Mechanical television systems

Mechanical television systems use a rotating disk with small holes or segments (called a scan disk) to scan an image line by line. As the disk spins, it directs a beam of light or electrons onto a photo-sensitive surface to generate an electrical signal, which encodes the image. On the receiving end, a similar disk recreates the image by modulating light or electron beams, displaying it on a screen. These early systems, developed in the 1920s and 1930s, relied on mechanical motion rather than electronic components, limiting resolution and image quality but pioneering the foundation of television technology.