ColorGraphics Weather Systems: Difference between revisions

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'''ColorGraphics Weather Systems''' is a pioneering [[computer graphics]] company that produces a series of systems for displaying [[weather forecast]] data used by television stations. Originally based on custom hardware, today their products are software-based systems running on commodity systems.

Terry Kelly graduated from the [[University of Wisconsin]]-Madison in 1971 with a degree in [[meteorology]] and almost immediately took a job with the local Channel 27 calculating weather predictions. Over the next two years he introduced a number of new techniques to the industry - using magnets to represent high and low points, color markers on a whiteboard for graphics, and later hand-photographing satellite cloud imagry with a Bolex camera to produce the first cloud-movement animations.<ref name=p306>Nelson, pg. 306</ref><ref name=mad>Robert Chappell, [http://www.madisonmagazine.com/article.php?section_id=918&xstate=view_story&story_id=194192 "The Liberal Media"], ''Madison Magazine'', March 2005</ref>

ColorGraphics was formed in 1979 as a partnership between Terry Kelly and Richard Daly. Kelly was a TV weatherman who started a business in 1974 to sell custom weather forecasts to smaller organizations like ski resorts and local hiway departments. He had also introduced a number of new concepts in TV broadcast, including producing movies of moving cloud cover by hand-photographing satellite images using a Bolex camera.<ref>Nelson, pg. 306</ref>

Kelly and several of his colleges also produced weather forecasting software. In 1974 he was promoted to chief meteorologist at Channel 27,<ref name=mad/> and at the same time started Weather Central to sell and operate their software for smaller organizations like ski resorts and local hiway departments.<ref name=p306/>

Kelly and Daly had both worked in the [[University of Wisconsin]]'s Space Science and Engineering department, developers of the [[PDP-11]]-based "McIdas" (Man-Computer Interactive Data Access System) weather display system. McIdas used downloaded satellite cloud cover images and superimposed them on locally generated maps. Designed for the [[National Weather Service]], McIdas was a high-end system well beyond the budgets of a television station.<ref>Nelson, pg. 302</ref>

ColorGraphics was formed in 1979 as a partnership between Kelly and Richard Daly. Kelly and Daly had both worked in the [[University of Wisconsin]]'s Space Science and Engineering department, developers of the [[PDP-11]]-based "McIdas" (Man-Computer Interactive Data Access System) weather display system. McIdas used downloaded satellite cloud cover images and superimposed them on locally generated maps. Designed for the [[National Weather Service]], McIdas was a high-end system well beyond the budgets of a television station.<ref>Nelson, pg. 302</ref>

Kelly's idea was to adapt the McIdas concept for lower cost [[home computer]] systems that were appearing in the late 1970s. Their first system, "LiveLine", was based on the [[Apple II]], which could not be [[genlock]]ed, so a TV camera had to be pointed at the screen to send the video into the production systems. This initial system was soon replaced by a similar one running on [[Cromemco]] computers using their [[Cromemco Dazzler|Dazzler]] color-graphics card.<ref>Robert Kuhmann, [http://www.retrotechnology.com/herbs_stuff/crom_kuh.html "Cromemco S-100 computer ~ a Silicon Valley memoir (1977-1997)"], January 2008</ref> In spite of its simplicity and low resolution, the fast production and "high tech" look caught on, and soon the system was almost universal, replacing [[bluescreen]] systems on cardboard maps that had previously been used.<ref>Nelson, pg. 303</ref> The company notes that 70% of the top 50 TV markets were using the system by 1982.<ref name=wxc>[http://www.wxc.com/corporate/history.html "Weather Central History"]</ref>