Wired!

Through the window: Humpty

Bradford's big switch on!

From John Logie Baird's original TV apparatus to Jim'll Fix It badges, the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television (NMPFTV) has the largest collection of TV technology in the world. Some of this will be on display at the Museum for the very first time.

Baird's Televisor

For John Trenouth, Head of Television at the Museum, the new gallery will not only show some of the milestones in the history of television but will also provide an opportunity for exploring some of its more historic failures. For those who think TV began in the 1930s, much of what John has to say comes as something of a surprise: "The oldest piece of TV equipment dates back to 1882. This was L. B. Atkinson's scanning drum."

One of the most important items in the Museum's collection is John Logie Baird's Televisor, perfected in 1925. Earlier attempts to create television had only resulted in silhouettes, not in pictures. However, as John points out: "There was a television but no TV services." In 1929 you could go out and buy a Televisor but its small flickering images must have compared very unfavourably to those on the big screen down at the local picture palace.

A new home for old friends!

Baird did realise that if he wanted to sell his invention, then there would have to be programmes. Between 1929 and 1935 he broadcast pictures using the BBC's radio transmitters late in the evening, a service that could be received anywhere in the country if you had the right equipment. The BBC, realising it should take control of what was being transmitted, opened a small studio in the basement of Broadcasting House in 1931.

In 1936 the BBC launched its own TV service but John Trenouth is convinced it was many years before TV was really taken seriously. He says: "Before the Second World War there was only one person in the world who realised the power television could have and that was Goebbels. The Germans wanted to use TV for propaganda."

Old friends - and old foes!

And if you think DVDs are a fairly new invention, then another surprise may await you in the new gallery. John Logie Baird also made the very first videodiscs back in 1927 - they came on 78s just like the music of the time.

Bradford has also played its part in the history of TV - the first TV pictures to be transmitted outside London by wireless were received in Nab Wood in 1929.

But it doesn't stop there! Historic TV and studio cameras will sit alongside Wallace and Gromit and all the Play School toys will be reunited with their famous windows.

The first TV pictures in Bradford, 1927

Visitors will be able to walk into a replica studio and get hands-on experience of how television is made. They will also be able to get an idea of what it is like to be a TV personality by having a go at reading the news or presenting the weather. The production zone will include a working quiz show set which will be used to demonstrate everything from studio lighting effects to vision mixing. Today's TV techniques can be explored in a special virtual studio.

Kathryn Blacker is the NMPFT's Project Director for Experience TV. She says: "This won't just be an opportunity to enjoy some fantastic telly nostalgia - though there will be plenty on show. The gallery will also allow people to have a go in front of the camera and try behind the scenes tasks to really get under the skin of television. We also plan to have live interpretation and formal and informal workshops for people who want to take things a little bit further and participate in making their own TV."

Experience TV also provides a home for the BBC in Bradford. Mark Byford, the BBC's Deputy Director-General, says: "We are delighted to be supporting the Experience TV venture, recognising that the Museum is at the forefront of connecting the public with both broadcasting's heritage and its future."