Home video
Encyclopedia
Home video is a blanket term used for pre-recorded media that is either sold or rented/hired for home cinema
entertainment. The term originates from the VHS
/Betamax
era but has carried over into current optical disc formats like DVD
and Blu-ray Disc
and, to a lesser extent, into methods of digital distribution
such as Netflix
.
The home video business distributes film
s, telemovies and television series in the form of video
s in various formats to the public. These are either bought or rented, then watched privately from the comfort of home by consumers. Most theatrically released films are now released on digital media, both optical (DVD or Blu-ray) and download-based, replacing the largely obsolete VHS (Video Home System) medium. The VCD
format remains popular in Asia, though DVDs are gradually gaining popularity.
s and television broadcasts. Super8
versions (often heavily edited) of some of the more popular theatrical features were sold at high prices since the late 1960s (see section Packaged movies at Super 8 mm film
).
The first company to duplicate and distribute home video was Magnetic Video
, established as an audio and video duplication service for professional audio and television corporations in Farmington Hills, Michigan
, USA, in 1968. Although Avco
's 1972 Cartrivision
system preceded Magnetic Vision's expansion into home video by a few years, it took until the late 1970s that VHS and Betamax became widely available for home use. Major United States
players in the video rental business today include Blockbuster Video and Netflix
.
, Citizen Kane
, or Casablanca
were the mainstay of video marketing and helmed by large studios like Universal
, 20th Century Fox
and Disney. At that time, not many consumers owned a VCR, and those who did tended to rent rather than buy videos. Toward the end of that decade, a rise of smaller companies began creating special interest videos, also known as "non-theatrical programming" and "alternative programming," and "selling-through" to the consumer.
. Home video release dates usually follow five or six months after the theatrical release, although recently more films have been arriving on video after three or four months. (Christmas
and other holiday-related movies are generally not released on home video until the following year when that holiday is celebrated again.)
Exceptions to the rule include the Steven Soderbergh
film Bubble
. It was released in 2006 to theaters, cable TV and DVD only a few days apart.
s are now also available in complete seasons on DVD. It has become popular practice for defunct TV shows to be released to DVD one season at a time every few months, and active shows to be released on DVD after the end of each season. Prior to the television DVDs, most television shows were only viewable in syndication
, or on limited 'best of' VHS releases of selected episode
s. These copyrighted movies and programs generally have legal restrictions on them preventing them from (amongst other things) being shown in public venues, shown to other people for money, or copied for other than fair use
purposes (although such ability is limited by some jurisdictionas and media formats: see below).
, videotapes and other video recordings without a certification symbol from the British Board of Film Classification
(BBFC) on their covers - or on the tapes themselves - were no longer allowed to be sold or displayed by rental shops. These tapes are called "Pre-Certs" (e.g., Pre-certification tapes). Recently these tapes have generated a cult
following, due to their collectability.
and CSS, and by the enactment of laws such as the DMCA, potentially hindering otherwise-lawful "fair-use" rights.
Categories and lists
:Category:Home video companies of the United States
:Category:Video
:Category:Years in home video
Home cinema
Home cinema, also commonly called home theater, are home entertainment set-ups that seek to reproduce a movie theater experience and mood with the help of video and audio equipment in a private home....
entertainment. The term originates from the VHS
VHS
The Video Home System is a consumer-level analog recording videocassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan ....
/Betamax
Betamax
Betamax was a consumer-level analog videocassette magnetic tape recording format developed by Sony, released on May 10, 1975. The cassettes contain -wide videotape in a design similar to the earlier, professional wide, U-matic format...
era but has carried over into current optical disc formats like DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
and Blu-ray Disc
Blu-ray Disc
Blu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
and, to a lesser extent, into methods of digital distribution
Digital distribution
Online distribution, digital distribution, or electronic software distribution is the practice of delivering content without the use of physical media, typically by downloading via the internet directly to a consumer's device. Online distribution bypasses conventional physical distribution media,...
such as Netflix
Netflix
Netflix, Inc., is an American provider of on-demand internet streaming media in the United States, Canada, and Latin America and flat rate DVD-by-mail in the United States. The company was established in 1997 and is headquartered in Los Gatos, California...
.
The home video business distributes film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
s, telemovies and television series in the form of video
Video
Video is the technology of electronically capturing, recording, processing, storing, transmitting, and reconstructing a sequence of still images representing scenes in motion.- History :...
s in various formats to the public. These are either bought or rented, then watched privately from the comfort of home by consumers. Most theatrically released films are now released on digital media, both optical (DVD or Blu-ray) and download-based, replacing the largely obsolete VHS (Video Home System) medium. The VCD
Video CD
Before the advent of DVD and Blu-ray, the Video CD became the first format for distributing films on standard 120 mm optical discs. The format is a standard digital format for storing video on a Compact Disc...
format remains popular in Asia, though DVDs are gradually gaining popularity.
History
Prior to the advent of home video as a popular medium in the late 1970s, most feature films were inaccessible after their theatrical runs for the general public. They were only viewable in theatrical re-releases, revival houseRevival house
A revival house or repertory cinema is a term for a cinema that specializes in showing classic or notable older films . Such venues may include standard repertory cinemas, multi-function theatres that alternate between old movies and live events, and some first-run theatres that show past...
s and television broadcasts. Super8
Super 8 mm film
Super 8 mm film is a motion picture film format released in 1965 by Eastman Kodak as an improvement of the older "Double" or "Regular" 8 mm home movie format....
versions (often heavily edited) of some of the more popular theatrical features were sold at high prices since the late 1960s (see section Packaged movies at Super 8 mm film
Super 8 mm film
Super 8 mm film is a motion picture film format released in 1965 by Eastman Kodak as an improvement of the older "Double" or "Regular" 8 mm home movie format....
).
The first company to duplicate and distribute home video was Magnetic Video
Magnetic Video
Magnetic Video was a home video/audio duplication service established by Andre Blay in 1968 and based in Farmington Hills, Michigan. In 1977 it became the first corporation to release theatrical motion pictures onto Betamax and VHS videocassette for consumer use. Magnetic Video was a home...
, established as an audio and video duplication service for professional audio and television corporations in Farmington Hills, Michigan
Farmington Hills, Michigan
Farmington Hills is a community in southeastern Michigan. It is the largest city in Oakland County in the U.S. state of Michigan. Its population was 79,740 at the 2010 census...
, USA, in 1968. Although Avco
Avco
Avco Corporation is a subsidiary of Textron which operates Textron Systems Corporation and Lycoming.-Brief history:The Embry-Riddle Company created the Aviation Corporation in 1928 as a holding company tasked with acquiring small airlines...
's 1972 Cartrivision
Cartrivision
Cartrivision was an analog video videocassette format introduced in 1972, and the first format to offer feature films for consumer rental. It was produced by Frank Stanton's Cartridge Television, Inc. , a subsidiary of Avco, who also owned Embassy Pictures at the time. Cartrivision was available in...
system preceded Magnetic Vision's expansion into home video by a few years, it took until the late 1970s that VHS and Betamax became widely available for home use. Major United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
players in the video rental business today include Blockbuster Video and Netflix
Netflix
Netflix, Inc., is an American provider of on-demand internet streaming media in the United States, Canada, and Latin America and flat rate DVD-by-mail in the United States. The company was established in 1997 and is headquartered in Los Gatos, California...
.
Special-interest video production
Until the mid-1980s feature film theatrical releases such as The Wizard of OzThe Wizard of Oz (1939 film)
The Wizard of Oz is a 1939 American musical fantasy film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed primarily by Victor Fleming. Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson and Edgar Allan Woolf received credit for the screenplay, but there were uncredited contributions by others. The lyrics for the songs...
, Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane is a 1941 American drama film, directed by and starring Orson Welles. Many critics consider it the greatest American film of all time, especially for its innovative cinematography, music and narrative structure. Citizen Kane was Welles' first feature film...
, or Casablanca
Casablanca (film)
Casablanca is a 1942 American romantic drama film directed by Michael Curtiz, starring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman and Paul Henreid, and featuring Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre and Dooley Wilson. Set during World War II, it focuses on a man torn between, in...
were the mainstay of video marketing and helmed by large studios like Universal
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
, 20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...
and Disney. At that time, not many consumers owned a VCR, and those who did tended to rent rather than buy videos. Toward the end of that decade, a rise of smaller companies began creating special interest videos, also known as "non-theatrical programming" and "alternative programming," and "selling-through" to the consumer.
"Home video is an exciting new area of opportunity for adventuresome publishers willing to produce new programs. Today's limitations within the video marketplace may be gone tomorrow. More people are finding innovative ways to create visually stimulating entertainment and information for the video tape player... Like contemporary book publishing, you can produce and distribute yourself to very narrow markets or seek broad-based distributors for mass-oriented appeal"
Special Interest Video is a huge and steadily increasing venue for products exposing new and old subjects through the medium of camera and tape. It is a new form of publishing, a specialty line of products for vertical "readership" and an exploding territory of subjects, audiences and new uses. Six years ago, dog handling videos, back pain videos and cooking videos were suppositions on a drawing board. Three years ago these took life. Now, along with golf and skiing tapes these S.I. videos are beginning to claim a marketshare. The wild part of this new video publishing adventure is the wide diversity of support with which each product comes to the market. New technology has changed the territory.
"Cambridge Associates puts the growth of the special interest genre at close to 600% in the last five years, to $625 million in supplier revenues last year."
Time gap until home video release
A time period is usually allowed to elapse between the end of theatrical release and the home video release to encourage movie theater patronage and discourage piracyCopyright infringement
Copyright infringement is the unauthorized or prohibited use of works under copyright, infringing the copyright holder's exclusive rights, such as the right to reproduce or perform the copyrighted work, or to make derivative works.- "Piracy" :...
. Home video release dates usually follow five or six months after the theatrical release, although recently more films have been arriving on video after three or four months. (Christmas
Christmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
and other holiday-related movies are generally not released on home video until the following year when that holiday is celebrated again.)
Exceptions to the rule include the Steven Soderbergh
Steven Soderbergh
Steven Andrew Soderbergh is an American film producer, screenwriter, cinematographer, editor, and an Academy Award-winning film director. He is best known for directing commercial Hollywood films like Erin Brockovich, Traffic, and the remake of Ocean's Eleven, but he has also directed smaller less...
film Bubble
Bubble (film)
Bubble is a movie directed by Steven Soderbergh. It was shot on high-definition video and was made for a relatively small budget of $1.6 million. It also featured some unusual production aspects.In traditional terms, the movie has no script...
. It was released in 2006 to theaters, cable TV and DVD only a few days apart.
TV programs
Many television programTelevision program
A television program , also called television show, is a segment of content which is intended to be broadcast on television. It may be a one-time production or part of a periodically recurring series...
s are now also available in complete seasons on DVD. It has become popular practice for defunct TV shows to be released to DVD one season at a time every few months, and active shows to be released on DVD after the end of each season. Prior to the television DVDs, most television shows were only viewable in syndication
Television syndication
In broadcasting, syndication is the sale of the right to broadcast radio shows and television shows by multiple radio stations and television stations, without going through a broadcast network, though the process of syndication may conjure up structures like those of a network itself, by its very...
, or on limited 'best of' VHS releases of selected episode
Episode
An episode is a part of a dramatic work such as a serial television or radio program. An episode is a part of a sequence of a body of work, akin to a chapter of a book. The term sometimes applies to works based on other forms of mass media as well, as in Star Wars...
s. These copyrighted movies and programs generally have legal restrictions on them preventing them from (amongst other things) being shown in public venues, shown to other people for money, or copied for other than fair use
Fair use
Fair use is a limitation and exception to the exclusive right granted by copyright law to the author of a creative work. In United States copyright law, fair use is a doctrine that permits limited use of copyrighted material without acquiring permission from the rights holders...
purposes (although such ability is limited by some jurisdictionas and media formats: see below).
Pre-Certs
After the passage of the Video Recordings (Labelling) Act of 1985 in the United KingdomUnited Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, videotapes and other video recordings without a certification symbol from the British Board of Film Classification
British Board of Film Classification
The British Board of Film Classification , originally British Board of Film Censors, is a non-governmental organisation, funded by the film industry and responsible for the national classification of films within the United Kingdom...
(BBFC) on their covers - or on the tapes themselves - were no longer allowed to be sold or displayed by rental shops. These tapes are called "Pre-Certs" (e.g., Pre-certification tapes). Recently these tapes have generated a cult
Cult
The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices...
following, due to their collectability.
DRM
There is great controversy about recent attempts to increase protections for rights owners using technical means such as MacrovisionMacrovision
Rovi Corporation is a globally operating, US-based company that provides guidance technology, entertainment data, copy protection, industry standard networking and media management technology for digital entertainment devices and services...
and CSS, and by the enactment of laws such as the DMCA, potentially hindering otherwise-lawful "fair-use" rights.
See also
Articles- Copyright lawCopyrightCopyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
- Direct-to-videoDirect-to-videoDirect-to-video is a term used to describe a film that has been released to the public on home video formats without being released in film theaters or broadcast on television...
- Film distributionFilm distributionThe distribution of a film is the process through which a movie is made available to watch for an audience by a film distributor...
- Home cinemaHome cinemaHome cinema, also commonly called home theater, are home entertainment set-ups that seek to reproduce a movie theater experience and mood with the help of video and audio equipment in a private home....
- LaserdiscLaserdiscLaserDisc was a home video format and the first commercial optical disc storage medium. Initially licensed, sold, and marketed as MCA DiscoVision in North America in 1978, the technology was previously referred to interally as Optical Videodisc System, Reflective Optical Videodisc, Laser Optical...
- Rental shopRental shopA rental shop, also known as a video library, is a business that allows a consumer to temporarily obtain a reusable good or product for a specified period of time in exchange for payment, a process known as renting...
- Videocassette recorderVideocassette recorderThe videocassette recorder , is a type of electro-mechanical device that uses removable videocassettes that contain magnetic tape for recording analog audio and analog video from broadcast television so that the images and sound can be played back at a more convenient time...
Categories and lists
:Category:Home video companies of the United States
:Category:Video
:Category:Years in home video
- List of notable home video companies
- List of years in home video