Ikegami Tsushinki Co., Ltd. (池上通信機株式会社) (tyo: 6771) is a Japanese manufacturer of professional and broadcast television equipment, especially professional video cameras, both for electronic news gathering and studio use. The company was founded in 1946.
History
Ikegami introduced the first portable 4 1/2-inch Image Orthicon tube hand-held TV camera.[1] The camera made its debut in the United States in February 1962, when CBS used it to document the launching of NASA's Friendship 7, its first crewed space mission to orbit the Earth.[1] In 1972, Ikegami introduced the HL-33, the first compact hand-held color video camera for electronic news gathering (ENG). In 1976, the HL-77 was introduced, which was the one of the first "one-piece" color video cameras, eliminating the required CCU "backpack" of the HL-33. 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. In addition to ENG, these cameras saw some use in outside broadcasts in Britain, particularly for roaming footage that was not possible to capture using the much larger tradition OB cameras.[2]