John Logie Baird, Britain's foremost television pioneer, experimented
with video recording onto gramophone discs in the late 1920s. Though
unsuccessful at the time, his experiments resulted in several
videodiscs, some 25 years before the videotape recorder became
practical. These videodiscs - called Phonovision - remained neglected
over the decades, considered by experts as unplayable.
In the early 1980s, the author sought out and restored the surviving
Phonovision discs. Using computer-based techniques in an investigation
reminiscent of an archaeological dig, the author has not only revealed
the images on the discs but also uncovered details of how the recordings
were made. The Phonovision discs have now become recognised as one of
Baird's most important legacies.
In 1996 and 1998, amateur 'off-air' recordings of the BBC's 30-line
Television Service (1932-35) were found, giving us our first view of
what viewers were then watching. The author's restoration overturns
established views on mechanically scanned television, providing us today
with a true measure of Britain's heritage of television programme-making
before electronic television.
As well as helping to explain a poorly understood and complex period in
television's history, this unique book, heavily illustrated with
previously unpublished or rarely-seen historic photographs restored by
the author, sheds light on the achievements of Baird, the development of
video recording and the definition and invention of television itself.
