Tape or Film?

A pop quiz:

1--”Murphy Brown” is shot on (a) videotape (b) film;

2--L.A. Times staff photographers shoot on (a) film (b) videotape;

3--The L.A. Times is (a) a newsletter (b) a newspaper.

“Murphy Brown” is, as are the majority of four-camera shows, shot on film, not tape (“Signing Off, Quietly,” by Judith Michaelson, March 16). There is a world of difference--in style, in look, in production, in cost. This across-the-board generic use of the word “taping” has come to distort both the intrinsic and the artistic nature of the medium.

JACK E. HERMAN

North Hollywood