MA
A slide scanner, the same one used for captions and programme slides. The ‘next’ slide command was initiated by a tone from the NAB audio cart. One of the first instances of automated playout 😎
https://goo.gl/images/gEi5dU
What kind of machine would have provided the slides?
A slide scanner, the same one used for captions and programme slides. The ‘next’ slide command was initiated by a tone from the NAB audio cart. One of the first instances of automated playout 😎
https://goo.gl/images/gEi5dU
Last edited by Markymark on 25 September 2018 5:43pm
SC
Many of these slide commercials had their soundtrack recorded on continuous loop NAB cartridges. These had two tracks - one for audio, and a cue track using audio tones to tell the cart when it had come back to the beginning, when it would stop and the audio was thus automatically cued to play again from the start. The same track was also used (with different audio tone frequencies) to provide an autimatic cue to change the slide (if the commercial used several slides) and a final tone to denote the end and put (some) machines into fast forward. These machines weren't perfect and there was often a little bleed from tones on the audio track.
Here are two examples of the effect I was referring to - at 03:21 and 03:43 - even audible on a “noisy” VHS recording, so that shows it was often pretty noticeable on air:
Thank you. That seems to mostly explain it.
A related question of sorts - what was the reason for (or function of) a faint partial-second of “tone” at the start of an audio recording? Noticeable again on pre-recorded ads read by a announcer/voiceover over a slide (played from a cart machine, I assume), and sometimes heard at the start of music tracks played by presentation.
A related question of sorts - what was the reason for (or function of) a faint partial-second of “tone” at the start of an audio recording? Noticeable again on pre-recorded ads read by a announcer/voiceover over a slide (played from a cart machine, I assume), and sometimes heard at the start of music tracks played by presentation.
Many of these slide commercials had their soundtrack recorded on continuous loop NAB cartridges. These had two tracks - one for audio, and a cue track using audio tones to tell the cart when it had come back to the beginning, when it would stop and the audio was thus automatically cued to play again from the start. The same track was also used (with different audio tone frequencies) to provide an autimatic cue to change the slide (if the commercial used several slides) and a final tone to denote the end and put (some) machines into fast forward. These machines weren't perfect and there was often a little bleed from tones on the audio track.
Here are two examples of the effect I was referring to - at 03:21 and 03:43 - even audible on a “noisy” VHS recording, so that shows it was often pretty noticeable on air:
MA
Many of these slide commercials had their soundtrack recorded on continuous loop NAB cartridges. These had two tracks - one for audio, and a cue track using audio tones to tell the cart when it had come back to the beginning, when it would stop and the audio was thus automatically cued to play again from the start. The same track was also used (with different audio tone frequencies) to provide an autimatic cue to change the slide (if the commercial used several slides) and a final tone to denote the end and put (some) machines into fast forward. These machines weren't perfect and there was often a little bleed from tones on the audio track.
Here are two examples of the effect I was referring to - at 03:21 and 03:43 - even audible on a “noisy” VHS recording, so that shows it was often pretty noticeable on air:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EH_xTefxxk
Yes, the NAB cart system had three tones. Primary at 1 kHz, to cue up the start, plus Secondary at 150 Hz, and Tertiary at 4 kHz to fire off other devices etc.
In radio triple stack cart machines would have the next cart (usually ad or jingle) fired off by a secondary tone,
and another cart machine possibly by a tertiary tone.
I used to hear them on some ILR stations, but normally the tones were masked by proper alighment of the filters, and of course the jingle etc anyway
Further reading
https://books.google.pt/books?id=XOvf30iChsYC&lpg=SA5-PA53&ots=DduPJR7ZSf&dq=NAB%20SECONDARY%20AND%20TERTIARY%20TONES&pg=SA5-PA53#v=onepage&q=NAB%20SECONDARY%20AND%20TERTIARY%20TONES&f=false
Thank you. That seems to mostly explain it.
A related question of sorts - what was the reason for (or function of) a faint partial-second of “tone” at the start of an audio recording? Noticeable again on pre-recorded ads read by a announcer/voiceover over a slide (played from a cart machine, I assume), and sometimes heard at the start of music tracks played by presentation.
A related question of sorts - what was the reason for (or function of) a faint partial-second of “tone” at the start of an audio recording? Noticeable again on pre-recorded ads read by a announcer/voiceover over a slide (played from a cart machine, I assume), and sometimes heard at the start of music tracks played by presentation.
Many of these slide commercials had their soundtrack recorded on continuous loop NAB cartridges. These had two tracks - one for audio, and a cue track using audio tones to tell the cart when it had come back to the beginning, when it would stop and the audio was thus automatically cued to play again from the start. The same track was also used (with different audio tone frequencies) to provide an autimatic cue to change the slide (if the commercial used several slides) and a final tone to denote the end and put (some) machines into fast forward. These machines weren't perfect and there was often a little bleed from tones on the audio track.
Here are two examples of the effect I was referring to - at 03:21 and 03:43 - even audible on a “noisy” VHS recording, so that shows it was often pretty noticeable on air:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EH_xTefxxk
Yes, the NAB cart system had three tones. Primary at 1 kHz, to cue up the start, plus Secondary at 150 Hz, and Tertiary at 4 kHz to fire off other devices etc.
In radio triple stack cart machines would have the next cart (usually ad or jingle) fired off by a secondary tone,
and another cart machine possibly by a tertiary tone.
I used to hear them on some ILR stations, but normally the tones were masked by proper alighment of the filters, and of course the jingle etc anyway
Further reading
https://books.google.pt/books?id=XOvf30iChsYC&lpg=SA5-PA53&ots=DduPJR7ZSf&dq=NAB%20SECONDARY%20AND%20TERTIARY%20TONES&pg=SA5-PA53#v=onepage&q=NAB%20SECONDARY%20AND%20TERTIARY%20TONES&f=false
SP
There is a story on one of the historical sites that at Radio 1, carts were stopping after a few seconds. It was eventually traced to a fault in the cart machine used to record trails recording a longer tone than the spec allows causing the studio machines to rescue.
TT
ttt
Thank you. That seems to mostly explain it.
A related question of sorts - what was the reason for (or function of) a faint partial-second of “tone” at the start of an audio recording? Noticeable again on pre-recorded ads read by a announcer/voiceover over a slide (played from a cart machine, I assume), and sometimes heard at the start of music tracks played by presentation.
A related question of sorts - what was the reason for (or function of) a faint partial-second of “tone” at the start of an audio recording? Noticeable again on pre-recorded ads read by a announcer/voiceover over a slide (played from a cart machine, I assume), and sometimes heard at the start of music tracks played by presentation.
Many of these slide commercials had their soundtrack recorded on continuous loop NAB cartridges. These had two tracks - one for audio, and a cue track using audio tones to tell the cart when it had come back to the beginning, when it would stop and the audio was thus automatically cued to play again from the start. The same track was also used (with different audio tone frequencies) to provide an autimatic cue to change the slide (if the commercial used several slides) and a final tone to denote the end and put (some) machines into fast forward. These machines weren't perfect and there was often a little bleed from tones on the audio track.
Here are two examples of the effect I was referring to - at 03:21 and 03:43 - even audible on a “noisy” VHS recording, so that shows it was often pretty noticeable on air:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EH_xTefxxk
Tyne Tees of course stopped using carts for this type of advert quite soon after this recording; they moved over to 100% ACR-based ads in 1983. They continued to use the audio carts for local news jingles though until 1989. (TTT's cart VT players were always quite noisy/buzzy audio anyway (noise that dipped out between the ads) but that's a different subject altogether).
A semi-related audio query; Channel 4 in the TTT region was broadcast with a very feint tone (possibly 400Hz) on the audio throughout the 1980s and into the 90s, which only ended when C4 started putting out their own adverts in 1993. Did any other regions have this, and was there a reason for it? YTV's C4 feed lacked this noise.
Last edited by ttt on 27 September 2018 6:26am
MA
A semi-related audio query; Channel 4 in the TTT region was broadcast with a very feint tone (possibly 400Hz) on the audio throughout the 1980s and into the 90s, which only ended when C4 started putting out their own adverts in 1993. Did any other regions have this, and was there a reason for it? YTV's C4 feed lacked this noise.
Good grief. Permanently on the output !? (During ad breaks too ?) The only permanent tones in that era
were transmitter status/anti piracy stuff up at 23 kHz, so totally inaudible (by humans !)
Whatever, I'd have pursued that via the IBA until it had been sorted. Totally unacceptable
A semi-related audio query; Channel 4 in the TTT region was broadcast with a very feint tone (possibly 400Hz) on the audio throughout the 1980s and into the 90s, which only ended when C4 started putting out their own adverts in 1993. Did any other regions have this, and was there a reason for it? YTV's C4 feed lacked this noise.
Good grief. Permanently on the output !? (During ad breaks too ?) The only permanent tones in that era
were transmitter status/anti piracy stuff up at 23 kHz, so totally inaudible (by humans !)
Whatever, I'd have pursued that via the IBA until it had been sorted. Totally unacceptable
SC
Many of these slide commercials had their soundtrack recorded on continuous loop NAB cartridges. These had two tracks - one for audio, and a cue track using audio tones to tell the cart when it had come back to the beginning, when it would stop and the audio was thus automatically cued to play again from the start. The same track was also used (with different audio tone frequencies) to provide an autimatic cue to change the slide (if the commercial used several slides) and a final tone to denote the end and put (some) machines into fast forward. These machines weren't perfect and there was often a little bleed from tones on the audio track.
Here are two examples of the effect I was referring to - at 03:21 and 03:43 - even audible on a “noisy” VHS recording, so that shows it was often pretty noticeable on air:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EH_xTefxxk
Tyne Tees of course stopped using carts for this type of advert quite soon after this recording; they moved over to 100% ACR-based ads in 1983. They continued to use the audio carts for local news jingles though until 1989. (TTT's cart VT players were always quite noisy/buzzy audio anyway (noise that dipped out between the ads) but that's a different subject altogether).
A semi-related audio query; Channel 4 in the TTT region was broadcast with a very feint tone (possibly 400Hz) on the audio throughout the 1980s and into the 90s, which only ended when C4 started putting out their own adverts in 1993. Did any other regions have this, and was there a reason for it? YTV's C4 feed lacked this noise.
I remember that “hum” on Channel 4 in the Tyne Tees area. I had always assumed the cause was our TVs not fine-tuned properly, but it seems not. I mainly noticed it on recordings I made of the testcard and break music. It wasn’t loud or distracting, but was certainly noticeable.
ttt - I know you’re quite knowledgeable about City Road - what format would Tyne Tees have played breakdown/interval music from in the mid 80s? They liked to play Simon Park tracks and The Paper Lads theme regularly - and I noticed these and other tracks all had that audio-tone at the start (though I wouldn’t have expected the music to be on cart?)
Many of these slide commercials had their soundtrack recorded on continuous loop NAB cartridges. These had two tracks - one for audio, and a cue track using audio tones to tell the cart when it had come back to the beginning, when it would stop and the audio was thus automatically cued to play again from the start. The same track was also used (with different audio tone frequencies) to provide an autimatic cue to change the slide (if the commercial used several slides) and a final tone to denote the end and put (some) machines into fast forward. These machines weren't perfect and there was often a little bleed from tones on the audio track.
Here are two examples of the effect I was referring to - at 03:21 and 03:43 - even audible on a “noisy” VHS recording, so that shows it was often pretty noticeable on air:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EH_xTefxxk
Tyne Tees of course stopped using carts for this type of advert quite soon after this recording; they moved over to 100% ACR-based ads in 1983. They continued to use the audio carts for local news jingles though until 1989. (TTT's cart VT players were always quite noisy/buzzy audio anyway (noise that dipped out between the ads) but that's a different subject altogether).
A semi-related audio query; Channel 4 in the TTT region was broadcast with a very feint tone (possibly 400Hz) on the audio throughout the 1980s and into the 90s, which only ended when C4 started putting out their own adverts in 1993. Did any other regions have this, and was there a reason for it? YTV's C4 feed lacked this noise.
I remember that “hum” on Channel 4 in the Tyne Tees area. I had always assumed the cause was our TVs not fine-tuned properly, but it seems not. I mainly noticed it on recordings I made of the testcard and break music. It wasn’t loud or distracting, but was certainly noticeable.
ttt - I know you’re quite knowledgeable about City Road - what format would Tyne Tees have played breakdown/interval music from in the mid 80s? They liked to play Simon Park tracks and The Paper Lads theme regularly - and I noticed these and other tracks all had that audio-tone at the start (though I wouldn’t have expected the music to be on cart?)
TT
ttt
A semi-related audio query; Channel 4 in the TTT region was broadcast with a very feint tone (possibly 400Hz) on the audio throughout the 1980s and into the 90s, which only ended when C4 started putting out their own adverts in 1993. Did any other regions have this, and was there a reason for it? YTV's C4 feed lacked this noise.
Good grief. Permanently on the output !? (During ad breaks too ?) The only permanent tones in that era
were transmitter status/anti piracy stuff up at 23 kHz, so totally inaudible (by humans !)
Whatever, I'd have pursued that via the IBA until it had been sorted. Totally unacceptable
Yes it was permanent. It was there from when the channel opened as well - I noticed it almost immediately but was told I was making it up as a kid(!). I blamed C4 for many years but it must have been either TTT or IBA transmitters responsible. And yes it was present on the ads as well, although there it was drowned out by the tape noise of Tyne Tees's ACR players.
TBH there was quite a lot about TTT's playout that was technically questionable - the noisy VT, mixers that produced both video and audio glitches on transitions, pre-recorded VT on Bilsdale segments that was both noisy and had video dropout etc. It was just the way the company rolled. From what I can make out few people noticed (even the geeks) at the time!
Last edited by ttt on 27 September 2018 11:29am
MA
A semi-related audio query; Channel 4 in the TTT region was broadcast with a very feint tone (possibly 400Hz) on the audio throughout the 1980s and into the 90s, which only ended when C4 started putting out their own adverts in 1993. Did any other regions have this, and was there a reason for it? YTV's C4 feed lacked this noise.
Good grief. Permanently on the output !? (During ad breaks too ?) The only permanent tones in that era
were transmitter status/anti piracy stuff up at 23 kHz, so totally inaudible (by humans !)
Whatever, I'd have pursued that via the IBA until it had been sorted. Totally unacceptable
Yes it was permanent. It was there from when the channel opened as well - I noticed it almost immediately but was told I was making it up as a kid(!). I blamed C4 for many years but it must have been either TTT or IBA transmitters responsible. And yes it was present on the ads as well, although there it was drowned out by the tape noise of Tyne Tees'
Was it on Pontop or Bilsdale ( or both ?)
A semi-related audio query; Channel 4 in the TTT region was broadcast with a very feint tone (possibly 400Hz) on the audio throughout the 1980s and into the 90s, which only ended when C4 started putting out their own adverts in 1993. Did any other regions have this, and was there a reason for it? YTV's C4 feed lacked this noise.
Good grief. Permanently on the output !? (During ad breaks too ?) The only permanent tones in that era
were transmitter status/anti piracy stuff up at 23 kHz, so totally inaudible (by humans !)
Whatever, I'd have pursued that via the IBA until it had been sorted. Totally unacceptable
Yes it was permanent. It was there from when the channel opened as well - I noticed it almost immediately but was told I was making it up as a kid(!). I blamed C4 for many years but it must have been either TTT or IBA transmitters responsible. And yes it was present on the ads as well, although there it was drowned out by the tape noise of Tyne Tees'
Was it on Pontop or Bilsdale ( or both ?)
TT
ttt
Here are two examples of the effect I was referring to - at 03:21 and 03:43 - even audible on a “noisy” VHS recording, so that shows it was often pretty noticeable on air:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EH_xTefxxk
Tyne Tees of course stopped using carts for this type of advert quite soon after this recording; they moved over to 100% ACR-based ads in 1983. They continued to use the audio carts for local news jingles though until 1989. (TTT's cart VT players were always quite noisy/buzzy audio anyway (noise that dipped out between the ads) but that's a different subject altogether).
A semi-related audio query; Channel 4 in the TTT region was broadcast with a very feint tone (possibly 400Hz) on the audio throughout the 1980s and into the 90s, which only ended when C4 started putting out their own adverts in 1993. Did any other regions have this, and was there a reason for it? YTV's C4 feed lacked this noise.
I remember that “hum” on Channel 4 in the Tyne Tees area. I had always assumed the cause was our TVs not fine-tuned properly, but it seems not. I mainly noticed it on recordings I made of the testcard and break music. It wasn’t loud or distracting, but was certainly noticeable.
ttt - I know you’re quite knowledgeable about City Road - what format would Tyne Tees have played breakdown/interval music from in the mid 80s? They liked to play Simon Park tracks and The Paper Lads theme regularly - and I noticed these and other tracks all had that audio-tone at the start (though I wouldn’t have expected the music to be on cart?)
TBH I have no idea ... although cart was a high quality medium (it's just tape at the end of the day) so no reason why it shouldn't have been that.