Professional video camera


A professional video camera is a high-end device for creating electronic moving images. Originally developed for use in television studios or with outside broadcast trucks, they are now also used for music videos, direct-to-video movies, corporate and educational videos, wedding videos, among other uses. Since the 2000s, most professional video cameras are digital.
File:Sony HDC-1550 HDVS.JPG|thumb|303x303px|Sony HDC-1550 camera with Fujinon lens
The distinction between professional video cameras and movie cameras narrowed as HD digital video cameras with sensors the same size as 35mm movie cameras - plus dynamic range and color rendition approaching film quality - were introduced in the late 2010s. Nowadays, HDTV cameras designed for broadcast television, news, sports, events and other works such as reality TV are termed as professional video cameras. A digital movie camera is designed for movies or scripted television to record files that are then color corrected during post-production. The video signal from a professional video camera can be broadcast live, or is meant to be edited quickly with little or no color or exposure adjustments needed.

History

The earliest video cameras were mechanical flying-spot scanners which were in use in the 1920s and 1930s during the period of mechanical television. Improvements in video camera tubes in the early 1930s ushered in the era of electronic television. Earlier, cameras were very large devices, almost always in two sections. The camera section held the lens and camera tube pre-amplifiers and other necessary electronics, and was connected to a large diameter multicore cable to the remainder of the camera electronics, usually mounted in a separate room in the studio, or a remote truck. The camera head could not generate a video picture signal on its own. The video signal was output to the studio for switching and transmission. By the fifties, electronic miniaturization had progressed to the point where some monochrome cameras could operate standalone and even be handheld. But the studio configuration remained, with the large cable bundle transmitting the signals back to the camera control unit. The CCU in turn was used to align and operate the camera's functions, such as exposure, system timing, video and black levels.
The first color cameras, notably the RCA TK-40/41 series, were much more complex with their three pickup tubes, and their size and weight drastically increased. Handheld color cameras did not come into general use until the early 1970s - the first generation of cameras were split into a camera head unit connected via a cable bundle to a backpack CCU.
The Ikegami HL-33, the RCA TKP45 and the Thomson Microcam were portable two piece color cameras introduced in the early 1970s. For field work a separate VTR was still required to record the camera's video output. Typically, this was either a portable 1" reel-to-reel VTR, or a portable 3/4" U-matic VCR. Typically, the two camera units would be carried by the camera operator, while a tape operator would carry the portable recorder. With the introduction of the RCA TK-76 in 1976, the Ikegami HL-77 in 1977, and the Sony BVP-300 in 1978, camera operators were finally able to carry on their shoulders a one-piece camera containing all the electronics to output a broadcast-quality composite video signal. A separate videotape recording unit was still required.
Electronic news-gathering cameras replaced the 16mm film cameras for TV news production from the 1970s onwards because the cost of shooting on film was significantly more than shooting on reusable tape. Portable video tape production also enabled much faster turnaround time for the quick completion of news stories, compared to the need to chemically process film before it could be shown or edited. However, some news feature stories for weekly news magazine shows continued to use 16mm film cameras until the 1990s.
At first, all these cameras used tube-based sensors, but charge-coupled device imagers came on the scene in the mid-80s, bringing numerous benefits. Early CCD cameras could not match the colour or resolution of their tube counterparts, but the benefits of CCD technology, such as introducing smaller and lightweight cameras, a better and more stable image and no need for registration meant development on CCD imagers quickly took off and, once rivaling and offering a superior image to a tube sensor, began displacing tube-based cameras - the latter of which were all but disused by the early 1990s. Eventually, cameras with the recorder permanently mated to the camera head became the norm for ENG. In studio cameras, the camera electronics shrank, and CCD imagers replaced the pickup tubes. The thick multi-core cables connecting the camera head to the CCU were replaced in the late seventies with triax connections, a slender video cable that carried multiple video signals, intercom audio, and control circuits, and could be run for a mile or more. As the camera innards shrank, the electronics no longer dictated the size of the enclosure, however the box shape remained, as it is necessary to hold the large studio lenses, teleprompters, electronic viewfinder, and other paraphernalia needed for studio and sports production. Electronic Field Production cameras were often mounted in studio configurations inside a mounting cage. This cage supported the additional studio accessories.
In the late 1990s, as HDTV broadcasting commenced, HDTV cameras suitable for news and general-purpose work were introduced. Though they delivered much better image quality, their overall operation was identical to their standard definition predecessors. New methods of recording for cameras were introduced to supplant video tape, tapeless cameras. Ikegami and Avid introduced EditCam in 1996, based on interchangeable hard drives. Panasonic introduced P2 cameras. These recorded a DVCPro signal on interchangeable flash memory media. Several other data storage device recording systems were introduced, notably XDCAM from Sony. Sony also introduced SxS, a flash memory standard compliant to the Sony and Sandisk-created ExpressCard standard. Eventually, flash storage largely supplanted other forms of recording media.
In the 2000s, major manufacturers like Sony and Philips introduced digital professional video cameras. These cameras used CCD sensors and recorded video digitally on flash storage. These were followed by digital HDTV cameras. As digital technology improved and also due to digital television transition, digital professional video cameras have become dominant in television studios, ENG, EFP and even in other areas since the 2010s. CCD sensors were eventually replaced by CMOS sensors.

Chronology

  • 1926 to 1933 "cameras" were a type of flying spot scanner using a mechanical disk.
  • 1936 saw the arrival of RCA's iconoscope camera.
  • 1946 RCA's TK-10 studio camera used a 3" IO – Image Orthicon tube with a 4 lens turret. The RCA TK-30 was widely used as a field camera. A TK-30 is simply a TK-10 with a portable camera control unit.
  • The 1948 Dumont Marconi MK IV was an Image Orthicon camera. Marconi's first camera was shown in 1938. EMI cameras from the UK were used in the US in the early 1960s, like the EMI 203/4. Later in the 60s the EMI 2000 and EMI 2001.
  • In 1950, the arrival of the Vidicon camera tube made smaller cameras possible. 1952 saw the first Walkie-Lookie "portable cameras". Image Orthicon tubes were still used till the arrival of the Plumbicon.
  • The RCA TK-40 is considered to be the first color television camera for broadcasts in 1953. RCA continued its lead in the high-end camera market till the TK-47, last of the high-end tube cameras from RCA.
  • 1954 RCA's TK-11 studio camera used a 3" IO – Image Orthicon tube with a four-lens turret. The RCA TK-31 was widely used as a field camera. A TK-31 is simply a TK-11 with a portable camera control unit. There is some commonality between the TK-11/TK-31 and the earlier TK-10/TK-30.
  • Ikegami introduced the first truly portable hand-held TV camera in 1962.
  • Philips' line of Norelco cameras were also very popular with models such as PC-60, PC-70 and PCP-90. Major American broadcaster CBS was a notable early customer of the PC-60 and PC-70 units. Philips/BTS-Broadcast Television Systems Inc. later came out with an LDK line of cameras, like its last high-end tube camera, the LDK 6. Philips invented the Plumbicon pick up video camera tube in 1965, which gave tube cameras a cleaner picture. BTS introduced its first handHeld Frame transfer CCD- Charge-coupled device-CCD camera the LDK90, in 1987.
  • Bosch Fernseh marketed a line of high-end cameras in the US, ending with the tube camera KCK-40. Image Transform used a specially modified 24-frame KCK-40 for their Image Vision system. This had a 10 MHz bandwidth, almost twice NTSC bandwidth. This was a custom pre HDTV video System. At its peak, this system was used to make "Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl" in 1982. This was the first major high-definition analog wideband videotape-to-film post production using a film recorder for film out.
  • In the 2000s, major manufacturers like Sony and Philips introduced the flash storage based digital television cameras. Since the 2010s, this storage system has become the most widely used.

    Usage types

Most professional cameras utilize an optical prism block directly behind the lens. This prism block separates the image into the three primary colors, red, green, and blue, directing each color into a separate charge-coupled device or Active pixel sensor mounted to the face of each prism. Some high-end consumer cameras also do this, producing a higher-resolution image, with better color fidelity than is normally possible with just a single video pickup.
In both single sensor Bayer filter and triple sensor designs, the weak signal created by the sensors is amplified before being encoded into analog signals for use by the viewfinder and also encoded into digital signals for transmission and recording. The analog outputs were normally in the form of either a composite video signal, which combined the color and luminance information to a single output, or an R-Y B-Y Y component video output through three separate connectors.