Comments

Jay Gladwell wrote on 5/6/2004, 6:52 PM
It's a "professional/broadcast" video tape format deveoped by Sony. First came, Betacam, then there was Beta SP, and after that Digital Beta.

J--
kentwolf wrote on 5/6/2004, 6:56 PM
Thanks!
kevgl wrote on 5/6/2004, 6:58 PM
For a bit more detail:

It was based on the old Betamax format, even has the same tape path, but uses higher quality tape running at 6 times the speed of Betamax to give a highband signal output (along with a lot of other extras as well).

Betacam was still pretty prone to dropouts and it wasn't till Betacam SP came along that good quality pics could be maintained over a few generations (nothing as good as today's stuff though). It's been around for quite a while (must be around 20 years now)and is still pretty popular. I've got two of 'em sitting here along with DVCPro.

Cheers
stormstereo wrote on 5/6/2004, 10:41 PM
VideoCurmudgeon - you forgot one, Beta SX. :)

Best/Tommy
mark2929 wrote on 5/7/2004, 1:51 AM
Just Curious What would Give better Picture/Sound Quality Betacam SP Or DV !
Jay Gladwell wrote on 5/7/2004, 4:36 AM
I've had tv engineers tell me that DV is at least as good as Beta SP.

J--
mark2929 wrote on 5/7/2004, 5:32 AM
That'l Do for me... TV Engineers would Know :)
stormstereo wrote on 5/7/2004, 5:37 AM
I agree, DV is widely used in television today, especially for news gathering. They either use DV, DVCam or DVCPro. All of which are usually referred to as the DV 25 format. The different manufacturers also make DV 50 cameras, the double bitrate, which is said to be close to Digital Beta.
Best/Tommy
TheHappyFriar wrote on 5/7/2004, 5:38 AM
Only difference is that DVCam/DVCPro record/playback VCR's cost as much as Betacam SP playback only decks (and they're no longer made!).
alfredsvideo wrote on 5/7/2004, 1:54 PM
What I'd like to know is: What do the letters B-E-T-A actually stand for. sorry to be so dumb.
farss wrote on 5/7/2004, 4:05 PM
It probably originated in Japan so I'd imagine it's quite cryptic!
As to the question of is DV25 as good as SP. That's a mighty difficult call. DV25 is better in that there's no generational loss. However SP certainly looks much nicer than DV25. It's helped no end by being shot on MUCH better cameras, LARGE CCDs and BIG lenses. Having said that though its a pain in the rear. I don't think any of the SP cameras would even playback the tapes in color and they didn't have TBCs or dropout compensation. To play the tapes you had to have a VCR and even today they're rather expensive and heavy.
Technically Betacam SP meets broadcast spec, DV25 does not. Thats not to say there isn't a lot of DV25 going to air, its just the official position of such august bodies as the EBU.
riredale wrote on 5/7/2004, 11:21 PM
Time to trot out the Adam Wilt website again. Great site for all things DV, and he has a ranking list that shows DV and BetaSP to be very similar, with DV on top. But as others have said, it isn't just the recording format--it's the lens, CCD, etc.

As for the selection of the name Betamax, I have no idea. Perhaps the technology chosen in the Sony lab to be commercialized was the second project they had done in this area, hence the name "Beta."
alfredsvideo wrote on 5/8/2004, 3:04 PM
The reason I asked what do the letters B-E-T-A stand for is because my son applied for a job as a cameraman and was asked this question, along with
what do the letters V-H-S stand for. He answered the latter, but failed the entrance exam on the B-E-T-A question. As the acronym has been around for just about as long as Video itself, I would have thought that the answer was fairly common knowledge in the industry. The elusive answer has been annoying me for years!!
John_Cline wrote on 5/8/2004, 3:46 PM
Alfred,

You may be able to find the answer to your question at this BetaMax web site.

Beta Info Guide

John

(BTW, BetaMax WAS the technically superior consumer tape format. I still have five BetaMax machines, including two SLHF-1000's and an EDV-9500 from 1988, which offered true insert video editing using flying erase heads and is capable of 500 lines of horizontal resolution, about the same as DV.)
vicmilt wrote on 5/9/2004, 4:42 PM
Just a little more about BetaSP from an end users perspective.

1. Until BetaSP, videotape was basically a composite analog affair.
We (those of us who were making a living in video) basically were depending on 1" videotape "C" format. This involved a technical engineer who would spend a half hour every morning (on the clock, BTW) to "setup" the C machines. These machines ran about $65,000 each, and you needed a minimum of two playback decks and one record deck to do simple dissolves.

2. Then in the mid to late 80's Sony dropped the BetaSP deck on us, and things began to change... rapidly. First you had a video cassette as opposed to a huge reel of 1" tape. Next the signal it put out was "component" - that is, split into three signals which tended to preserve quality. And third, and most important, the technology was so solid, you no longer needed an engineer to setup your decks. In 1989 I took a (huge) deep breath, borrowed about $200,000 and bought an "on-line" broadcast quality BetaSP setup - three sony deck controlled by an Abacas switcher/editor/effects unit. It paid for itself the first year.

I used that setup until AVID brought out their first on-line media composer. (Only $120,000 including drives, real-time Genie and other junk.) I used that until 2001 when I switched to Vegas 3 (total cost including computer - under $2,000). Still here in Sony Vegas land, and loving it.
kevgl wrote on 5/10/2004, 5:24 PM
I had a quick look at John's Beta link but there were too many links, so in case none of them answer the "what does Beta stand for", it's not B.E.T.A., it is because the tape path around the heads looks like the Greek letter Beta when viewed from above.

Cheers
pb wrote on 5/10/2004, 9:45 PM
Obsolete, mate. Sony is down to offering one Industrial dockable, the PVV3 (inferior to the venerable BVV-5), one Industrial Editor, the PVW 2800 and *I think* they may still manufacture a couple of the Prosumer UVW series, maybe the 1600 and the 1800. The BVV-5 I bought for 30,000 CAD in about 1999 might be worth maybe 7500$ CAD now. I gave both of them to another department, along with the SD only DXC D30s.

I dumped all my BetaSP stuff except for a couple of PVW 2800s I use for tape logging (DVCAM is a bugger to cue due to the teeny tape size).

Beta SX is okay but seems to have been pretty well rendered semi obsolete by IMX. In 2000/2001 we bought 2 DNW A75s, 2 A65s, 2 75s, a 65 and a DNV-5 so though I wish I'd known IMX was coming, I'm married to BetacamSX for the next several years.

BetaSP is still an okay format but DVCAM is sharper and the 4:1:1 sampling is a non-issue for me becasue we don't chroma key and 99% of the output goes to MPEG1 or Media 8 at 512 kps. Oh, and DVD too. We shoot virtually all our material with DSR 570 or DC50/DSR1 anyway. The editors will make DVCAM->BetaSX rough cut tapes via SDI then use the BetaSX tapes for the AVIDs. It all comes down to the editors hating to cue DVCAM tapes, takes them too long I guess. Also we are on a tight budget this year and need to keep DVCAM tape consumption down, thus necessitating using the hundreds of virgin BetaSP tapes in the BetaSX decks.

I guess I might use the DC50/DNV5 combo to shoot BetaSX maybe once or twice a month and only for B-Roll requested by Public Affairs for distribution to the Broadcasters.

Peter