Discussion Apollo 16 footage played on Ampex VR-2000B

[apollo16uvc]

On my request, Zdenek digitized his 2 inch Ampex Quadruplex reel labled Apollo 16.

Thank you very much Zdenek for making this possible.

More might come from an other, much bigger +10inch reel that may contain Apollo 17 footage.

2 inch Ampex Quadruplex reel, labled Apollo 16 being played on restored Ampex VR-2000B. Contains AS 16 Launch, live footage and splashdown.

Raw unedited footage of the tape from 3:01

Source:

Uploads to internet made by me in case YT source goes down:

This video file has been downloaded from YT with 4kvideodownloader set to original resolution, MP4.

As long as the YT link is still up, it is preferred as it naturally has less compression than this download. That is the nature of YT video and lossy codexes, it is out of my hands.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxS3Nsrmk63eMnJpdndualJPNGM/view?usp=sharing
https://archive.org/details/AS16AMPEX1

Discuss!

 

[Artlav]

Where is that footage from?
That is, was it a TV montage, signal recording or something else?
The quality is kinda low for it to be the actual downlinked or returned footage.

 

[Notebook]

Apollo 16 was in April 1972, and the 2" format was active till the 1" format came in in 1976. I started in 1977, and 2" machines were still being used for studio recordings and transmission. So its no surprise to see Apollo material on a 2" tape.

If I saw correctly, there was some info on the box, "Praha"? on one part?
Usual thing, who owns it, and where did it come from?

N.

 

[GLS]

Heads-up: the launch is that of Apollo 15.

 

[Notebook]

Just posted the thread link to a friend of mine who has more experience on VR2000's:

As you say it is a Czech tape, CST is their equivalent of the beeb. The main studio complex is in Prague (Praha), also the "1" of the 16 was written the continental way looks more like our 7. I got a look around 30 odd years back, a family friend was an engineer in VTR. Zdenek is also a very common first name. The VR2000B looked in good condition, and good RF, but I was surprised to see the head amp nuvistors exposed.

N.

 

[4throck]

Interesting but not that useful since you have (at least) 1970's NTSC » PAL conversion.
So there's some degradation of the original images right there.

If you take the original NTSC tapes, you may get interesting results with modern super-resolution algorithms. And proper color space conversion. Early NTSC had a larger color space.

 

[Notebook]

We have discussed this in anther thread I think, if that 2" was made in 1976, its as good a quality as you are likely to get. If its a later copy, then it may be worth going back to the earlier version. Finding all that source material will be very difficult.

As far as I know, the video-head stack for a VR2000 would be practically impossible to source these days. There was only one company in US refurbishing them, and that was in 1994/5.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?biw...y-ab..0.0.0.iE0TR-b1dv8#imgrc=yryXS5kUbBKp8M:

N.

 

[apollo16uvc]

Answers to questions 1

Where is that footage from?
That is, was it a TV montage, signal recording or something else?
The quality is kinda low for it to be the actual downlinked or returned footage.

Apollo 16 was in April 1972, and the 2" format was active till the 1" format came in in 1976. I started in 1977, and 2" machines were still being used for studio recordings and transmission. So its no surprise to see Apollo material on a 2" tape.

If I saw correctly, there was some info on the box, "Praha"? on one part?
Usual thing, who owns it, and where did it come from?

N.

I think it is a TV montage from NASA, given there is a NASA logo in the beginning. It is not an original live tape.

The launch seems to be from Apollo 15 though, weird. But the rest of the scenes look to be from Apollo 16.

Zdenek owns the reel. He digitized and uploaded it to YT on my request.
I do not know where it came from, I have asked Zdenek about that and will get back to you if I get any more information.

Apollo16uvc

 

[Notebook]

No probs, Its none of my business who owns it, or where it came from.
I was referring to the content.

Some folk think that if you get an "archive" copy of some material it will be "better" than existing formats. Not always true.
Broadcast tape formats were meant to be as transparent to the content as possible. The limiting factor will be the picture/sound generating source.
Be it, camera, film, live, the tape was one element of a transmission path.

I think its only because some of the first formats are approaching the end of their practical life, these issues are arising.

Just for info:
This diagram shows a typical studio setup.
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id...nepage&q=code of practice studio path&f=false

CAR is Central Apparatus Room, held the vision-mixer, distribution amplifiers, assignation matrices, any other stuff that didn't belong in VTR or camera set-up area.
As you can see VTR is a self contained area, and has inputs and outputs. Needed as vtr's record and playback, and not just from studio. Could be dubbing from another machine, or transferring film via the Telecine area, or recording from external source.
Note the assignment sytem before the studio mixer. Needed as their are many more sources than inputs on the vision mixer. A studio could have >5 vtr's, >4 telecine machines, three or more cap-gen machines, incoming lines. With 4/5 cameras per studio, you run out of inputs. Generally the first 4/5 inputs were hard wired to cameras, the rest of the inputs could be pre-selected using the assignment matrix.

A brief history of telly-studios 1978 and frozen to death(analogue PAL).
N.

Sorry, someone found this, its not my fault...

https://tvforum.uk/tvhome/scenes-magpie-38894/

Do take the blame for this though...

 

[apollo16uvc]

Zdenek Houska: "
The record comes from my uncle who worked in Czech TV as editor. He is a great apollo enthusiast. "

Source: YT video comment section.