TELEVISION

Evening Post, Volume CXVII, Issue 103, 3 May 1934, Page 19

TELEVISION

WHAT OF THE FUTURE ?

EXPERT LOOKS AHEAD

What is the actual position as regards television? Many owners of wireless sets must have asked themselves that question, and must have wondered, too, how long it will be before they can, see as well as hear through their sets. One of the greatest authorities in the, world today on wireless is Mr. E. T. Fisk, general manager of Amalgamated Wireless (Australasia), Ltd., and in a special interview recently he said that at the present television was a toy, tut in 10 years time . . .?

A picture of a' futura when. microray apparatus,' Stationed on the top of big city buildings, would bo capable of being revolved in. various directions to summon directly fire brigades and police, and when television would have attained enormous political and social possibilities, was painted by Mr. Fish. He spoke in level, matter of fact tones, yet he conjured up a vision of enormous forces now struggling at birth which some day Voald powerfully affect mankind. The work which he had done in furtherance of television, he said, was not on the spectacular lines of recent -demonstrations in London, and was directed rather at the optical aspect than, the electrical. He had realised that until comparatively recently the electrical aspect of television was being developed on lines thai; could not ultimately" be successful —that was with the scanning mirror and definitions of the' order of 30 or 60 lines to the inch:

"Research work in that direction has [been very costly," he said, "ana in my opinion is not likely to lead to success, j I have therefore confined myself to < following closely what is being done overseas while refraining from spendlirig money in 'the same direction. At | the same time I realised that very little .attention was |being paid to the optical [problem, and what I have done links iij> with the new developments now taking place. ' In my view the greatest thing in television yet developed is the ieonoseope, which reproducea in an electrical apparatus, tho principles of the retina of the—human -eye. • When ■some day that is joined with the mieroray, I think that wireless broadcasting and certain . other things will be alteied be-yond recognition. "But the time for that is noi; yet. Very much the same thing applies to television' that applied to moving pictures. Huge sums were spent' in experiments npon pictures, and there were spectacular, flashes just as you have them in television today.

"Broadcasting .provides another parallel. In 1900, while in New York, I listened- to the first broadcast, but it was not until IS2I that it became really practicable in America, and was not officially established in Australia until 1923. I think television is going to be the most interesting toy for the nest few years, and then it is going to be a>big public seiviee, with many headaches for technicians and. programmer managers. It will do for broadcasting what the v talkies Have done for the cinema. .When the -public really take tfie thing^jpthefy will demand a high grade of entertainment. To produce every ■ day .in the studio a new play of the requisite standard will be enormously costly. Yon may say, 'Why not use films?' but the film companies will obviously require compensation for the effect upon theatre patronage. The 'micro-ray will probably contribute a great deal towards making television practicable. It will also be very useful for telephone services in.many instances in place of lines. 1 think) it will also bo nsed for power control/fire and burglar alarms, and so on. Bnt yon will not see these thing for 10 years, anyway."

Explaining the operation of television. Mi, Fisk said that only one d> mension could be transmitted by wire or Tadio. To transmit a picture two dimensions of length and breadth had to be converted into one. That meant that it had to bo divided into extremely thin strips of dots which, when "transmitted, had to' be assembled so as to produce the picture. ' To transmit sat-' isfactorily a moving picture approximately 1,000,000 dots a second had to be "pumped like peaa through ' a pea shooter," correctly assembled, and jeproduced. The utmost that the ordinary broadcasting wave could • transmit was 10,000 do-ls a second. There \yas no alternative to this'method of transmission, but development was taking place in the r.pparatus to make it possible.