Scoring Display Questions...
TDN2OO1
7-segment vane displays, etc...).
Who was the company or what was the official name of the specific scoring
displays used on Marshall's "Hollywood Squares"?
These "eggcrate displays" were also used on "The Newlywed Game" in the 60s &
70s, as well as Tom Kennedy's "Split Second" show. Were there others?
Ted Novak
--
Dan Sadro
wrote:
While I'm sure that Zachhie has already answered this one with irrelevant
information...but the term on Ryan Bugaj's page is "Go" board. I'm not
sold on the name, but I can tell you that "Go" and the unsold pilot "The
Riddlers" used them, and a few other shows (I think there's at least one
other miserable 70s Barris show that used it).
Hope I helped somewhat,
--Dan
To reply, use this address: dan at sadro dot com
Ryan Bugaj
is always up for debate on these types of things, except where there's an
official designation.
(Translation: You call it one thing, I call it another; makes no
difference.)
The Barris show you're thinking of, Dan, is "The Family Game."
-RB
"Dan Sadro" <sp...@sadro.com> wrote in message
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chris319
>displays used on Marshall's "Hollywood Squares"?
A defunct company named Display Systems made most of the readouts you see on
TPIR and WOF. That company has changed hands several times and is now Vista
Electronics, which does the scoreboards for J!. Some of those readouts may have
been home-brew custom stuff churned out by a network's stage electronics shop. I
think the 7-segment readouts currently used on HS were custom jobs from the CBS
stage electronics shop.
Randy West
Vista Electronics is a creative company staffed with some really cool
guys! In fact, the head honchos are former employees of CBS and
created much of what is still in use at TPIR.
They not only build the scoring displays and some shows' podiums, but
they actually write the software that runs most of the games. The
nostalgic days of a bunch of guys in moth-bitten cardigan sweaters
keeping score on blackboards for the host and contestants, Solari
countdown clocks clicking, and people signaling across the stage are
pretty much extinct. Vista programs the logic, the timings and game
play sequences of many shows and wires the feeds to the needed
displays, as well as interfacing all this with the control room for
graphic display. As a result, so many shows are now giant PC games!
A Vista employee and a back-up or two may simply press a stylus to a
monitor to indicate a "right" or "wrong" answer, and everything
follows the cue: scores change, clocks reset, displays change, control
passes to the next player, etc, etc. Whatever the game entails. It's
really cool... when it works :-)
Yes, there have been a few really legendary incidents where shows
became the victims of their own technological advances. Tape stops,
and you wish folks like Ira Skutch could simply indicate responses
with thumbs up or down, there were blackboards and people who can add,
etc. But for the most part Vista rocks, and they are amazing to watch.
Between Vista and CBS Electronics (which contracts for similar outside
work and is Vista's only real competitor) they've got a lock on this
game show biz of fabrication and programming. You see the same Vista
crewmembers at network, cable and syndie games from J! down to Street
Smarts, and everything in between.
Randy West
Ryan Bugaj
Display Field Guide sometime next week.
Randy, if you (or anyone else) has other information you'd like to share for
posting (credited, of course!), then by all means, e-mail me.
And I thought the DFG was going to become a dead document... :)
-Ryan Bugaj
Curator, Display Field Guide
http://pages.cthome.net/ryan_bugaj/fieldguide.html
e-mail me at ryan_...@snet.net
"Randy West" <rand...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:bf2bf200.0205...@posting.google.com...
chris319
The company that made the FF board readouts was Ferranti Packard (note
spelling). I can't find a web link to them; I wonder if they're still in
business.
The 7-segment magnetic vane readouts were made by Staver. Now it appears that
Colorado Time Systems has taken over that business:
http://www.staver-signalex.com/
Their first game show use that I'm aware of was on Mindreaders in 1979, which
did not use the "sports type" you describe.
The "sports type" and 7-segment with bulbs are the same basic technology. The
units you see in contestants' row were made by Display Systems. And, there is no
such pricing game as "IUFB", it's "One Bid".
JocabTheGenius
>spelling). I can't find a web link to them; I wonder if they're still in
>business.
I'm not positive, but I seem to remember driving through Canada once and seeing
a large "Ferranti Packard" building. At first I thought it was a faucet company
for some reason but then I remembered seeing that name on the DFG....
Sherman Potter
news:<2d37duc4h01nqdp5n...@4ax.com>...
> > >Who was the company or what was the official name of the specific
scoring
> > >displays used on Marshall's "Hollywood Squares"?
> >
> > A defunct company named Display Systems made most of the readouts you
see on
> > TPIR and WOF. That company has changed hands several times and is now
Vista
> > Electronics, which does the scoreboards for J!. Some of those readouts
may have
> > been home-brew custom stuff churned out by a network's stage electronics
shop. I
> > think the 7-segment readouts currently used on HS were custom jobs from
the CBS
> > stage electronics shop.
>
>
> Vista Electronics is a creative company staffed with some really cool
> guys! In fact, the head honchos are former employees of CBS and
> created much of what is still in use at TPIR.
If I'm not mistaken, Display Systems/Vista Electronics also makes stadium
scoreboards, bank time/temp signs, roadside variable message signs, and
other goodies of the sort, don't they?
chris319
>scoreboards, bank time/temp signs, roadside variable message signs, and
>other goodies of the sort, don't they?
Not to my knowledge. I think their clientele comes mainly from show bidness.