Ikegami Tsushinki - History

History

• Most noted of Ikegami's achievements in broadcast television technology was its introduction of the first portable hand-held TV camera. The camera made its debut in the United States in May 1962, when CBS used it to document the launching of NASA's Aurora 7 manned space flight. Ikegami continued in the development of portable video camera technology and in 1972 introduced the HL-33, the first compact hand-held color video camera for ENG. The compact ENG cameras made live shots easier and—when combined with portable videotape recorders—provided an immediate alternative to 16mm television news film, which required processing before it could be broadcast. The later HL-51 was popular among broadcasters for both ENG and EFP image acquisition.

• Although Ikegami is known as a manufacturer of high-quality television cameras, the company does not make video recorder mechanisms (VTRs), and has been a licensee of professional video formats such as Sony's Betacam SP and DVCAM, and Panasonic's DVCPRO. In 1995 Ikegami co-operated with Avid on a tapeless video acquisition format called Editcam but few were sold. Ikegami's latest tapeless camera format is called GFCAM, jointly developed with Toshiba.

• According to some sources in the early 80s, Ikegami developed a number of arcade games as a subcontractor to Japanese video game companies. Among the games they may have developed are Computer Othello, Block Fever, Monkey Magic, Congo Bongo, Popeye, Donkey Kong, Radar Scope, Sheriff, Space Fever, Space Firebird, Space Demon, Heli Fire, Sky Skipper, Space Launcher and Zaxxon. At that time, computer programs were not recognized as copyrightable material. According to these sources, Ikegami proceeded to sue Nintendo for unauthorized duplication of the Donkey Kong program code for the latter's creation of Donkey Kong Junior (1983, Tokyo District Court), but it was not until 1989 that the Tokyo High Court gave a verdict that acknowledged the originality of program code. In 1990, Ikegami and Nintendo reached a settlement, terms of which were never disclosed.