The Test Card Thread

BTW, if use alone is the chief criterion, then the Philips PM5544, the SMPTE color bars, and the Telefunken FuBK are the most famous test cards, as they were (and still are) used most widely and for the longest period of time.

This thread is (tele)funken ridiculous.

Why?

Here's a really interesting site about test cards / patterns:

http://www.pembers.freeserve.co.uk/Test-Cards/

Wasn't there a BBC2 sting where the test card girl replaced the clown with the 2?

Yes, there was...

Like this ?


http://www.rp-networkservices.com/tvforum/uploads/bbc2_short_tcf.jpg

Ah yeah, that used to freak me out.

Shall we keep all test card discussions in this thread and just keep it as a general discussion thread?

It was discussed in a thread that was closed rather quickley wether you think ITV should bring back the test card.

I think it would be great if ITV did decide to bring back the ETP-1. I never saw an ITA/IBA/ITV Test card. Do they even still use the ETP - 1?

To be fair though test cards are a thing of the past, much like station clocks, IBA slides & regional ITV, and whilst it would be nice to go back to those days TV has moved on a lot since then, although not in a good way neccersarily

Unfortunately test cards are being obsoleted. Back in the day, they were great for the engineers on the site to make sure everything was running perfectly, but with digital they're not needed as it's either on or off, they don't have colour tuning, NICAM processing and such to worry about.

Though TCF/J/W are less about checking technical quality and more about receiver line-up and display alignment - the latter of which is still useful. TCW also has some very useful 4:3 and 14:9 markers.