Hair in the gate (film) is when tiny shavings of emulsion (from the movie as it passes through the gate) collect like small fibres and get photographed. They must be cleaned out at regular intervals during filming. Sometimes, of course, you can get real hair in the gate of either the camera or a projector, especially if the equipment has been sitting around unprotected and there’s been a shaggy dog around the studio.
Halation (film) a round halo encircling a picture, usually caused by reflections inside an actual movie base.
Handbasher (VT, film) is a light of about 800 watts in power, its hand-help, hence the name.
Hardware (VT, BT, and ST) all the hard tools used in production and projection, e.g. cameras, editing tools, projectors, etc. as opposed to software, which is the tapes, slides and so on, borrowed from computer terminology.
HDTV (VT) stands for high definition television. A Japanese progress for a system of TV based on 1,125 lines instead of 525 lines (NTSC) or 625 lines (PAL and SECAM). The aspect ratio is also different, at 5 to 3. The HDTV system gives much better quality in picture terms, and it is thought that in time this system will fully replace the poorer 525 and 625 editions in use today. Another advantage of this would be that HDTV would – presumably – permit standardization of format all over the world, which would avoid the problems created at the moment by the need to undertake standards conversion from country to county. However at the time of writing HDTV is still at a comparatively early stage in its progress and the experts are predicting that we will probably be well into the 1990s before all traces of PAL, SECAM and NTSC have vanished.
Head (VT, sound) the parts of videotape or audio recording and playback tools that actually touch the tape when it’s in motion, so recording or playing back the picture or sound.
Head clog (VT) when the head of a videotape recording or playback device gets bunged up with stray particles of oxide lost from the tapes.
Head out (sound) an audio tape is head out when it has been wound so that you can just thread it up and play it, with no need to reverse it first.
Headphones (BT, sound) see cans
Headset (VT, film, BT) a pair of earphones with a microphone attached which allows two-way communication among all
members of the crew.
Hearing it back (sound) listening to whatever has just been recorded, when the tape has been reverse and is played back.
High band (VT) ¾ – inch-wide videotape type. It is quite widely used as the original tape for non-broadcast VT programs as the quality is quite reasonable and the cost of it is low when compared to 1-inch or 2-inch videotape. It is officially supposed to be broadcast-standard tape; however, very few broadcast programs are made with it in Europe or the US.
See also low band, U-matic
High hat (VT, film) a little support used to raise a camera up from ground level.