NTSC (National Television System Committee)

The organization that developed both our American Black & White and Color television system is the National Television System Committee. Our television system, itself, has become known as NTSC. Other countries such as Canada, Mexico, and Japan have also standardized on NTSC. (The word "System" is sometimes printed in the plural form.) NTSC is also known as "Never Twice the Same Color" as a result of some of the problems encountered in implementing the system.

U.S. government and industry committee which defined the 525-line 60 (59.94) interlaced fields per second analog broadcast TV standard over 50 years ago. (This format is referred to as NTSC.) Of the 525 scan lines, 480 (give or take a few) contain the picture and the rest contain synchronizing information, hold the encoded closed caption text, and provide a time delay to move the electron beam back to the top of the screen. NTSC is used mainly in North America and Japan. Originally 30 frames per second, the standard was changed slightly to 29.97 frames per second at the time color was introduced since that change made it easier to incorporate the color information into what is now a composite video signal. The change was so small that practically all older TV sets continued to receive the signal properly without loss of vertical hold.

The organization that developed both our American Black White and Color television system is the National Television System Committee. Our television system, itself, has become known as NTSC. Other countries such as Canada, Mexico, and Japan have also standardized on NTSC. (The word "System" is sometimes printed in the plural form.) NTSC is also known as "Never Twice the Same Color" as a result of some of the problems encountered in implementing the system.