TeleTales #29…The First Handheld Color Camera Use, ABC

On January 27, 2015 - TV History

TeleTales #29…The First Handheld Color Camera Use, ABC

At the link is a clip from November 11, 1967 showing the camera in use by ABC at the UCLA – USC game in Los Angeles.

ABC had modified the Ampex creation which, as seen below, was meant to include their portable VR 3000 video tape recorder. Instead, they have taken the case and put a modified camera control unit in the backpack and cabled it to the truck. Later, they came up with a small wireless transmitter for the Ampex rig. Enjoy and share! -Bobby Ellerbee

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6 Comments

  1. Ed Dudkowski January 1, 2016

    Sorry Guys, the BCC-300 was strictly a black and white camera. When Harry Mathias and I mated the Ampex VR-3000 to an Asaca COLOR camera, we did the first portable color “mini-cam” shooting in 1974. This was while Compact Video in Hollywood was cabled to a VR-3000 mounted in a min-van.

  2. Tom Edwards January 28, 2015

    As I recall, the VR-3000 was a two inch helical deck which worked like the later UMatic machines.

  3. Andrew Palser January 28, 2015

    How did the video head drum work? There appears to be no compressed air.

  4. Don Cox January 27, 2015

    Here is mine. It has been hi-banded, but has no power supply.

  5. Dave Dillman January 27, 2015

    I remember the first VR3000 from, must have been NAB 1966 or 67. Every night they would bring it from the Hilton to the WFLD studio in the Opera House to work it over. Reminds me of the production company that had two and when shooting on location would overnight on back to their shop while the alternate machine would be shipped to location. Last one I saw was hanging on an office wall as sculpture.

  6. Allan McConnell Jr January 27, 2015

    Wow! A great memory since I had a little experience with the VR-3000 VTR.