I recently visited a very small town radio station, that was like walking into a broadcasting time capsule. They didnt have music playout on hard disc. They still were spinning CDs. By far the oddest thing was that the overnight shift (12p-6a) was played out over hifi vhs tape. They play classic country music overnight with no commercials. They have a set of 31 pre-recorded tapes corresponding to each day of the month. I wont name the station as not to disparage them as they are tremendously active in their community. Has anyone else seen the practice of using VHS in studio?
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VHS voice tracking
- Thread starter Fieldtech1
- Start date
I once worked at a station that was look for a logging solution. I recommend to the Chief an idea that I picked up from a fellow that worked for Muzak when Westinghouse owned them. Muzak was using VCRs to record their Foreground format 24 hours a day.
The station I was working for installed a stack of VHS VCRs about bought a bundle of T-160 tapes. They programmed the VCRs so they would overlap and had enough tapes to record for a month. The video portion of the recording was a security camera in the main lobby that had time and date stamp.
The system worked for many years until they installed an Eventide logger.
They had a VCR separate from the recording system that they used to pull live reads for the sales dept.
The system worked so well the PD took the idea with her when she moved to a big time AM in Chicago.
Test123
The station I was working for installed a stack of VHS VCRs about bought a bundle of T-160 tapes. They programmed the VCRs so they would overlap and had enough tapes to record for a month. The video portion of the recording was a security camera in the main lobby that had time and date stamp.
The system worked for many years until they installed an Eventide logger.
They had a VCR separate from the recording system that they used to pull live reads for the sales dept.
The system worked so well the PD took the idea with her when she moved to a big time AM in Chicago.
Test123
When I started in radio full time on the 7p-12mid (really 1AM shift) I would record 7-12 on a VHS HIFI tape. Then I would jock until 1am, cue up the tape, and fire it off at 1 to repeat my show until the morning news guy came in at 5. I could listen to my first hour on the way home, it actually helped me a lot being able to hear everything in context while driving in the car like the rest of the audience.
Now of course, it's a lot easier to put fresh content on the overnights if a station is so inclined.
Now of course, it's a lot easier to put fresh content on the overnights if a station is so inclined.
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ncfradio
Guest
Although not original, I had a station that originated a network morning show. I placed a VCR on a camera and had it focused on a digital time of day clock as well as a count-up timer. Whenever the stop set started in the local studios, the timer would reset to zero via a relay closure from a receiver monitoring our satellite transmission. That way when an affiliate of ours complained we weren't sending stop set start pulses, we could verify everything by watching back the video of the clock, timer as well as listen to the satellite received audio which was also recorded. Sure stopped a lot of arguments! It also helped us troubleshoot relay issues if there was a problem.
I think this is more time shifting than voice tracking.
I've seen similar things done in the past. With today's computer technology and the difficulty of purchasing VHS recorders and tapes, I couldn't imagine why anyone would bother with the tapes.
The entire overnight show could be produced using something like Adobe Audition, saved as a bunch of mp3's and then played back.
And unlike VHS tapes, the mp3's could be produced off-site and emailed to the station for playback within minutes.
Thanks for the memories.
The entire overnight show could be produced using something like Adobe Audition, saved as a bunch of mp3's and then played back.
And unlike VHS tapes, the mp3's could be produced off-site and emailed to the station for playback within minutes.
Thanks for the memories.
As i said, the station I recently visited was pretty much stuck in the past in regards to modern broadcast technology. My understanding is that the owners health has been failing and the station is not doing very well money wise. With all its shortcomings the station still has a strong presence in its served community. It was just odd to see vhs-hifi as a means of playout, as I had never seen it used in as many studios as I have visited. The main reason for the visit was that some friends of mine were looking at possibly making an offer to either buy or lease the station as they already own a pair of stations in an adjacent community.
B
Bob1370
Guest
This brings back a lot of memories...back about 20 years ago some of the pioneer digital recording systems used VHS tape because it had a lot of data capacity and could accommodate hours of audio on a single cassette. They were good for remote recordings of live concerts, and that's what we used them for, taping blues and jazz concert sessions. It was for an AM station but we did it in stereo nonetheless--against the day when we'd be airing stereo as well. Never happened, the station changed to wall-to-wall news and talk 24/7 and we switched, first to compact DAT recorders and finally, 10 years ago, to an all-digital, all-hard drive record/edit system modeled on WABC's with Wheatstone hardware and ENCO software.
I think we still have the old hardware tucked away somewhere along with shelves full of tapes. Probably never air them again, which is too bad--they were good shows...
I think we still have the old hardware tucked away somewhere along with shelves full of tapes. Probably never air them again, which is too bad--they were good shows...
In the early days of PCM Digital Audio, the Sony processors commonly used were used with 3/4" U-Matic tape or Beta tape. VHS wasn't robust in the tracking department back then and unreliable for PCM use. We used the PCM-F1 and BetaMax combo for field recording back in 1980. This was at WATO 1290. Sounded good as a rule though only 14 bit.
I knew of a station who hired a part time announcer and put him on the overnight for couple months, at the same time keeping everything generic and vague, as he was recording the shows on VHS for later airings. as long as the midnight guy started the tape at the right time, it would be fine, even if he was off by a couple minutes, it would be no big deal for an overnight audience.
I also remember a small town AM filling the midnight to 3 am gap sunday morning by dubbing American Top 40 to VHS without commericals (it was a canadian station, so it ran the international version of the show) from the CD's real time.
Problem was, the tapes wear after repeated use. As a general rule, video heads are far more hard on tapes then analog audio heads.
I still use VHS when I record my weekly podcast show, as it's a cheap and dependable way to record and archive the whole session after the DAT's get recorded over and the original wav's gets edited. We also really don't have a reliable, dependable digital medium for archive purposes. I'd rather have to ability to go back to a analog VHS tape to pull off the session then a DVD or CDR which maybe not readable in less then 10 years. I have 20-25 year old VHS tapes that still play, and VHS HIFI is very impressive for quality.
I also remember a small town AM filling the midnight to 3 am gap sunday morning by dubbing American Top 40 to VHS without commericals (it was a canadian station, so it ran the international version of the show) from the CD's real time.
Problem was, the tapes wear after repeated use. As a general rule, video heads are far more hard on tapes then analog audio heads.
I still use VHS when I record my weekly podcast show, as it's a cheap and dependable way to record and archive the whole session after the DAT's get recorded over and the original wav's gets edited. We also really don't have a reliable, dependable digital medium for archive purposes. I'd rather have to ability to go back to a analog VHS tape to pull off the session then a DVD or CDR which maybe not readable in less then 10 years. I have 20-25 year old VHS tapes that still play, and VHS HIFI is very impressive for quality.
I suggested this for my station back in the mid 90s when they had a hard time finding overnight fill-ins when needed. I don't think anyone 'trusted' the format enough to use it.
A friend and I used to run a part 15 back in 1995 on Friday nights. I would record our live show (pre-processing) to the VHS hi-fi deck. When we were finished with our three-hour funfest, we would cycle it back and repeat it. I would also play back one of the tapes if he wasn't around on a Friday. I still have the tapes in my attic, but have not listened to them in years.
My daughter and I still use the same deck to archive our part 15 shows! It is a 1986 vintage Panasonic model AG-1950 (11 years older than she is) with a couple million hours on it, and still records excellent hi-fi audio!
It is still a reliable 'analog' format (won't crash) that provides hours of high-quality audio on very cheap media, so why not? The funny thing is that we use computer automation for our live show on the part 15 now... Still, you can't do a live show and voice track it at the same time.
A friend and I used to run a part 15 back in 1995 on Friday nights. I would record our live show (pre-processing) to the VHS hi-fi deck. When we were finished with our three-hour funfest, we would cycle it back and repeat it. I would also play back one of the tapes if he wasn't around on a Friday. I still have the tapes in my attic, but have not listened to them in years.
My daughter and I still use the same deck to archive our part 15 shows! It is a 1986 vintage Panasonic model AG-1950 (11 years older than she is) with a couple million hours on it, and still records excellent hi-fi audio!
It is still a reliable 'analog' format (won't crash) that provides hours of high-quality audio on very cheap media, so why not? The funny thing is that we use computer automation for our live show on the part 15 now... Still, you can't do a live show and voice track it at the same time.
The public radio station I worked for transitioned from reel to reel to Hi-Fi VHS for recording concerts. They considered a Sony PCM unit and Betamax but decided on Hi-Fi VHS. It was a Toshiba machine with manual level control purchased at Circuit City. A couple of years later they transitioned to DAT as an early adopter of the format.
Years later I worked for a cesspool of a radio station. They were using a hard drive based automation system (1995) and archiving audio on cassette and scrap reels. Since the bottom feeder owner didn't want to pay for any hard drive back up I suggested a Hi-Fi VCR. The operation manager said, "Why do we want to purchase a VCR for audio?". I explained the cost effective audio quality. He again said, "Why do we want to purchase a VCR for audio?" I decided not to discuss this any further. Why yes, the operation manager was an idiot. Why do you ask?
Years later I worked for a cesspool of a radio station. They were using a hard drive based automation system (1995) and archiving audio on cassette and scrap reels. Since the bottom feeder owner didn't want to pay for any hard drive back up I suggested a Hi-Fi VCR. The operation manager said, "Why do we want to purchase a VCR for audio?". I explained the cost effective audio quality. He again said, "Why do we want to purchase a VCR for audio?" I decided not to discuss this any further. Why yes, the operation manager was an idiot. Why do you ask?
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