Scratch Video a mutant hybrid of scratch DJ music and guerrilla TV

scratchvideo/evolution/personalcomputer

Combining audio style sampling and remixing with video began to appear in the 1980s. Music producer Steinski, working alongside John Kane and Glen Lazzaro, were creating quick-cut videos, to "out-MTV MTV". They used sampled images (such as the JFK assassination footage) as sources to work with, creating And the Motorcade Sped On in 1984. Lazzaro's term for this style of video was "density editing", describing the tightly packed images in each piece.

This is just one example of what would come to be known as scratch video. It was made possible because of personal computers now powerful enough to digitize video images. Steinski, Lazzaro and Kane were paying around $400 an hour to have access to the professional editing suites they used.

The first personal computer inspired a wave of DIY home tinkering like the porta-pak and drum machines had. Software made the PC (personal computer) into a creative visual medium. Increasing power and storage of "multimedia" PCs eventually gave consumers desktop video editing. Visual applications for MIDI technology would make the PC a tool to create perfect synch between image and sound. And now home personal computers have enough processing power and storage capability for an application like full screen video editing. The world wide web acts as a distribution medium for completed projects.

Copyright 2000© Hart Snider