Videos

Video is the technology of electronically capturing, recording, processing, storing, transmitting, and reconstructing a sequence of still imagesrepresenting scenes in motion.

Video technology was first developed for cathode ray tube (CRT) television systems, but several new technologies for video display deviceshave since been invented. Charles Ginsburg led an Ampex research team developing the first practical video tape recorder (VTR). In 1951 the first video tape recorder captured live images from television cameras by converting the camera's electrical impulses and saving the information onto magnetic video tape. This tape was sold for around $50,000 in 1956. Sony began selling videocassette recorder (VCR) tapes to the public in 1971. Later advances in computer technology have allowed computers to capture, store, edit and transmit video clips. After the invention of the DVD in 1997 and Blu-ray Disc in 2006, sales of video tape and tape equipment plummeted.

The term video ("video" meaning "I see", from the Latin verb "videre") commonly refers to several storage formats for moving pictures: digital video formats, includingBlu-ray Disc, DVD, QuickTime (QT), and MPEG-4; and analog videotapes, includingVHS and Betamax. Video can be recorded and transmitted in various physical media: in magnetic tape when recorded as PAL or NTSC electric signals by video cameras, or in MPEG-4 or DV digital media when recorded by digital cameras.Quality of video essentially depends on the capturing method and storage used.Digital television (DTV) is a relatively recent format with higher quality than earlier television formats and has become a standard for television video. (See List of digital television deployments by country.)

3D-video, digital video in three dimensions, premiered at the end of 20th century. Six or eight cameras with realtime depth measurement are typically used to capture 3D-video streams. The format of 3D-video is fixed in MPEG-4 Part 16 Animation Framework eXtension (AFX).

In many countries, the term video is often used informally to refer to bothVideocassette recorders and video cassettes; the meaning is normally clear from the context.

Number of frames per second

Frame rate, the number of still pictures per unit of time of video, ranges from six or eight frames per second (frame/s) for old mechanical cameras to 120 or more frames per second for new professional cameras. PAL (Europe, Asia, Australia, etc.) and SECAM (France, Russia, parts of Africa etc.) standards specify 25 frame/s, while NTSC (USA, Canada, Japan, etc.) specifies 29.97 frame/s. Film is shot at the slower frame rate of 24photograms/s, which complicates slightly the process of transferring a cinematic motion picture to video. The minimum frame rate to achieve the illusion of a moving image is about fifteen frames per second.

Interlacing

Video can be interlaced or progressive. Interlacing was invented as a way to reduce flicker in early mechanical and CRT video displays without increasing the number of complete frames per second, which would have required sacrificing image detail in order to remain within the limitations of a narrow bandwidth. The horizontal scan lines of each complete frame are treated as if numbered consecutively and captured as two fields: an odd field (upper field) consisting of the odd-numbered lines and an even field (lower field) consisting of the even-numbered lines.

Analog display devices reproduce each frame in the same way, effectively doubling the frame rate as far as perceptible overall flicker is concerned. When the image capture device acquires the fields one at a time, rather than dividing up a complete frame after it is captured, the frame rate for motion is effectively doubled as well, resulting in smoother, more life-like reproduction (although with halved detail) of rapidly moving parts of the image when viewed on an interlaced CRT display, but the display of such a signal on a progressive scan device is problematic.

NTSC, PAL and SECAM are interlaced formats. Abbreviated video resolution specifications often include an i to indicate interlacing. For example, PAL video format is often specified as 576i50, where 576 indicates the total number of horizontal scan lines, i indicates interlacing, and 50 indicates 50 fields (half-frames) per second.

In progressive scan systems, each refresh period updates all of the scan lines of each frame in sequence. When displaying a natively progressive broadcast or recorded signal, the result is optimum spatial resolution of both the stationary and moving parts of the image. When displaying a natively interlaced signal, however, overall spatial resolution will be degraded by simple line doubling and artifacts such as flickering or "comb" effects in moving parts of the image will be seen unless special signal processing is applied to eliminate them. A procedure known as deinterlacing can be used to optimize the display of an interlaced video signal from an analog, DVD or satellite source on a progressive scan device such as an LCD Television, digital video projector or plasma panel. Deinterlacing cannot, however, produce video quality that is equivalent to true progressive scan source material.

Display resolution

Main article: Display resolution

The size of a video image is measured in pixels for digital video, or horizontal scan lines and vertical lines of resolution for analog video. In the digital domain (e.g. DVD) standard-definition television (SDTV) is specified as 720/704/640×480i60 for NTSC and 768/720×576i50 for PAL or SECAM resolution. However in the analog domain, the number of visible scanlines remains constant (486 NTSC/576 PAL) while the horizontal measurement varies with the quality of the signal: approximately 320 pixels per scanline for VCR quality, 400 pixels for TV broadcasts, and 720 pixels for DVD sources. Aspect ratio is preserved because of non-square "pixels".

New high-definition televisions (HDTV) are capable of resolutions up to 1920×1080p60, i.e. 1920 pixels per scan line by 1080 scan lines, progressive, at 60 frames per second.

Video resolution for 3D-video is measured in voxels (volume picture element, representing a value in three dimensional space). For example 512×512×512 voxels resolution, now used for simple 3D-video, can be displayed even on some PDAs.