Scanning Line, Television

a narrow, usually horizontal strip traced by an electron beam on the target of a television camera tube or the screen of a kinescope during scanning of an image. The video signal corresponding to the scanning line contains information on the brightness distribution of the image transmitted in a horizontal direction, that is, along the line. Oscillograms of the video signals of particular television lines make it possible to measure different characteristics and parameters of television camera tubes and other transducers that convert light to electrical signals. These characteristics include the transfer characteristic, the accuracy of color transmission, horizontal linearity, sensitivity, and the signal-to-noise ratio.