC -- Never The Same Colour
>
> >> > Not true. NTSC is neither inherently inaccurate or unstable.
>
> >> The UK PAL (Phase Alternate Line) inverts the subcarrier phase on
> >> alternate
> >> lines so phase distortion during transmission cancells itself out - NTSC
> >> doesn't and is inherently prone to drift, hence it was dubbed; Never
> >> Twice
> >> the Same Colour.
>
> > But they traded color drift for high-brightness ficker; not necessarily
> > a good choice, since the early color drift of NTSC, being due to
> > equipment instabilities, was soon fixed by better gear, while PAL's
> > flicker problem, having been designed in, persisted.
>
> Flicker is due to the 50Hz field rate, its only noticeable if you're used to
> 60Hz field rate.
I agree you do get used to the 50 Hz flicker. I've worked with PAL in
Hollywood for 17 years.
G²
isw
"Ian Field" <gangprob...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
> "isw" <i...@witzend.com> wrote in message
> news:isw-4E35A7.20165205042011@[216.168.3.50]...
> > In article <KFLmp.2976$9h6....@newsfe02.ams2>,
> > "Ian Field" <gangprob...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
> >
> >> "William Sommerwerck" <grizzle...@comcast.net> wrote in message
> >> news:infp1h$k9v$1...@dont-email.me...
> >> >> Also an artifact of NTSC -- Never The Same Colour
> >> >
> >> > Not true. NTSC is neither inherently inaccurate or unstable.
> >>
> >>
> >> The UK PAL (Phase Alternate Line) inverts the subcarrier phase on
> >> alternate
> >> lines so phase distortion during transmission cancells itself out - NTSC
> >> doesn't and is inherently prone to drift, hence it was dubbed; Never
> >> Twice
> >> the Same Colour.
> >
> > But they traded color drift for high-brightness ficker; not necessarily
> > a good choice, since the early color drift of NTSC, being due to
> > equipment instabilities, was soon fixed by better gear, while PAL's
> > flicker problem, having been designed in, persisted.
>
>
> Flicker is due to the 50Hz field rate, its only noticeable if you're used to
> 60Hz field rate.
That's not what I was talking about.
PAL's high-brightness flicker problem is caused by a combination of it's
very low interlace rate and the human eye's sensitivity to periodic
variations in light intensity, especially at high levels of brightness.
The actual interlace rate (the rate at which a specific "pixel" repeats
with the exact same amplitude and phase) is, for NTSC, half the frame
rate -- say, a tad below 15 Hz. (Don't forget that the color subcarrier
is also interlaced). Due to it's extra phase alternation (the "P" of
"PAL"), the actual interlace rate for PAL is *one quarter* of its frame
rate, or 6.25 Hz.
NTSC's flicker rate is high enough that it's just not very noticeable,
while PAL's is well below the flicker fusion rate, and is easily
noticeable.
After a while, "high-end" PAL sets were offered which did not exhibit
the flicker problem, but (unlike NTSC's hue problem) it was not
eliminated so much as obscured by considerably more complex (and
expensive) signal processing.
Isaac
isw
<9905863f-b7fd-4011...@i14g2000yqe.googlegroups.com>,
stra...@yahoo.com wrote:
> On Apr 5, 11:11 am, John Robertson <s...@flippers.com> wrote:
> > William Sommerwerck wrote:
> > >> How come some of the old B&W programs on the "Oldies Channel"
> > >> (THIS-TV) are black and white, while others are tinted, usually black
> > >> and greenish white? Yes, the color programs are accurately colored,
> > >> so it's not that the TV colors are off, and some B&W programs are
> > >> actually correct. Is this in the film or is the tv transmitter wrong?
> >
> > > Filmed B&W programs are often transferred with a color camera or telecine
> > > and transmitted as a color signal. The transfer equipment might not be
> > > set
> > > up correctly.
> >
> > > It's also possible your TV's tracking is off, but you say some B&W
> > > programs
> > > look okay, so that's not likely.
> >
> > > I occasionally watch this, and haven't noticed any unusual color casts in
> > > B&W shows ("Bat Masterson", "Sea Hunt", etc).
> >
> > > I've noticed something similar on Blu-rays, both color and B&W. Scenes
> > > appearing in the supplemental material have a different color balance or
> > > cast, even though they're presumably derived from the same source. "North
> > > by
> > > Northwest" and "Young Frankenstein" are good examples.
> >
> > Also an artifact of NTSC - Never The Same Colour -
I don't think so. For DVDs, "NTSC" or "PAL" does not exist (or, does not
*need* to exist), at any point in the signal chain prior to the final
video output portion of the DVD player, and whatever performance it has,
won't vary from one part of a disk to another.
The effect you speak of is most likely due to the fact that the
supplemental stuff just didn't get the same degree of attention when
color correcting the film sources.
Isaac
William Sommerwerck
Although about 90% of all silent films have been lost, many exist in full
versions. (Believe it or not, 50% of all sound films are believed to be
lost. Most of these were probably from small studios.)
> some of which were "tinted" with the bluish or brownish look.
It's called "sepia". Tinting was common, used to establish mood. Kodak made
fine-grained release films with a tinted base. Tinting ended with the
introduction of sound.
> They call it 'art'. I call it crap...
It was standard when color was not available. Think about the fact that the
film itself isn't "realistic".
> ...but it was not a burst phase error. If there is no chroma (the
> definition of B/W) the phase wouldn't mean a thing.
This is true in terms of the way NTSC and PAL are designed/defined, but I'm
not sure it's true in practice.
> The OP says all other color is normal (though I have seen some
> TVs that were dreadful when the owner thought it was great), so
> perhaps he found one of these tinted B/W films.
Yes, of course. "Bat Masterson" was printed on sepia stock, "Sea Hunt" was
printed on blue, etc, etc, etc.
William Sommerwerck
> up again. I know Hue controls that were never touched
> because it wasn't a problem.
I've owned color TVs since 1974, and I simply don't remember adjusting the
hue control (incorrectly called tint on many sets).
It should be pointed out that a "true" phase error is a differential (that
is, non-minimum) phase error. Readjusting the hue control to get the
fleshtones correct pushes other colors in the wrong direction.
I've noticed over the years that people tend to adjust the hue control for
slightly greenish flesh tones. Don't know why.
William Sommerwerck
> a differential (that is, non-minimum) phase error.
Whoops. That should have been non-linear. So easy to get confused...