3.4 introducing electronic, radio transmitted television
4 Changing US Demographics
4.1 people moved away into suburbs
4.2 away from downtown theaters
4.3 families became more selective about entertainment
4.4 initially they listened to radio
5 National Television Standards Committee
5.1 electronics firms, including RCA
5.2 formulated interoperable standard for television
5.3 analog TV standard
1941
525-lines
60 Hz (field per second)
30 frames per second (later 29.97 for color)
interlaced
6 Color Format War
6.1 CBS system, 1951
6.2 RCA system, 1953
6.3 CBS was not compatible with black and white TV, but RCA color was
6.4 NTSC adopted RCA color, 1954
6.5 first national color broadcast was 1955 Tournament of Roses Parade
7 Ultra High Frequency
7.1 FCC chose intermixture of VHF and UHF
7.2 VHF
Channels 2–13
higher power (wattage)
greater geographic reach
most network stations were on VHF band
7.3 UHF
Channels 14–69
less power
require less channel separation
stations would often be less-watched independent or
educational
7.4 FCC did not mandate TVs to receive both VHF and UHF until 1960
7.5 UHF stations did not thrive like VHF stations
8 Popularity of Television
8.1 Sales of TV would be strong throughout the 1950s
8.2 less than 10% of American households did not have TV in 1950
8.3 about 90% of American households had TV in 1960
8.4 New dominant visual medium
by 1954 there were 32 million
1960 90% of homes had TV
TV would radically alter many media industries
movies
newspapers
magazines
radio
9 Live vs. Recorded Programming
9.1 television is the only medium that could broadcast live pictures
instantly over great distance
9.2 networks preferred live television
kept stations dependent on networks for content
kept movie studios out of television
9.3 recording technology did not exist
videotape would not be invented until 1958 (Ampex)
kinescopes were of low fidelity, inferior to live television
10 Live Anthology Dramas
10.1 U.S. Steel Hour (1945–1953)
10.2 Kraft Television Theater (1947–1958)
10.3 Playhouse 90 (1956–1960)
10.4 acting style
Gilbert Seldes: “The style of acting in television is
determined by the conditions of reception. There is no place
for florid gesture, the overprojection of emotion, the
exaggeration of voice or grimace or movement, inside the
average American living room” (1950)
10.5 Marty
Written by Paddy Chayefsky
Directed by Delbert Mann
Goodyear Television Playhouse
aired on NBC May 24, 1953
11 Hollywood and TV
11.1 movie studios were kept out of television by radio networks
11.2 movies thought TV was a threat to attendance
11.3 smaller movie studios sold movies to television
Disneyland (1954) on ABC
Disney was a minor studio
ABC was third to CBS and NBC
11.4 other major studios followed suit
20th Century-Fox Hour (1955)
MGM Parade (1955)
11.5 major movie studio revenues came from television by the end of
the 1950s