The first time I ever used a teleprompter was in the 1980's. Channel 13 TV in Birmingham (WVTM now, but it may have still been WAPI back then) had a job opening for someone to do brief local news inserts in the NBC overnight news program they were airing. I applied and was given a "test" at the prompter. I have to admit, it felt perfectly natural to read the copy as it scrolled down on the black and white screen, and I was thinking as I read it "Hey, I can do this!". Of course I didn't get the job, so perhaps my perception was off a bit? I was thinking about that first exposure to the machine today after reading a N.Y. Times story about President Obama always using a prompter, and the experience of other presidents going back to Harry S. Truman. I've gotten used to them now, of course, after fourteen years of TV, and I've also learned how they can attack without warning. The night of the very last For The Record, the prompter was showing the wrong script as the show opened...not to mention no "tally light" on the cameras, so countdown clock, no audio in my earpiece (IFB).
Prompters are all computer driven now, but not too long ago this is what they looked like...
...a small camera mounted above a long narrow printed copy of the script. The camera image would be sent to a monitor mounted at camera level. An operator would use an electronic control to advance the copy, hopefully at a pace the reader could keep up with.
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