1981
"Songs of Praise" first programme to use Transportable Earth Station
Built by Research Department for live transmissions from Guernsey via the Orbital Test Satellite.
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1982
HDTV (High Definition Television) studies commence in earnest
1983
Successful transmission of two 68 Mbit/s PAL television/sound/data packages over 140 Mbit/s between London and Birmingham
This was undertaken in cooperation with Designs Department, Communications Department and British Telecom (BT). This experimental digital link provided the main feeds to Birmingham for several months.
Queen's Award for Teletext
Awarded with the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA).
1984
Video Watermarking devised
A method for electronically labelling television pictures.
First ever IBC award presented to Dr Geoffrey Phillips
Dr Geoffrey Phillips, Head of Radio Frequency Group received the first ever IBC Award in recognition of over thirty years of internationally acclaimed work in fostering the efficient use of the radio spectrum. The award was designed by John Tribe, a graphic designer at London Weekend Television. It is in an engraved glass form, using the classic Greek Golden Section to symbolise the marriage between technology and artistic creation in broadcasting.
1985
LF Radio Teleswitching service launches
This enables the Electricity Supply Industry to remotely control radio teleswitches in homes, offices and factories in order to optimise power distribution at peak demand times.
1986
HDTV picture store and high line-rate picture monitor demonstrated
At IBC in Brighton.
Development of motion estimation technology and application to standards conversion
A patent for this work was filed in March 1986, it was licensed to Snell & Wilcox and used in the 'Alchemist' standards converter and jointly awarded a Queen's Award in 1998.
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1987
R&D designed Digital Audio Editor
It was subsequently installed in ±«Óãtv Broadcasting House, London.
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1987
Queen's Award for LF Radio Teleswitching
In April 1987 ±«Óãtv Engineering received their fourth Queen's Award, on this occasion jointly with the Electricity Council, for their pioneering work in developing Radio Teleswitching. Radio Teleswitching was an offshoot of what, to broadcasters, was a much more important system - RDS.
1988
RDS (Radio Data System) on FM launches
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1989
The Ginger Tree (the first HD Film) produced
A co-production between the ±«Óãtv and the NHK network of Japan, it was produced in 1035 line HD using the Sony HDD 1000 VTR.
Helitrak successfully demonstrated during the Boat Race
Helitrak stands for - Automatic Helicopter Radio Camera Link.
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