Can T.V.s be used as cameras with no modification

twitchy: yes, the phosphor on the back side of the screen will do that because it's made to be bombarded by electrons to excite the particles to produce light. there's no way it can work in reverse the way you implied.

the poster that talked about hooking your speakers up to your mic jack - yes that works because a microphone is the same as a speaker. the thing you're missing is you had to plug the speakers into the MIC jack to make that work. no amount of shouting into an output port will get you any kind of recording. tv's are output devices. plain and simple. if you have a cable box/dvr then there's data transmission to a certain degree, but it has no way of capturing and encoding video or audio.

If Tv's really have cameras and radio is microphone
who watches and listens all this people?
Only I have 3 tv's so how many employees is there to watch whole world?
Hmmmmmm... Now I see where billions of U.S. tax money goes..

Originally posted by an0maly33
twitchy: yes, the phosphor on the back side of the screen will do that because it's made to be bombarded by electrons to excite the particles to produce light. there's no way it can work in reverse the way you implied.

I respecfully disagree, any photosensitive material can produce and or capture an image, period. There is even some evidence to suggest that photography, or a similar concpet dates back to ancient times using a camera obscura and photosensitive materials. The shroud of Turin was thought to have been created with such a method, and the cameras on the Voyager space crafts had similar imaging devices. You don't have to have silver hallide crystals on a roll of film or digital processing to create, transmit or retain an image. You can even create a fantasticly realistic image with a piece of toast and varying thicknesses of aluminum foil.

i respectfully disagree to your disagreement. just because a material is reactive to light doesn't mean there's any mechanism to capture/encode/transfer that light. the back of a tv tube fires electrons, nothing more.

to put it in perspective, can you project an image with a camera? no. because it's designed to collect and encode light. not emit it. the opposite is true for a tv.

[edit on 19-2-2008 by an0maly33]

reply to post by an0maly33


I would have to agree here. Of course if I am wrong, I will be heading up to the store to get some glow-in-the-dark stickers. Then I will turn them into some cheap cameras and make millions off of my glowing-cameras!

I personally find it highly unlikely that a TV can be made into a camera, and a post on the first page seems to confirm my thoughts. And even IF it could be made into a camera, there would have to be other circuitry involved to get it to broadcast. What happens if you do not have cable/satellite connections? Either the receiving party would have to be real close, or you would need to have a real big TV.

I don't believe this is possible. I have been dealing with technology and learning about the new LED tvs for sometime, purchasing an LED rear projection myself.

The reason it's not possible is the only reason we receive the picture is because the digital signal is interpreted locally, then fed through the LED's which then hit mirrors and project onto your screen. If you were to even put a camera behind your television you would see so much distortion you could barely make out a human being.

If you were to reverse-project the image across these mirrors you wouldn't end up with the same result as the first. You need a very bright light source such as the LED's to make the image possible in the first place.

Conclusion:
Not even close to possible as of now and the way televisions are being made.
Even less possible with Plasma and LCD technologies.