The PXL2000 , or Pixelvision , was a toy black and white video camera, introduced by Fisher-Price in 1987 at the International Toy Fair in Manhattan, which could record sound and images onto Compact Cassette tapes. It was on the market for one year with about 400,000 units produced. After that one year, it was pulled by the market, but rediscovered in the 1990s by low-budget filmmakers who appreciated the grainy, shimmering, monochrome produced by the unit, and the way in which its lens allowed the user to photograph a subject an eighth of an inch away from the camera, and pull back to a long shot without manipulating a dial, while keeping as the background and the foreground in focus. It is also appreciated by collectors, artists, and media historians, and has been used in major films and spawned dedicated film festivals.
29-582: PXL may refer to: PXL-2000 , camcorder Paclitaxel , drug PCL 6 Enhanced , printer command language Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title PXL . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=PXL&oldid=933068763 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description
58-412: A 1990 interview, Zappa mentioned that Fialka gave him a present that impressed him more than any other present from his staff: a videotape of The World's Greatest Sinner . Zappa band member Ike Willis called Fialka "one of the most brilliant people I have ever known and ever met ... an astoundingly astute and brilliant person ... the kind of guy that Frank [Zappa] loved to have in his orbit." Fialka
87-699: A PXL2000 to shoot key scenes, processing the footage with enhanced monochrome. The custom PXL2000 camera was fitted with windshield mount suction cups and painted with the red and white paint scheme of the Canadian flag. The PXL2000 was used by the characters Melody and Jess during the show Archive 81 . Gerry Fialka Gerry Fialka (born March 15, 1953) is an American experimental filmmaker , curator, lecturer, interviewer, and writer. He lectures and leads workshops on experimental film, avant-garde music and art, subversive social media , books by James Joyce , and Marshall McLuhan ’s media theory . He
116-572: A custom ASIC (the Sanyo LA 7306M), and an audio cassette mechanism. This is mounted in a plastic housing with a battery compartment and an RF video modulator selectable to either North American television channel 3 or 4 . It has a plastic viewfinder and some control buttons. The system stores 11 minutes of video and sound on a standard audio cassette tape by moving the tape at nearly nine times normal cassette playback speed. It records at roughly 16.875 inches (428.6 mm) per second, compared to
145-709: A feature-length experimental documentary film The Brother Side of the Wake , released in 2021, about the people of Venice in Los Angeles, California. It is billed as a remake of Orson Welles 's satire The Other Side of the Wind , since both films probe the same question: "Is the journey more important than the destination?" Fialka's film mixes in elements of "psychic effects of direct cinema , abstract animation, films about films", communal call-and-response ritual, and James Joyce ’s book Finnegans Wake . Fialka ran
174-920: A film festival dedicated to projects shot exclusively on the PXL2000. The festival continues to occur annually in Los Angeles , California , usually at the Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center and the Echo Park Film Center, with Fialka continuing as organizer and curator. Although the festival operates without a budget, it still manages to tour many locations including the San Francisco Cinematheque and Boston's MIT campus. Festival entries, oral history interviews, and other relevant materials donated by Fialka are being processed into
203-490: A full book, Strange Questions: Experimental Film as Conversation, of his interviews with notables in avant-garde cinema who offer insights into "its creative processes, formative influences, and hidden psychic effects." Some of his other interviews have been cited or republished by others. Fialka has published essays in various experimental film magazines including cineSource Magazine, Otherzine , and Canyon Cinemazine, and regularly publishes essays on local news in
232-445: A minor revival in popularity since the 1990s among filmmakers, due to its point-and-shoot simplicity and low-grade aesthetic. Because the unit is degradable and obsolete, its use is aligned with a certain romanticized mortality, unfit for serious mainstream appropriation. Erik Saks wrote this: "Each time an artist uses a PXL2000, the whole form edges closer to extinction." In 1990, Pixelvision enthusiast Gerry Fialka founded PXL THIS,
261-410: A standard cassette's speed of 1.875 inches (47.6 mm) on a C90 CrO 2 ( chromium dioxide ) cassette. In magnetic tape recording, the faster the tape speed, the more data can be stored per second. The higher speed is necessary because video requires a wider bandwidth than standard audio recording. The PXL2000 records the video information on the left audio channel of the cassette, and the audio on
290-475: A tour of Barfko-Swill in the 1987 VHS release (but not the original 1979 film release) of Zappa's film Baby Snakes . While not listed in the film credits, he is credited on-screen as "GERALD FIALKA Cool Guy Who Wraps Stuff So It Doesn't Break". A short clip of this appearance is also included in the 2020 documentary film Zappa . Fialka has published articles on Zappa, and was a co-interviewer in 1988 when Zappa expressed his thoughts on media theory . In
319-471: A variety of other community events including film screenings, discussion groups, and art shows. He also displays his own artwork, primarily collages, in local art shows, and produces local live musical shows. He performs in local music bands, including as a contributor to the Waywords and Meansigns international project setting Finnegans Wake to music. Fialka and Williams were the featured couple in
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#1732786976308348-479: Is among the most critically acclaimed pioneers of the PXL2000, one of which was given to them by their father James Benning around the age of 15. Benning's early video diary works gained popularity in the artist market, earning them a lasting reputation as an innovator, with an important presence in video art. Michael Almereyda used the camera for several of his films. Another Girl Another Planet (1992) and his short Aliens (1993) were shot with it entirely, it
377-542: Is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages PXL-2000 The PXL2000 was created by a team of inventors led by James Wickstead. He sold the invention rights to Fisher-Price in 1987 at the American International Toy Fair in Manhattan. The PXL2000 consists of a simple aspherical lens , an infrared filter, a CCD image sensor,
406-687: The Ann Arbor Film Co-op from 1972 to 1980. He has been a panelist, served on the screening committee (1977-1980), and run many workshops at the Ann Arbor Film Festival . Fialka founded, curates, and hosts the annual Venice Film Fest. He was also director of the Ann Arbor 8mm Film Festival . Fialka is the founder, organizer, and curator of the PXL THIS Film Festival, usually held at
435-489: The Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center and the Echo Park Film Center, both in Los Angeles, California . The festival features films made using a PXL-2000 toy video camera formerly sold by Fisher-Price . Although the festival operates without a budget, it still manages to tour many locations including the San Francisco Cinematheque and Boston's MIT campus. Festival entries, oral history interviews, and other relevant materials donated by Fialka are being processed into
464-903: The Free Venice Beachhead . He sometimes writes using a pen name that is an obvious take-off on his real name, such as Geritol Fialkaseltzer or Germy Folkywaze. Fialka has written a chapter " ‘Don’t Even Look At It' ─ Pixelvision & Multi-Screens" in the book Undependently Yours: Imagining A World Beyond The Red Carpet, and contributed an essay to the book Craig Baldwin: Avant to Live! Fialka married singer-songwriter Suzy Williams in 2001. They currently live in Venice , Los Angeles, California, where Fialka founded, organizes, and leads reading clubs on Marshall McLuhan ’s books and percepts on media theory and on "his own distinctive approach" to James Joyce ’s novel Finnegans Wake , annual Venice film and photography festivals, and
493-500: The July 2020 edition of Venice Living magazine. An entire subchapter "Pixilated Populism" of the book Venice, CA: A City State of Mind (which includes a photograph of Fialka on its cover), is devoted to Fialka, and summarizes Fialka's significance to Venice by stating "Gerry's a master at introducing people and steering the wayward onesomes to action ... to spreading awareness ... His encyclopedic grasp of Venetian and media history swells
522-1585: The Performing Arts and Moving Image Archives at the University of California, Santa Barbara Library . Fialka has conducted and published over 365 interviews. His interview of funk musician George Clinton was published in Flipside fanzine . He has also interviewed singer-songwriter Dr. John ; music performer-composer-arranger-producer Van Dyke Parks ; turntablist -music producer-philosopher-writer DJ Spooky ; singer and activist Jello Biafra ; Zappa-band guitarists Steve Vai , Warren Cuccurullo , and Mike Keneally , and keyboardist Don Preston ; folk musician Baby Gramps ; musical satirist Roy Zimmerman ; rock and roll groupie -writer-musician-actress Pamela Des Barres ; writer Janet Fitch ; artists Alexis Smith and Mike Kelley ; artist-dancer-choreographer-writer Simone Forti ; actress-writer-artist Mary Woronov ; actress-singer Ann Magnuson ; Firesign Theatre comedian Phil Proctor ; comedians Paul Krassner and Rick Overton ; filmmakers Nile Southern , Mike Hoolboom , and Haskell Wexler ; physicist and media ecologist Robert K. Logan , communications theorist and media ecologist Eric McLuhan (son of Marshall McLuhan ); media theorist and writer Douglas Rushkoff ; media arts and political theorist Gene Youngblood ; Film Threat publication founder Chris Gore ; political activist Tom Hayden ; and more. Fialka has published
551-515: The Performing Arts and Moving Image Archives at the University of California, Santa Barbara Library . Recalling the PXL2000's initial promise of accessibility, Fialka's vision includes accepting submissions indiscriminately, juxtaposing the works of established artists with those of amateurs and children. PXL2000 cameras have been used occasionally in professional filmmaking, with camera modifications to output composite video , enabling it to interface to an external camcorder or VCR . The PXL2000
580-515: The final image for viewing. For playback and view-through purposes, circuits read image data from either a recorded cassette or the CCD and fill half a digital frame store at the PXL reduced rate, while scanning the other half of the frame store at normal NTSC rates. Since each half of the frame store includes only 10 800 pixels in its 120 × 90 array, the same as the CCD, the display resolution
609-434: The imaginary trial, incarceration, and eventual pardoning (by newly-elected president Jesse Ventura ) of Pee-wee Herman for the sale of Yohimbe . The PXL2000 was used by the characters Maggie ( Anne Hathaway ) and Jamie ( Jake Gyllenhaal ) in the 2010 film, Love & Other Drugs , although the black and white footage from the camera is shown at full film resolution. In 2018, Toronto filmmaker Karma Todd Wiseman used
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#1732786976308638-486: The right. In order to reduce the amount of information recorded to fit within the narrow bandwidth of the sped-up audio cassette, the ASIC generates slower video timings than conventional TVs use. It scans the 120 × 90 pixel CCD 15 times per second, feeding the results through a filtering circuit, and then to a frequency modulation circuit driving the left channel of the cassette head, as well as to an ADC , which creates
667-529: Was Frank Zappa ’s archivist and production assistant for ten years, and also worked for George Carlin . LA Weekly has described Fialka as a “cultural revolutionary”. Fialka worked for musician-composer Frank Zappa as archivist, production assistant, tour assistant, and factotum from 1983 to 1993. He answered the phone for Zappa’s Barking Pumpkin Records hotline, and ran Zappa’s mail-order merchandise business Barfko-Swill . Fialka appears giving
696-662: Was Executive Producer for the first song, "Revenge of the Nurds", ever released by Dawayne Bailey , who went on to play guitar for rock music bands including Chicago and Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band . Fialka also acted as Bailey’s first manager. He has also produced recordings by local Venice, California musicians, including Sunny War. Guitarist John Frusiante of the Red Hot Chili Peppers has talked about Fialka's influence on him when he
725-554: Was deemed to be marginal, and black borders were added around the picture, squashing the frame store image content into the middle of the frame, preserving pixels that would otherwise be lost in overscan . An anti-aliasing low-pass filter is included in the final video output circuit. The market success of the PXL2000 was ultimately quite low with its targeted child demographic, in part due to its high pricing. Introduced at US$ 179 (equivalent to about $ 480 in 2023) and later reduced to $ 100 (equivalent to about $ 270 in 2023), it
754-493: Was expensive for a child's toy but affordable by amateur video artists. The PXL2000 was produced in two versions: model #3300 at $ 100 with just the camera and necessary accessories; and #3305 at $ 150 adding a portable black and white television monitor with a 4.5-inch (110 mm) diagonal screen. Extra accessories were sold separately, such as a carrying case. It was also produced as Fisher-Price PixelVision, Sanwa Sanpix1000, KiddieCorder, and Georgia. The PXL2000 has received
783-527: Was interviewed by music executive and producer Rick Rubin . Fialka has written, directed, produced, and/or acted in several short experimental films. Collaborators have included Mark X. Farina, Will Erokan, Clifford Novey, Bruno Kohfield-Galeano, Tyler Bartram, Tim Corvin, and Mike Sakamoto (who is making a film about Fialka); and some films feature Fialka’s wife Suzy Williams , or Morgan Ågren , who played drums for various Frank Zappa projects and concerts . Fialka produced and directed
812-534: Was used by Richard Linklater in his 1990 debut film, Slacker . A roughly two-minute performance art sequence within the film is shot entirely in PixelVision. Peggy Ahwesh 's Strange Weather (1993), which follows several crack cocaine addicts in Florida, was shot entirely on a PXL2000. This video relies heavily on the camera's portability to maintain an intimate presence. Video artist Sadie Benning
841-589: Was used for point of view shots of the title character in Nadja (1994), and it was used by the title character to make video diaries in Hamlet (2000). The camera has been used for several music videos, including "Mote" by Sonic Youth and "Black Grease" by the Black Angels . Artist John Humphrey's 2003 video, Pee Wee Goes to Prison was shot on a PXL2000, employing a cast of dolls and other toys to stage
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