Portapak

A Portapak is a battery powered, self-contained video tape analog recording system that can be carried by one person. Because earlier television cameras were large and relatively immovable, the Portapak made it possible to record video easily outside of the studio. Although it recorded at a lower quality than television studio cameras, the Portapak was adopted by both professionals and amateurs as a new method of video recording. Before Portapak cameras, remote television news footage was routinely photographed on 16mm film and telecined for broadcast.

The first portapak system, the Sony Video Rover was introduced to the market in 1967. It was a two-piece set consisting of a black-and-white composite video video camera and a separate record-only helical scan ½" video tape recorder (VTR) unit. It required a Sony CV series VTR to play back the video. Following Sony’s introduction of the Video Rover, numerous other manufacturers sold their own versions of Portapak technology. Although it was light enough for a single person to carry and use, it was usually operated by a crew of two: one carrying and controlling the camera, and one carrying and operating the VTR.