8mm Film Conversion Questions

gordonwd · Post by **gordonwd** » Mon May 01, 2006 3:07 pm

I have mainly been using VS to produce DVDs from old 8mm and Super-8mm movie films. Up to now, the place that has done the initial conversion burns an AVI file on a DVD and I just copy those to HD, read them into VS, and have at it. But they are now out of business and I'm looking for someplace else to do the job.

One place I've looked at claims that they do a "frame-by-frame" capture. They can give the result to me in AVI format, but they said that I will then have to do the "speed adjustment". 8mm film runs at 16 or 18fps or so. I have no idea how this relates to digital video, but does this sound like something that VS10 can do? I'm also curious how this would work at all: if digital video displays at a higher frame rate, would VS basically have to insert duplicate frames or something? Wouldn't this make it pretty jerky? (The AVI files that I got from the original place run very smoothly and at the correct speed.)

They can also provide the conversion to me in MPEG format, with the speed corrections "already done". This would make the files way smaller, but with some loss of quality, especially since I will be editing and re-rendering them. On the other hand, the quality of any 8mm film is not that great when blown up to TV size, so maybe that's the way to go.

One other nice thing is that this is a local outfit and they said that I can just bring them a USB hard drive and they can copy the files right to that instead of burning a bunch of DVDs. I'm thinking of having them do a trial in multiple formats so I can see what looks and works best, but am interested in any comments from the experts here.

jloughery · Post by **jloughery** » Tue May 09, 2006 12:31 pm

I have recently started converting 8mm to DVD at home. I use the ADS Technologies DVDXpress DX2 to capture the video onto my hard drive. It has an onboard processor which does the conversion into MPEG 2 so it doesn't use the computer system resources to convert. I have been very pleased with it so far and have not experienced any problems. I picked it up at Sam's Club for around $62.00.

erock1 · Post by **erock1** » Tue May 09, 2006 4:35 pm

jloughery wrote:I have recently started converting 8mm to DVD at home. I use the ADS Technologies DVDXpress DX2 to capture the video onto my hard drive. It has an onboard processor which does the conversion into MPEG 2 so it doesn't use the computer system resources to convert. I have been very pleased with it so far and have not experienced any problems. I picked it up at Sam's Club for around $62.00.

jloughery, I have a question or two for you. I have a bunch of 8mm and super 8mm film reels that I would like to convert to DVD. You indicate that you're using the ADS DVDExpress DX2. This hardware device is for capturing using USB, S-Video etc. How are you using this device with an 8mm movie projector? You had to leave out a crucial component and step in the capture. Can you please let me know what it is you're using.
TIA,
Erock

Doverwhite · Post by **Doverwhite** » Tue May 09, 2006 8:56 pm

Hear hear !!!

I would also like to know what is the intermediary device. I have had some success using a camcorder mounted alongside the projector such that the angle between the two is as small as possible. The resulting recording from the screen obviously has some distortion but this is barely perceptible. But is there a better way?

DVDDoug · Post by **DVDDoug** » Tue May 09, 2006 10:35 pm

I would also like to know what is the intermediary device.

I suspect jloughery has 8mm magnetic video tape, rather than 8mm optical film.

8mm film runs at 16 or 18fps or so. I have no idea how this relates to digital video, but does this sound like something that VS10 can do? I'm also curious how this would work at all: if digital video displays at a higher frame rate, would VS basically have to insert duplicate frames or something? Wouldn't this make it pretty jerky?

Right! I'm not sure how this is done "at home", but it's a problem with professional 35mm movies too...

35mm film is shot at 24 FPS. NTSC video is 29.97 FPS, and PAL is 25 FPS.

With PAL, there are 2 methods. You can simply play it back at 25 FPS with the associated 4% speed increase and 4% increase in audio pitch. The other (better) solution is to repeat one "field" (half-frame) every 12th frame.

NTSC uses a complicated process called 3:2 pulldown. Again, frames are repeated. It's actually a complicated sequence and 5:4 ratio involving the upper and lower fields... If forget where the 3:2 ratio comes from...

You can put 24 FPS on a DVD (at least the pros can), and the DVD player will perform the 3:2 pulldown with its firmware. That means that you are not wasting valuable DVD space on redundant frames.

gomactrading · Post by **gomactrading** » Tue May 16, 2006 12:30 am

Frame by frame transfer needs to be speed adjusted and the result can be produced as an .avi file not only .mpeg. The only problem is that the adjusted .avi file is twice as big as the captured one. If you do your own DVDs you can have the film captured and put either on a DVD as .avi files or on any type of hard drive. If you need this type of service you can visit www.filmorvideo.com.

sjj1805 · Post by **sjj1805** » Tue May 16, 2006 12:33 am

Please view:
http://phpbb.ulead.com.tw/EN/viewtopic.php?t=8849

DiscCoasterPro · Post by **DiscCoasterPro** » Tue May 16, 2006 2:08 am

I have played quite a bit with capturing projected super8 film to my miniDV. What I did was use a variable speed projector that slowed down the film to a point where flicker was greatly reduced. I'm guessing that adjustment point was about 15 or so fps. didn't really effect the visual speed, but you can step that up again after you digitize it. I think if it halves the miniDV 30fps and kind of syncs every other one

thats what minimizes the flicker.

I put a blank screen on the wall and a magazine page taped to it. After putting the camcorder on manual, I made my focus adjustment to that page. I took the page down and ran the film. When the projector was in focus, so was my camcorder. I used about an 18" size projection, and placed my camcorder on a tripod in front of and slightly under the projector.

The results were good.

edit ... I would alway opt for an AVI file and do absolutely everything to the clip that I could before encoding it to mpeg. I edit, and save my projects to an avi file and bring them into workshop for menuing. Only when I'm done do I encode with workshop. Before that last step, I say as far away from mpegs as I can

erock1 · Post by **erock1** » Tue May 16, 2006 5:52 pm

sjj1805 wrote:Please view:
http://phpbb.ulead.com.tw/EN/viewtopic.php?t=8849

Steve, thanks for this wonderfully detailed "How to." I have many reels of regular 8mm that I've always wanted to transfer. I now have a nice project ahead

Thank you too DisCoaster

romilar · Post by **romilar** » Mon May 22, 2006 6:37 pm

If you have cans and cans of vintage 8mm footage to convert, consider one of the telecine setups from the following company:

http://www.moviestuff.tv/8mm_telecine.html

Their equipment works well, and if you are converting is your business, or if you have much to convert, one of their setups will give you excellent quality, with reasonable returns on your investment of money, and time...

start under $1100.00

jloughery · Post by **jloughery** » Tue May 30, 2006 4:40 pm

Apologies for the confusion. I meant 8mm video.

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