History Of Cctv

By Author: sudarshan singh
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The first CCTV system was installed by Siemens AG at Test Stand VII in Peenemunde, Germany in 1942, for observing the launch of V-2 rockets. The noted German engineer Walter Bruch was responsible for the design and installation of the system.

In the U.S. the first commercial closed-circuit television system became available in 1949, called Vericon. Very little is known about Vericon except it was advertised as not requiring a government permit.CCTV recording systems are still often used at modern launch sites to record the flight of the rockets, in order to find the possible causes of malfunctions, while larger rockets are often fitted with CCTV allowing pictures of stage separation to be transmitted back to earth by radio link.

The history of CCTV in the United States varies from that of the United Kingdom. One of is first appearances was in 1973 in Times Square in New York City. The NYPD installed it in order to deter crime that was occurring in the area however crime rates did not appear to drop much due to the cameras. Nevertheless, during the 1980s video surveillance began to spread across the country specifically ...
... targeting public areas. It was seen as a cheaper way to deter crime compared to increasing the size of the police departments. Some businesses as well, especially those that were prone to theft, began to use video surveillance. During the 1990s digital multiplexing, which allowed for several cameras at once to record, and introduced time lapse and motion only recording, increased the use of CCTV across the country. This would have been preferable to the old style of camera due to the amount of time and money that could be saved. From the mid 1990s on, police departments across the country installed an increasing number of cameras in various public spaces including housing projects, schools and public parks departments. Following the attacks on September 11th, the use of video surveillance has become a common occurrence in the country to deter future terrorist attacks.

In September 1968, Olean, New York was the first city in the United States to install video cameras along its main business street in an effort to fight crime. The use of CCTV later on became very common in banks and stores to discourage theft, by recording evidence of criminal activity. Their use further popularised the concept. The first place to use CCTV in the United Kingdom was King's Lynn, Norfolk. In recent decades, especially with general crime fears growing in the 1990s and 2000s, public space use of surveillance cameras has taken off, especially in some countries such as the United Kingdom.

A CCTV system may be installed where an operator of a machine cannot directly observe people who may be injured by some unexpected machine operation. For example, on a subway train, CCTV cameras may allow the operator to confirm that people are clear of doors before closing them and starting the train. Operators of an amusement park ride may use a CCTV system to observe that people are not endangered by starting the ride. A CCTV camera and dashboard monitor can make reversing a vehicle safer, if it allows the driver to observe objects or people not otherwise visible.

A development in the world of CCTV (October 2005) is in the use of megapixel digital still cameras that can take 1600 x 1200 pixel resolution images of the camera scene either on a time lapse or motion-detection basis. Images taken with a digital still camera have higher resolution than those taken with a typical video camera. Relatively low-cost digital still cameras can be used for CCTV purposes, using CCDP software that controls the camera from the PC.

Images of the camera scene are transferred automatically to a computer every few seconds. Images may be monitored remotely if the computer is connected to a network. Combinations of PIR activated floodlights with 1.3Mpix and better digital cameras are now appearing. They save the images to a flash-memory card which is inserted into a slot on the device. The flash card can be removed for viewing on a computer if ever an incident happens. They are not intended for live viewing, but are a very simple and cheap "install and forget" approach to this issue. Closed-circuit digital photography (CCDP) is more suited for capturing and saving recorded photographs, whereas closed-circuit television (CCTV) is more suitable for live-monitoring purposes.