History of Editing
Vision Switchers
A vision mixer (also called video switcher or production switcher) was used in television studios and edit suites for creating transitions such as wipe/dissolve effects, keying (matte and chroma keys) and graphics/titles. The studio switcher is used to select between multi-cameras, possibly one or more video sources and in some cases compositing (mix) video sources together to create special effects.
Special Effx (Avid, Paintbox etc)
As editing systems became more affordable and flexible, so did their ancillary special effects adds ons called Digital Video Effects (commonly known as DVE's). These effects provided video image manipulation, distortion or movement of the image.
Early examples of DVE devices found in the broadcast post-production industry include the Ampex ADO ("Ampex Digital Optics"), Quantel DPE-5000, NEC DVE and Abekas A-53D. Modern video switchers often contain internal DVE functionality.
Harry/Henry
In 1985, Quantel released the 'Harry' effects compositing system which was the first non-linear editing system. It was rumoured in the industry that they didn't know what to call it that described what it did so its development pet name was used. Although Harry could only hold up to 80 seconds of uncompressed D1-style video, it was quite an advanced machine and the only system like it then. It was designed to render special effects in non-real time to the video recorded on its built-in hard disk array much like most computer based non-linear editing systems today. Harry's million dollar price tag limited it to high-end post-production facilities.
In the early '90s, Quantel released "Henry" the next generation system after Harry. Henry was the first Multi Layer compositing system that became the worldwide industry standard for commercial production.
