Digitizing old tapes; Digital8, miniDV, etc

---------------

basman007 wrote in post #11741795
Hello everyone!

I'm new to making/editing video and I'm in need of your help. I've got alot of old tapes ranging back about 80 years. Most of them are in storage, so I don't exactly know what kind of format they are. The ones I've got with me are about 30 Digital8 and miniDV tapes from the last 10 years. I've also got a few VHS tapes.
I want to make a digital (lossless) copy of all the tapes to act as a backup and I want to edit them and burn them on a dvd for the whole family to enjoy. Now, all I've got are the tapes; I don't have any old cameras (just a digital one) or cables, etc.
What is the best way to handle this? Is there a device that plays different format tapes? Or should I get a 2nd hand camera from ebay (although I noticed these old cameras aren't as cheap as I thought) to get the tapes on my pc without loss of quality? What other hardware or software do I need?

Thanks in advance

Honestly, to get all the different players you're going to need, it's probably going to be cheaper to find a company in your area that offers this kind of service -- there should be someone near you, just look up film digitizing or whatever in google in your area.

If you go to Bestbuy you can buy a device that will hook up to your vcr or camcorder and you can then feed the films into your laptop or computer. It's about fifty bucks. They have it, even if the salespeople say they don't. Look at the link below, and occasionally the product changes, but essentially you simply plug the vcr into the device (through standard av plugs) and the device plugs into the USB port on the computer, click a few times, and bring the videos across. You can save them in any format you want (most use avi.). You can even plug the camcorder into the device and transfer movies that way.

As far as films are concerned, there are a couple options: 1. Project it on the wall and film it using a video camera (for silent movies). This is not high-tech, and the results will most likely suffer in quality, but those old films probably have poor quality anyway. Plus, at least you'll have the memories (and you can always add music to them or narration).

The only other option I can think of is a company that converts. Just google it.

Finally, you could always take a class at a community college and learn how to convert yourself using their equipment, but that's very time-consuming and not guaranteed to work as they usually don't let first-year students have unrestricted access to all the equipment.

Good luck. Get it done (don't put it off). My sister and I put it off (converting our deceased mom's films, pics, etc.) and they got ruined sitting in a garage for years and years.

Now's the time.

Then store them in the cloud.

Here it is at Best Buy. Best 50 bucks I spent (at the time). I saved home videos going back to 1999. This product says "VHS to DVD" but you can save them to your harddrive and then upload them to the cloud (smugmug, etc....any website that offers free video storage...youtube, vimeo, etc.).

http://www.bestbuy.com …76&skuId=921365​6&st=video to digital&lp=2&cp=1

If you have a lot of tapes to convert and want a really good convertor, check out Canopus: http://www.bhphotovide​o.com …onal_Media_Conv​erter.html

I have one of these and it works perfectly, never a single dropped frame, unlike others I've tried. I've tried cheaper ones and found them to be a waste of time and money and do a poor job overall. Sometimes you do get what you pay for.

hawkeye60 wrote in post #11742476
If you have a lot of tapes to convert and want a really good convertor, check out Canopus: http://www.bhphotovide​o.com …onal_Media_Conv​erter.html

I have one of these and it works perfectly, never a single dropped frame, unlike others I've tried. I've tried cheaper ones and found them to be a waste of time and money and do a poor job overall. Sometimes you do get what you pay for.

something like that is nice but only works on the DV tape. He'd have to buy another converter for his super8, and yet another for VHS, etc. -- which is why I recommend finding a service that does the converting.

Basman,

From the list you posted, all your Digital8 and miniDV tapes are already digital. Only the VHS tapes are analog. All you need for the Digital8 and miniDV tapes is something in which to play them attached to your computer. Heck, I still have an old Sony Digital8 camera. I used it to convert non-digital 8mm video tapes.

For the VHS tapes, if you still have a VCR, you can just connect that device to something like the one MikeFairbanks suggested.

But it would seem to me, since you have a lot of tapes and multiple formats, that a commercial service would be the way to go. If you had to find a VCR, Digital8 camera or deck, and a miniDV camera or deck to play all of those tapes into your computer, you are going to spend some money. The likelihood of using those devices once you got the tapes transferred is low to nil, so just spend the money on a transfer service and you won't have to go to the hassle of finding the devices and doing it yourself.

---------------

Chippy569 wrote in post #11742575
something like that is nice but only works on the DV tape. He'd have to buy another converter for his super8, and yet another for VHS, etc. -- which is why I recommend finding a service that does the converting.

No it works all. I used it mainly for my old VHS tapes.

basman007 wrote in post #11750096
I think the majority of the videos are on hi8 and digital8 tapes. They can be played be the same camera, right? Perhaps I can get a 2nd hand camera for those and just connect it directly to my pc...
What about the heads in 2nd hand cameras? If they're old will that result in less quality? Would it be a big difference?

I originally had a Sony 8mm analog video camera (actually, I had an old Sony Beta video camera, but that is a whole other story). Once I upgraded to a digital8 Sony camera, I was able to digitize my old 8mm analog videos by just playing them in my new digital camera connected to my computer via firewire. The quality was not the best, but they were still pretty good.

As to the quality of some second hand camera, that will depend on the camera.

Good luck.