RCA TK-42/43 Cameras

[TVBeeGee]

I actually have one module from a TK-42. It's packed away currently, but I got it to have an example of that style of modular construction. Those RCA modules looked a little clunky, but they were quick and easy to work on.

[Tim Tress]

The newscaster in the KDKA-TV picture is Bill Burns; he was a "fixture" at the station for years, and was later joined on screen by his daughter Patti.

[TVBeeGee]

I thought that was Bill Burns myself initially, but I have a higher resolution version of the photo and one can see in that version that the newscaster doesn't look much like Burns. The date of the photo is 1967 and the color of the guy's hair is pretty light. Did Burns have grey hair in 1967? Maybe, but somewhat doubtful...and the face doesn't look like him in the higher resolution version. Maybe it is indeed him and they just caught him with a weird expression on his face, but I think it might be more likely that it was maybe one of the weekend guys.

[TVBeeGee]

Here's a blow-up of the newscaster.

[Telecolor 3007]

But what that's a film-chian camera? It takes electronic images and puts them onto a film?

[ARC Tech-109]

Opposite this. Camera and film projectors on a common screen and a sync'd shutter to match the TV field rates 24fps-->30fps NTSC (oversimplified)

[Telecolor 3007]

So a kind of telecine.

[ARC Tech-109]

Quite similar however the chain can also do slides for stills. I ran one years ago in Jr high school to transfer the 16mm's to 3/4 Umatic, don't recall the make but it was an over/under reel arrangement for the film. They used the 3/4" tapes to dup over to a fleet of open-reel EIAJ Panasonic NV-3120's... our school had I think 2 color RCA Lyceum metal cabinet sets on the big roll around carts and one RCA (Panasonic) top load VHS, yes we were high-tech in 1982. One of the Lyceum sets was used with the chain as it had a provision to do color correction by sliding colored gels before the light source.

[nasadowsk]

NYC projection tax? Good lord, is there *anything* NYC doesn't have a stupid tax on?

(IIRC, didn't projectionists have to be licensed by the city at one time? Did that ever go away? Maybe after Nitrate film was no longer a thing?)

[KentTeffeteller]

Originally Posted by nasadowsk

NYC projection tax? Good lord, is there *anything* NYC doesn't have a stupid tax on?

(IIRC, didn't projectionists have to be licensed by the city at one time? Did that ever go away? Maybe after Nitrate film was no longer a thing?)

Yes, projectionists had a City license in New York. And it was a very heavily IATSE unionized city.

[Mark N]

My first job after college was as a "technician" at WFMJ-TV, where the two studio cameras were both '42s (with a pair of '27s in the film & tape room, with two TR-70s). I was too low on the totem pole to be allowed to adjust anything, but those '42s seemed quite reliable and stable. The Chief tweaked things a couple times a week if he saw anything "out."

Once, something failed in one camera during an afternoon commercial taping, so the evening news aired on the remaining camera alone. The experienced techs and camera operators (same people) did a smooth job of transitioning between news, sports and weather, though viewers were treated to a rare wide angle whole-set view a couple times. There were no complaints that we heard of.

When I worked for RCA Broadcast in the camera group, we learned of "pot drift" - the tendency of some people to never let a camera control be left unadjusted. There was one manager who so frustrated the engineers by trying to "improve" a camera's setup that they disconnected the front panel pots on some modules and mounted the working controls inside!