Problems
A recurring problem with the format was damage to the videotape caused by prolonged friction of the spinning video drum heads against a paused videotape. The drum would rub oxide off the tape or the tape would wrinkle; when the damaged tape was played back, a horizontal line of distorted visual image would ascend in the frame, and audio would drop out. Manufacturers attempted to minimize this issue with schemes in which the tape would loosen around the spinning head or the head would stop spinning after resting in pause mode for a pre-determined period of time.
The format video image also suffered from head-switching noise, a distortion of the image in which a section of video at the bottom of the video frame would be horizontally askew from the larger portion.
The format also had difficulty reproducing the color red, and red images would be noisier than other colors in the spectrum. For this reason, on-camera talent was discouraged from wearing red clothing that would call attention to the technical shortcoming.
Copying video from one VCR to another VCR displayed compromised playback reliability, and exponential levels of head-switching noise, chroma smearing and noise, compounded with every generation. These technical challenges motivated videotape editors and engineers to plan work around minimizing generational degradation. Use of a time-base corrector (TBC) or "dub" cable were methods of minimizing multi-generational quality loss. The TBC regenerates the sync tip portion of the video signal, improving playback reliability. The dub, demodulated (or "demod") cable was a multi-conductor cable that circumvented a portion of video circuitry, minimizing amplification noise.
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Famous quotes containing the word problems:
“Our young people are diseased with the theological problems of original sin, origin of evil, predestination, and the like. These never presented a practical difficulty to any man,—never darkened across any man’s road, who did not go out of his way to seek them. These are the soul’s mumps, and measles, and whooping- coughs, and those who have not caught them cannot describe their health or prescribe a cure. A simple mind will not know these enemies.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I rarely speak about God. To God, yes. I protest against Him. I shout at Him. But to open a discourse about the qualities of God, about the problems that God imposes, theodicy, no. And yet He is there, in silence, in filigree.”
—Elie Wiesel (b. 1928)
“The man who is forever disturbed about the condition of humanity either has no problems of his own or has refused to face them.”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)