The early days of home video

[mleach]

There is an old commercial on You Tube from the mid 60s for TV Guide whose main feature that week was about home video. More less it was how this new thing was the new way to make home movies. Interesting nothing in the ad mentioned about how one can tape shows off the air for playback later. Had me wondering, did those early home VTR's even offer this function? If not, when did they?

I remember reading awhile back that as early as 1968 both Elvis Presley and Carol Burnett were using their home VTRs to tape off the air. In Elvis' case it was to tape football games during the day so he could watch them at night since Elvis was a "night person".

Another thing I have heard was that many celebrities at first didn't like the idea of home video. A friend of mine once told me he remembered hearing that Paul Newman, Lucille Ball even the great Ed Sullivan all at one time or another made some comments about how they were against the idea of viewers at home making their own video tapes.

 

[bhayes1016]

There is an old commercial on You Tube from the mid 60s for TV Guide whose main feature that week was about home video. More less it was how this new thing was the new way to make home movies. Interesting nothing in the ad mentioned about how one can tape shows off the air for playback later. Had me wondering, did those early home VTR's even offer this function? If not, when did they?

I remember reading awhile back that as early as 1968 both Elvis Presley and Carol Burnett were using their home VTRs to tape off the air. In Elvis' case it was to tape football games during the day so he could watch them at night since Elvis was a "night person".

Another thing I have heard was that many celebrities at first didn't like the idea of home video. A friend of mine once told me he remembered hearing that Paul Newman, Lucille Ball even the great Ed Sullivan all at one time or another made some comments about how they were against the idea of viewers at home making their own video tapes.

Bob Crane was also (rather infamously) an early home video afficianado..

 

[stevezodiac]

Yes, I remember seeing some BIG Sony reel to reel VTR's in some local Dallas department stores. I'd stand there and drool on them for hours at a time. They came with a little B&W camera, recorded in B&W, and the tapes lasted about 60 minutes.
Here's a link I found with more info: http://www.retrothing.com/2005/11/the_sony_cv2000.html

 

[KML0224]

Holy crap! That old Sony info was a GOOD read!

 

[bk77]

[Bob Crane was also (rather infamously) an early home video afficianado..

Actually John Carpenter who sold Bob Crane to the idea of home video also sold Elvis his VTR outfit too.

Didn't Disney at one time try to stop the production of VCRs? I seem to recall that.

 

[LKellerIII]

I operated a video rental store in the early and mid 1980s. I don't know if Disney tried to stop the manufacture of VCRs. It sounds like something they would do. But they did try to stop the rental of their movies - they wanted to SELL them exclusively, aand didn't like the idea of rental stores making money they could not get a percentage of. So they designated select video stores in most towns as "official" Disney stores. Our store was not one of the select few. Of course, there was no law preventing the rental of any movie - anymore than a tool manufacturer can prevent rentals of their tools, or a book publisher can prevent secondary (used) book sales. So all we had to do was go BUY the Disney movies for the retail price at the "official" Disney store, then rent them.

Broadcast TV was NOT happy about VCRs, and the potential for people to time-shift their viewing, and skip commercials. But there was really nothing they could do to stop it. In the early 80s, the Bay Area cable companies (mostly Viacom then) refused to hook-up VCRs to their service. If they came to your house for a service call, they would even disconnect your VCR. It was up to the customer to re-connect it once the service person had left.

 

[KeithE4]

Yes, I remember seeing some BIG Sony reel to reel VTR's in some local Dallas department stores. I'd stand there and drool on them for hours at a time. They came with a little B&W camera, recorded in B&W, and the tapes lasted about 60 minutes.
Here's a link I found with more info: http://www.retrothing.com/2005/11/the_sony_cv2000.html

Those were popular in schools back in the '60s. Sony had a color unit in the early '70s but I'll guess it was discontinued when Betamax came out.

But how could the "average Joe or Jane" record their own programs? I don't remember these VTRs having a built-in tuner unless it was an extra-cost option. The ones that we had when I was in school didn't have tuners, IIRC.

 

[anotherguyTN]

Disney was involved in the Betamax case attempting to block home video recording, but the Supreme Court eventually ruled that it was legal. Here's a link to an article on the case: http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/B/htmlB/betamaxcase/betamaxcase.htm

If the Supreme Court had ruled the other direction, I doubt if the home video industry would be where it is today. (Most movies on pay per view rather than being able to buy your own copy?)

The first VCR I saw was in my high school in 1975, and was probalby a Beta. It had a tuner, because the time I saw it they were taping a show from TV.

 

[Braves2005]

When VCR's first came out into wide view in the late 70's and early 80's, they were selling for about $800 to $1200 depending on which one was the best. The blank tapes were $10 to $15 EACH!!! Anyone remember the VCR's where you put in the cassettes like you would in a cassette recorder? Anyways, I wished that the VCR's would come down so we could get one and finally in 1988 we did and VCR's cost about $200 to $400 then and the blank tapes were $2.50 to $4.00 depending on what type of tape you were using.

 

[mleach]

Disney was involved in the Betamax case attempting to block home video recording, but the Supreme Court eventually ruled that it was legal. Here's a link to an article on the case: http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/B/htmlB/betamaxcase/betamaxcase.htm

If the Supreme Court had ruled the other direction, I doubt if the home video industry would be where it is today. (Most movies on pay per view rather than being able to buy your own copy?)

It seems that whenever something new comes along in the home entertainment front someone has a beef about it. It was when I was in college when CDs started to replace records and cassettes and even they had their foes. I believe it was Elton John who said back then that people should NOT buy CDs featuring his old stuff such as Tiny Dancer, Bennie & The Jets, Your Song, Elderberry Wine and so forth because they sounded better on LPs. I assume his record company wasn't happy with what he said.

One does have to wonder what would have happened if the Supreme Court went the other way. I agree that home video as we know it today would be different but at the same time I can't see the local police actually arresting those who had a VCR either.

 

[mjlarochelle]

When VCR's first came out into wide view in the late 70's and early 80's, they were selling for about $800 to $1200 depending on which one was the best. The blank tapes were $10 to $15 EACH!!! Anyone remember the VCR's where you put in the cassettes like you would in a cassette recorder? Anyways, I wished that the VCR's would come down so we could get one and finally in 1988 we did and VCR's cost about $200 to $400 then and the blank tapes were $2.50 to $4.00 depending on what type of tape you were using.

We still had a VCR that loaded like that in 2004...we'd had it since 1985. Still got some tapes from 1985 too, with some classic CHCH 11 "Event Television" and news.