Fading Memories

Ken Hart wrote in news
On 11/13/2016 05:05 PM, Jeff wrote:
android wrote in
:

Noons Wrote in message:
On 11/11/2016 5:42 @wiz, android wrote:
FYI: Colour negs from the seventies are fading badly now and slides
are fading too. Even Kodachrome. If you want to preserve your
pictures then the time to start scanning is now.



My Kodachromes from the early 60s are still as good as back then.
But they have not been projected a lot. Scanned, yes. A coupla
times.

The Agfa CT18 and CT200 slides from the 80s are ruined. Scanned them
just in time!

The Fujichrome slides from the 80s are fine. The Ektachrome slides
from the early 80s are starting to fade but have now been safely
scanned.

Colour negatives, the ones with plastic(?) base, are reasonable and
being scanned. The ones with celluloid(?) are a total mess now...

The scans are kept in 16-bit colour tiff files, 3 copies in 3
different 2Tb USB disks.

I'm actually surprised most of the film has survived so well!

Now, to take care of the VHS and S-VHS tapes...

Feel free to clue me in.
I have over 300 of them with two to four
movies on each...

You are facing a lot of time, since the tapes can only play in real
time.

Simply buy a VHS/DVD recorder that will dub the tape to a recordable
DVD. If you want to keep multiple movies on a DVD, you are done. If
you want to separate the movies to one per DVD, then:
1. dub the tape to DVD (use rewritable discs so you can erase and reuse
them later)
2. copy the vob files to your computers hard drive
3. use video editing program to merge the vob files into one mpeg file
4. cut and save each movie to a separate file
5. convert files to DVD format and burn to recordable DVD.


But before you do that: You might want to try to download a copy of the
movie (possibly a legally questionable thing to do!), and burn that to a
DVD.
Years ago, I started converting my Beta format movie collection to DVD,
by playing the tape into a converter box into my computer, and burning
the DVD. The quality was fair. I was able to find many of my movies
online for download and the burned DVD was much better, due to removing
a copy generation.


I tried the converter box method, also. The combo recorder gave me better
quality and didn't tie up the computer for a long time. Of course, the
quality can only be as good as the source tape.

On 13/11/2016 7:40 @wiz, android wrote:

Now, to take care of the VHS and S-VHS tapes...

Feel free to clue me in.
I have over 300 of them with two to four
movies on each...

Ouch!
I'm very likely the last person to give good advice on video.
(I have a real problem trying to understand the jungle of digital video
formats and options available nowadays)

FWIW, here goes what I do now.
My analog tapes are all home made. Family, kids, trips, etc.
Most of the movie ones I've bought the equivalent in dvd over the years.
No, I won't say how many dvds I have...

For the tapes I'm using a USB converter. It plugs into a S-VHS output
in a player and writes out to mpeg or better, choice of a few. It's
actually quite a no-brainer, more the time involved in playing them out
again than anything else. They all end up in USB 1TB or 2TB drives.
But it needs to be done before they all turn into mush...
Wish I had more free time to finish it off quickly.
A few I'm editing together once they are in digital using Corel Video
Studio Pro - which is cheap and quite good.
Nothing fancy, just putting lots of small S-VHS cartridge tapes together
into something that looks passable.

Not even sure if there is such a thing as a "master" video format that I
should be converting everything into, and then later edit it to viewable
formats! Kinda like keeping originals in RAW and only using processed
jpg ones. I just hope I won't lose anything precious...

In article , Noons
wrote:

On 13/11/2016 7:40 @wiz, android wrote:

Now, to take care of the VHS and S-VHS tapes...

Feel free to clue me in.
I have over 300 of them with two to four
movies on each...

Ouch!
I'm very likely the last person to give good advice on video.
(I have a real problem trying to understand the jungle of digital video
formats and options available nowadays)

FWIW, here goes what I do now.
My analog tapes are all home made. Family, kids, trips, etc.
Most of the movie ones I've bought the equivalent in dvd over the years.
No, I won't say how many dvds I have...

For the tapes I'm using a USB converter. It plugs into a S-VHS output
in a player and writes out to mpeg or better, choice of a few. It's
actually quite a no-brainer, more the time involved in playing them out
again than anything else. They all end up in USB 1TB or 2TB drives.
But it needs to be done before they all turn into mush...
Wish I had more free time to finish it off quickly.
A few I'm editing together once they are in digital using Corel Video
Studio Pro - which is cheap and quite good.
Nothing fancy, just putting lots of small S-VHS cartridge tapes together
into something that looks passable.

Not even sure if there is such a thing as a "master" video format that I
should be converting everything into, and then later edit it to viewable
formats! Kinda like keeping originals in RAW and only using processed
jpg ones. I just hope I won't lose anything precious...

Well, I think that I would have to build a RAID and dedicate a computer
for the transfer process. If I put one tape in the player in the morning
and tag the files in the evening then the job would be done in less than
two years! :-) Won't start tomorrow...
--
teleportation kills

In article , Jeff
wrote:

You are facing a lot of time, since the tapes can only play in real
time.

Simply buy a VHS/DVD recorder that will dub the tape to a recordable
DVD.

much better and far more convenient to archive them to a hard drive.

Which was part of the process I described and you snipped.

your process involved writing numerous dvds and then reading them back
in to copy off the vob files to then be converted to another format.

that's nuts. there is *no* point in doing it that way. import directly
to hd. done. not only faster and more convenient, but no transcoding
either.

nospam wrote in news:141120160929511560%
lid:

In article , Jeff
wrote:

You are facing a lot of time, since the tapes can only play in real
time.

Simply buy a VHS/DVD recorder that will dub the tape to a recordable
DVD.

much better and far more convenient to archive them to a hard drive.

Which was part of the process I described and you snipped.

your process involved writing numerous dvds and then reading them back
in to copy off the vob files to then be converted to another format.

that's nuts. there is *no* point in doing it that way. import directly
to hd. done. not only faster and more convenient, but no transcoding
either.

I said nothing about transcoding. The vob files are already mpeg format to
start with. There is no converting to another format, merely renaming the
file. I mentioned joining them and splitting _only_ if the movies were to be
handled as separate files.
VHS tapes are not a digital file you can "import directly to hd". My method
takes pressing a couple buttons to start the digitising process and you can
go on about your life for the hours it takes to do it.

In article , Jeff
wrote:

You are facing a lot of time, since the tapes can only play in real
time.

Simply buy a VHS/DVD recorder that will dub the tape to a recordable
DVD.

much better and far more convenient to archive them to a hard drive.

Which was part of the process I described and you snipped.

your process involved writing numerous dvds and then reading them back
in to copy off the vob files to then be converted to another format.

that's nuts. there is *no* point in doing it that way. import directly
to hd. done. not only faster and more convenient, but no transcoding
either.

I said nothing about transcoding. The vob files are already mpeg format to
start with.

true, but nobody wants vob files and the mpeg is mpeg 2 anyway.

There is no converting to another format, merely renaming the
file. I mentioned joining them and splitting _only_ if the movies were to be
handled as separate files.

it's much better and much, much faster to go straight to hard drive
than write a dvd, read it back and manipulate vob files. that's just
nuts.

you're drastically increasing the amount of work and amount of time it
takes.

VHS tapes are not a digital file you can "import directly to hd".

so what?

if the computer doesn't have a video input (most don't), then get a
converter box or handycam w/firewire. very simple.

after importing, optionally edit the file into separate clips, trim the
begin/end, etc.

i've done it many times.

My method
takes pressing a couple buttons to start the digitising process and you can
go on about your life for the hours it takes to do it.

your method ridiculous.

the simplest and most efficient way is import directly to a hard drive.
cheaper too.

On Thursday, November 10, 2016 at 10:05:23 PM UTC-5, Michael wrote:
On 2016-11-10 18:42:43 +0000, android said:

FYI: Colour negs from the seventies are fading badly now and slides are
fading too. Even Kodachrome. If you want to preserve your pictures then
the time to start scanning is now.

I recently scanned older Kodachromes than that and as long as they are
dark stored they hold up. But Kodachrome fades badly when projected a
lot. Ektachrome holds up better in light but not as well over time even
in the dark.
--
Michael

Hi,

My 1955 Kodachrome slides are still intact. My Rollei Anscochromes were 75% faded after about 15 years,and had to be scanned and then enhanced in Picasa.

Mort Linder

In article ,
RichA wrote:

On Thursday, 10 November 2016 13:42:46 UTC-5, android wrote:
FYI: Colour negs from the seventies are fading badly now and slides are
fading too. Even Kodachrome. If you want to preserve your pictures then
the time to start scanning is now.
---

Fixing them is complex, you need to create 3 layers (Red, green blue in PS)
or some other program and work with them. Forget Lightroom, it's N/G for
this.

Reducing the green channel seem to be the main key for negs. I've set it
to 75 percent in Vuescan and adjusted the tint in Preview for the
quickie JPGs. I guess that I'll use some similar formula for the DNGs
when I get to work with them. The slides, from the seventies are not
that bad, yet but needs some adjustment in colour balance and saturation
depending on brand and age. My fathers slides from the fifties OTOH... I
did get some coulor out of them but minty fresh they do not appear to
be...
--
teleportation kills