Strobe lag is identified as a major source of sensitivity in distinguishing acceptable and flawed glassware in bright field video inspection systems employing strobed light sources and video systems with vidicon tubes. By disabling video signal generation from the photoconductive target of the vidicon for several milliseconds beginning with initiation of the strobed light sources, less sensitive and more stable operation of the video inspection apparatus is achieved. The video signal is generated from the fully developed stored image on the photoconductive target.