Light Biasing

All the vidicon type tubes except the vidicon itself were able to use a light biasing technique to improve the sensitivity and contrast. The photosensitive target in these tubes suffered from the limitation that the light level had to rise to a particular level before any video output resulted. Light biasing was a method whereby the photosensitive target was illuminated from a light source just enough that no appreciable output was obtained, but such that a slight increase in light level from the scene was enough to provide discernible output. The light came from either an illuminator mounted around the target, or in more professional cameras from a light source on the base of the tube and guided to the target by light piping. The technique would not work with the baseline vidicon tube because it suffered from the limitation that as the target was fundamentally an insulator, the constant low light level built up a charge which would manifest itself as a form of 'fogging'. The other types had semiconducting targets which did not have this problem.