The video format war that Beta has won

📼 Beta had lost the format war... or had it not? Betamax lost to VHS, but its professional-grade offspring, Betacam, won over the professional variants of VHS. Follow the rivalry of Betacam vs M-Format and of their updated versions, Betacam SP vs MII.
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Broadcast Engineering and Broadcast Management/Engineering magazines served the main source for this video. Video samples from the BBC, KPIX, Sony, CBS, NBC are used. I want to particularly mention Sony BVW 400 review by ‪@drdma1‬ and Betacam SP footage uploaded by ‪@ReelyInteresting‬.
#beta #betamax #betacam #mii #sony #panasonic

[@EDOmontreal]

Excellent research on the topic. Well done.

[@VCDPlus]

Totally agree.

[@HDCAMAN]

Great video

[@JoeUrbanYYC]

Thanks for this, really interesting history.

[@m80116]

Fellow repairman @12voltvids could have a thing or two to add.
I don't have any competence on the topic but I've been fascinated by Betacam since I've seen what luma resolution could achieve back in the 80s.

[@ConsumerDV]

I hugely respect Dave both for his videographer and editor credentials as well as for his knowledge and skill as a technician.
I think you mean chroma resolution, because luma is not so great for Betacam, about 300-350 LWPH, SVHS and Hi8 are better. Chroma, on another hand, is night and day: about 30 LWPH for all color-under formats, and 120 LWPH for Betacam and M/MII. Also, much better S/N and resilience to multiple generations. Betacam and M were the first truly editable and composable formats.

[@m80116]

@@ConsumerDV To be honest I did really mean luma not chroma, I might have got it wrong.
I watched one of his video and he was talking about bandwidth and how they manage to squeeze additional (?) lines of resolution.
But anyways I was quite impressed by his restored Betacam, the color picture looked so sharp compared to say a VHS.
Perhaps one day I might get into the sport and document myself a bit better.

[@ConsumerDV]

3/4-inch format (Umatic), as well as Betamax, SuperBeta, ED Beta, VHS, SVHS, Video8, Hi8 - they all are so-called color-under formats. Some of them, like Umatic SP, SVHS, Hi8, ED Beta, have wider bandwidth for luminance portion of the signal, hence higher horizontal resolution. But chrominance resolution is about the same for all of these formats including professional Umatic; it is very low, which is why color-under video has blurry smudgy colors. Dave (12voltvids) is of very low opinion of all these formats.
Betacam / Betacam SP as well as M / MII are Component Analog Video formats (CAV). I probably should have spent more time in the video describing how they are different and much better than color-under formats. The original Betacam used the same cassette and tape as Betamax and pretty much the same mechanism, but the recording method was completely different. SP and MII moved even further with metal tape.
In my other reply I posted the link to the Reely Interesting video off Betacam SP tape. Despite that it has lots of reds (red has been traditionally the most problematic for color-under formats), the picture looks sharp and clean, and the color is not blurry. Reely Interesting also has a video from a regular Betacam, it still looks very respectable. It is obvious why Sony did not port Betacam to consumer market: you get only 20 minutes of recording off an L500 cassette, which is otherwise good for 2 hours of Beta II. Even the large cassette fits only 90 minutes, so for a Hollywood movie you would need two of them :)

[@m80116]

@@ConsumerDV Very interesting points. I noted the other video, not so much for the Betacam SP but I find it somewhat historically relevant to watch that interview now.
Who's watching 35yo interviews... besides Sandra is surely watchable topic, I believe she embodies the 80s look.

[@Lfe-l8n]

13:58, Sandra ??

[@ConsumerDV]

Yes. The complete unedited video is here: ruclips.net/video/Hh7llPlAqKE/видео.html

[@Lfe-l8n]

@@ConsumerDV Thanks 😇

[@m80116]

Yup