NAEB Newsletter (Aug 1957)

At this time I wish to welcome two new member stations to the network: WFUV, Fordham University, New York City, and WPSR, School City of Evans¬ ville, Ind. The contact persons at these stations are the Rev. John A. St. George, S. J., and Dr. Claude B. Smith, respectively. During the summer “slack” season the network production staff has had an opportunity to examine and patch up (or discard when necessary) quite a few of our old tapes. The tape returns this summer have been plentiful, and we wish to thank all concerned. Frankly, it appears that the strict tape return policy is paying off in better tapes for use over your stations. However, some poor tapes are still in circulation, but with your assistance I think we can catch and retire them. NAEB “UNUSABLE” stickers are available. If your engineer finds a poor NAEB tape, have him mark it accordingly before returning it to us. The tape in question will be inspected carefully when it arrives here. Thanks for your help. MOVE TO ELIMINATE EXCISE TAX ON UHF SETS Senator Warren G. Magnuson (D-Wash) of the Com¬ mittee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, has come out in support of a proposal to eliminate the Federal excise tax from ultra-high frequency re¬ ceivers. While addressing his colleagues on July 17, he stated that the findings of his Committee indicate that one of the chief causes of UHF’s problem is the fact that only 7 million of the 40 million TV sets in use are capable of UHF reception. To overcome this disparity, Magnuson said, the Committee has strongly recommended the elimination of the Federal excise tax in anticipation that this would lead to the general production of such sets. The Senator also referred to an article by Jack Gould in the New York Times July 14 issue which, he said, forcibly demonstrates the importance of develop¬ ing UHF-TV channels and the facilitating effect the removal of the tax will have on this development. —N A E B— An experimental 13-week music appreciation course for credit is presently offered by the University of South Carolina’s Extension Division over WIS-TV, Columbia, S. C. The course is conducted by Edwin F. Jones, USC music professor and former concert master of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. —NAEB— To meet the increasing demand for higher education in TV, two West Coast schools, the University of California in Los Angeles, and the University of Southern California, will add TV major programs to their curricula starting next fall. TV TECHNICAL TIPS —Cecil S. Bidlack A timely letter from Glen Southworth, staff engineer, at KWSC, Pullman, Washington, arrived to give us a lead’ item for this column. He writes of three recent TV developments for KWSC. These have proved useful in practice, and he is preparing articles des¬ cribing them to be submitted to technical publica¬ tions. He has given advance information with per¬ mission to use it in the Newsletter. Perhaps the most interesting of these devices is an electronic pointer or framing device which can be used to locate significant material in slides, film clips or pick-ups. The pointer circuitry generates the white outline of a rectangle of any size and dimensional re¬ lationships, which may be located at any place on the raster. In addition, any or all the sides of the rec¬ tangle may be removed. If desired, the vertical sides may be “flexed” to attract attention; or a solid rect¬ angle may be derived from the equipment which can be used to key a montage amplifier or for other special effects. (See photo). A second device has been derived from the elec¬ tronic pointer circuitry. This two-tube circuit per¬ mits reproduction of oscilloscope traces over the TV system without need for any auxiliary equipment other than the signal source. The technique used is essentially limited to a 60 cps sweep rate, and re¬ verses the X and Y scope axes on the TV screen. Mr. Southworth thinks it should prove a very useful device in some applications. For instance, it is pos¬ sible to convert a normal TV set into an oscilloscope through the use of this technique. By the use of an¬ other tube in the circuit, it is possible to display two traces simultaneously. In fact, he believes it is pos¬ sible to display N traces by adding one tube per trace. It is a very simple matter to super these traces 4 NEWSLETTER