I thought it worthwhile writing a small amount on my experience with home movie to video transfers. What I often find with my customers is that they are unaware of what is available and what is going to make a difference in how their home movie transfer ends up looking. While it may be impossible to write an entirely unbiased opinion on the subject I’ll do my best. We are satisfied with the quality of transfer that we offer and are quite certain that it is very good for the price that we charge. That said there are higher end options that you may want to explore and definite things to avoid if you are trying to make a decision between one local provider and another.

I (Greg Miller – partner at Film Rescue International) have been offering super 8 and regular 8 transfers to video since about 1988. From that time to 1999 before opening this business I was operating what was considered one of the top quality transfers in North America at Exclusive Film and Video in Toronto. One of the few companies at that time stupid enough to lock down a 20 thousand dollar video camera on a super 8 transfer unit. Most of the work was for students and production companies though there was a good amount of home movie work sprinkled in.

We set our transfer service up here at Film Rescue because it was necessary for some of the developing work that we do. We didn’t need an absolute top end transfer unit that would involve mortgaging our homes to pay for but we also didn’t want to be offering a transfer that would produce results where we’d have to keep our fingers crossed that the customer would be happy. Along with this we needed a unit that would run real time and allow us to get through our work at a reasonable pace. In the end we opted for a unit with a top quality (top quality four years ago that is) professional video camera and well maintained projectors that would give us a solid image without any shake. We’re happy with the results and the unit works well and has good ergonomics for what we need to do. Enough about us. We understand that our customers will often want to shop locally or at times will need or be able to afford an absolute top quality transfer.

Here’s what matters…in my opinion of course

There are different methods of getting your home movies onto video. What has been considered in the movie industry the apex of what’s available is what is called a flying spot scanner. When you go to your local video store and rent a movie this is how the film has been transferred into the video format for duplication and distribution. While there are probably well over a hundred of these units in North America there is only about 3 or 4 that have the gate that will allow them to transfer Super 8 film to video. I know of none that will transfer regular. These machines new are hundreds of thousands of dollars and it follows that because of this transferring your home movies on these units will also be expensive.

In the last few years a new type of transfer unit has been developed that puts out top quality and is far far less expensive to purchase. It’s called a video work printer. I’ve seen transfers from both these units and flying spot scanners of super 8 film. I prefer what this unit is putting out compared to the fly spot though some would argue differently. The problem with these units is that, though very high quality, they must be run very slow (6 frames per second). The images are captured frame by frame into a computer. After this is done the frame rate must be converted so that the images are moving at the correct speed. Though this unit is a fraction of the price to purchase then the flying spot scanner, a technician needs to spend a lot of time to get film transferred to DVD. Because of this, the expensive for transfers on these units is generally also quite high. Though with competition what it is, there are those out there that will do it for less then I’d be willing to do it for if I had such a unit.

The Video Work Printer is basically a film projector pointed into a video camera. Though with this unit the capture is frame by frame into a computer. Most transfer machines are just this. A video camera somehow pointed into a film projector. Now there are different approaches to this but that’s it. Pretty basic stuff. There are those out there that are simply projecting onto a wall and shooting it with a video camera. Do your best to avoid these people like old fish.

So…..What makes one transfer service better then another when it comes to transfers offered between 10 and 15 cents a foot? Two things. It’s important that the transfer unit have a good quality 3 chip video camera on the rig. A three-chip camera will give you better color fidelity and picture. Just as important is the operator. Someone that knows what they’re doing and someone that fully attends the transfer. You can have a wonderful transfer system but if you’re just going to put it on auto exposure and leave the room you will likely have a less then satisfying transfer.

I’ll also mention here a notoriously low quality transfer system that many companies use because it’s easy to operate and comes as a self-contained unit. It’s called an Elmo Transvideo. What this is is an Elmo projector (Elmo projectors are in fact very high quality) with a small single chip video camera built into approximately where the lens used to be. These are old technology and haven’t been manufactured since the late 80’s. The concept was good but the video camera is horribly out of date. Transfers from these are muddy and lack any kind of reasonable color fidelity. Ask and make sure that the provider that you are considering is not using one of these units to transfer your film. A lot of companies still are so be careful.

Another thing to consider is the running speed of your film. The standard running speed for Super 8 film was 18 frames per second (fps) and for regular 8, 16 fps. The high end transfers like the flying spot scanner and the Video work printer can transfer at the proper speed. Other systems, such as our own, some compromises must be made in order to sync the film with video (North American standard video is 29.97 fps). I won’t go into the math but for super 8 to sync with video it must be run at about 20 fps to eliminate flicker on the screen. That speed can be cheated down to about 19 fps without the flicker becoming unreasonably apparent. A one fps different will not be noticeable with silent film. With Super 8 film that has a sound stripe though that 1 fps is enough to make voices noticeably higher. Generally still acceptable but some may beg to differ.

The bigger issue is with regular 8 film. A standard 8mm projector like a super 8 projector will sync with video at 20 fps. There’s no cheating that down to 16fps and a 4 fps speed difference is quite noticeable. It will give your film a comedic Chaplinesque feel but that really wasn’t how the film was intended to be viewed. It will also considerably shorten the running time of your family home movie achieve. There is a way around this for those offering transfers. That is to have the shutter in the regular 8 projector modified from the standard 3 bladed shutter to a 4 bladed shutter. This will allow the Regular 8 projector to sync with video at 15fps. Still a frame off but it too can be cheated up a bit to bring it very near its appropriate running speed.

Before I end I’d like to tackle a couple of myths.

Myth 1:

“Your film is getting old and falling apart. It better be transferred to video as soon as possible.”

This especially made me upset when the common format to transfer to was video tape. I have many customers that had their film put to video 20 years ago and are now having to redo it because it’s the video falling apart - not the film. Albeit film will eventually turn to dust as all things will but in most cases there’s no panic to have it put to DVD. Even though we at Film Rescue do use so called “archival” DVDs the jury is still out on just how long these things will last. There is some concern with Ektachrome type film. This was film, that unlike Kodachrome or B&W film had the dye incorporated into the emulsion. These dyes have faded and color shifted over time and are certainly not getting any better. They do only account for about 20% of the home movie film that is out there. It is a good idea to think about getting these converted over sooner rather then later. Don’t get me wrong. It certainly isn’t a bad idea to not keep all of your eggs in one basket and not have your film transferred but on the other hand….It’s very rare that I have in my hands film that has been stored in normal conditions, that is less then 60 years old (often older) that is in any emanate danger of going back to the elements. Generally film of this vintage is still quite projectable. Bigger considerations should be “do I have a projector that is working properly to look at these films on?” and “It would be nice if I could have copies of this made so that everyone in the family can have one”.

Myth 2:

“At our company we can make your film look better then it does projected.”

Grrrrrrr!!!! Complete baloney. Never have I seen a transfer that looks better on any kind of video screen then properly exposed film will look with a good projector on a proper screen in a darkened room. Not to mention the wonderful experience of sitting with the hum of a projector looking at a screen with family in a darkened room. Oh dear…am I talking myself out of business here. Granted if you have some footage that is a good deal underexposed then some measure can be taken to improve that in the transfer to video. But generally no. There is no magic yet out there that will make your film look better then the projected image. First off video often cannot reproduce the range of light that is on your film (a flying spot scanner will be the best at this). Normally in transferring, especially outdoor high contrast scenes you’re going to lose something either in the shadows or highlights of the image. Second, There’s all sorts of software out there that do wonderful things but this takes huge amounts of processing and thus huge amounts of time and if your transfer is in that 10 to 15 cents a foot range then this likely isn’t happening with your film. Even with the amazing software that’s available there’s still nothing in the way of decent film grain reduction software. The one thing your small format film could truly benefit from. When you look at your transferred film you shouldn’t be saying to yourself “this sure looks better projected”. That would be an unsatisfactory transfer. Though I don’t think those with decent projection equipment will ever find themselves saying “this sure looks better then it did on the projector”.

This is getting long and likely really not all that interesting so for those that made it this far... I hope you don’t feel your time has been wasted. And for those that will just skip to the bottom line I’ll make it simple by putting into bold type…

There are all sorts of qualities of home movie transfer out there - From the very good to the extremely poor. Before you pay anywhere between 100 and 1000 dollars if not more, to get your family achieves transferred to DVD, pay to have a test done with a small portion of your film (we’ll generally do a couple of minutes for free if requested). Make sure you’ll be happy with what you get. In the end, all technical jargon aside, that’s what will matter.