CompuServe Thread

Pete (and Don), After my last message I repeated the "test" (and put a lot more effort into my observations, I might add), and I'd like to pull back from my original statement if I may. I now tend to think composite's broadcast advantage was "psychovisual" rather real. It like this, when one picture is more detailed than the other, not only will the picture detail be more distinct but so will the garbage. On a cable "broadcast" you're not expecting any garbage (snow) so when you see it you think of it as picture degradation. However, if you blur the picture a bit the snowiness almost disappears due to its small size so you perceive this as an improvement. On the other hand, when viewing a tape of a broadcast there is bound to be a further degradation of the picture, more than the softness of composite can handle. Therefore, you perceive the smaller, finer edged details (including garbage) as improvement and the larger, more blurred details of composite as degradation. What happened was that on the 2nd try I looked at the edge details (like I should have in the 1st place) and the improvement of Y/C was obvious. Not enough to kill yourself for, but still there nevertheless. This effect is well known in photography, and I should have allowed for it. Sorry.