Video is an electronic medium used for the recording, copying, playback, transmission, and display of moving visual images and pictures, with or without accompanying audio. Video technology was initially developed for live transmission and later expanded to include recording and storage through analog formats such as magnetic tape. Since the late 20th century, digital video has become the dominant form, enabling efficient compression, storage, editing, and distribution across broadcast television, physical media, and internet-based platforms. Advances in digital imaging, compression standards, and network infrastructure have significantly influenced media production, communication, entertainment, education, and information dissemination worldwide. Video systems vary in display resolution, aspect ratio, refresh rate, color reproduction, and other qualities. Both analog and digital video can be carried on a variety of media, including radio, magnetic tape, optical discs, computer files, and network streaming.
Etymology The word video comes from the Latin video, "I see," the first-person singular present indicative of videre, "to see".
History
Analog video
Video developed from facsimile systems developed in the mid-19th century. Mechanical video scanners, such as the Nipkow disk, were patented as early as 1884, but it took several decades before practical video systems could be developed. Whereas the medium of film records using a sequence of miniature photographic images visible to the naked eye, video encodes images electronically, turning them into analog or digital electronic signals for transmission and recording. Video was originally exclusively live technology, and was first developed for mechanical television systems. These were quickly replaced by cathode-ray tube (CRT) television systems. Live video cameras used an electron beam, which would scan a photoconductive plate with the desired image and produce a voltage signal proportional to the brightness in each part of the image. The signal could then be sent to televisions, where another beam would receive and display the image. Charles Ginsburg led an Ampex research team to develop one of the first practical video tape recorders (VTR). In 1951, the first of these captured live images from television cameras by writing the camera's electrical signal onto magnetic videotape. VTRs sold for around US$50,000 in 1956, and videotapes cost US$300 per one-hour reel. However, prices gradually dropped over the years, and in 1971, Sony began selling videocassette recorder (VCR) decks and tapes into the consumer market.
Digital video
Digital video is capable of higher quality and, eventually, a much lower cost than its analog predecessor. After the commercial introduction of the DVD, in 1997, and later the Blu-ray Disc, in 2006, sales of videotape and recording equipment fell. Advances in computer technology allow even inexpensive personal computers and smartphones to capture, store, edit, and transmit digital video, further reducing the cost of video production and allowing programmers and broadcasters to move to tapeless production. The advent of digital broadcasting and the subsequent digital television transition are in the process of relegating analog video to the status of a legacy technology in most parts of the world. The development of high-resolution video cameras with improved dynamic range and broader color gamuts, along with the introduction of high-dynamic-range digital intermediate data formats with improved color depth, has caused digital video technology to converge with film technology. Since 2013, the use of digital cameras in Hollywood has surpassed the use of film cameras.
Characteristics
Frame rate Frame rate—the number of still pictures per unit of time—ranges from six or eight frames per second (frame/s or fps) for older mechanical cameras to 120 or more for new professional cameras. The PAL and SECAM standards specify 25 fps, while NTSC specifies 29.97 fps. Film is shot at a slower frame rate of 24 frames per second, which slightly complicates the process of transferring film to video. The minimum frame rate to achieve persistence of vision (the illusion of a moving image) is about 16 frames per second.
Interlacing vs. progressive-scan systems Video can be interlaced or progressive. In progressive scan systems, each refresh period updates all scan lines in each frame, in sequence. When displaying a natively progressive broadcast or recorded signal, the result is the optimum spatial resolution of both the stationary and moving parts of the image. 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. Interlacing retains detail while requiring lower bandwidth compared to progressive scanning. In interlaced video, 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, 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 lifelike reproduction of rapidly moving parts of the image when viewed on an interlaced CRT display. NTSC, PAL, and SECAM are interlaced formats. In video resolution notation, 'i' denotes interlaced scanning. For example, PAL video format is often described as 576i50, where 576 indicates the total number of horizontal scan lines, i indicates interlacing, and 50 indicates 50 fields (half-frames) per second. When displaying a natively interlaced signal on a progressive scan device, the overall spatial resolution is degraded by simple line doubling—artifacts, such as flickering or comb effects in moving parts of the image, appear unless special signal processing eliminates them. A procedure known as deinterlacing can 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.
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