8mm Movies

[Spawn67]

About 15 years ago my parents got our old 8mm movies converted to Video. I just had a friend of mine convert them to DVD.Watching old family outings from the 70's and early 80's is kinda hard to watch when I see old relatives that have long passed. The good thing is seeing me and my Megos and Star Wars and pretty much every toy that came out back then on Xmas morning.
Anyone else have any old 8mm movies that have been converted to video or DVD?

[Mikey]

I have.

I converted my super-8's to VHS back around 1985 ... and finally burned that on DVD a few years ago.

Today the films themselves are almost unwatchable due to deterioration.

Almost every film is covered in red/orange spots .... Glad I converted them when I did.

[Marvelmania]

I've got a few 8mm and super 8 movies but never had them converted to anything

[toysrus]

My parents converted ours years ago. Now that you mentioned the Megos, i'm going to search my Christmas 1970's 8mm for some classic toys!

[HardyGirl]

My brother has our family's home movies and has yet to convert them. I wish he would get the lead out.

[almitysufx]

I got my old super 8's out about 10 years ago and watched them with my daughter who was 8. We had such a good time that one of my friends snuck my movies out and had them converted to vhs and gave me the tape for my birthday. It was a great suprise. I need to have that tape converted to dvd before it gets messed up.

[mazinz]

I had mine done professionally (finally) within the last two years because all three of my projectors crapped out when I started to do this project myself. Cost me an arm and a
leg with a final total, but worth every penny

[Mikey]

Projector bulbs are expensive now

Ones for my projector run about $30.00

[megoapesnut]

When my grandfather passed away, I got all of his 8mm films as nobody else wanted them. They are priceless treasure troves of memories. I purchased my house from my grandmother 20 years ago after she moved in with my aunt. I have film of me running around the yard and riding my tricycle down the street of what is now my house. I have my Mom and Dad's wedding, and tons of footage of us down at the shore where my grandparents owned a trailer. I have my Dad's graduation. I have all of the equipment needed to do the conversions, so I got them on DVD about 6 years ago and gave everyone a copy for Christmas. Nobody knew I was doing it and had even forgotten that I had the films. We were laughing and crying for hours and it was an awesome experience - probably one of the top 10 days of my life.

[noelani72]

yea, but my question is; how'd they actually transfer?
I've pondered doing this very thing for years; but wish not to resort to filming off a screen or using one of those little mirror boxes.
I have watch the web over the years, and there are projectors designed to reduce the flicker and capture the film.
One would think in this day and age, a freaking simple scanner would be made for home use and just zip that stuff thru it.
I have a few hours worth from my grandparents that would be cool to do.

[megoapesnut]

Mine transferred very nicely. I do use one of the mirror boxes but I have a VERY old Sony camcorder - one of the first they ever sold, around 1986 or so and it has a switch to adjust the shutter speed. One of the settings gives me a perfect flicker free transfer. I transfer by connecting the camera directly into my computer using a converter box so the image is fed directly into the video editing software. It doesn't make a stop onto tape first, which saves a generation of quality. Now, these are 40-50 year old films. So, they aren't Blu-ray quality, but they are as good as if you were looking at them on a screen from the projector. Maybe a little better because you don't have to be in dark room.

[Spawn67]

When we were looking through the films that we coverted to video we found some old Baltimore Colts footage from some point in the 60's that my grandfather filmed. Theres even Johhny Unitas throwing one of his Infamous touchdowns!
I know what you mean by priceless treasures by converting them.

[JPkempo]

I have a VERY old Sony camcorder

What's the model number of the camera?

I have transfered lots of film but the flicker can be bad at times.

[megoapesnut]

It is the Sony CCD-V8AFu. I saw the one in Back to the Future when it came out and I had to have one. I think I paid like $3000 for it at the time. A year ago that bought me a Sony 3 CCD 1080i HiDef semi-pro camcorder. But this thing is the bomb when it comes to 8mm transfer, for a couple of reasons. One the shutter speed adjustment that I mentioned and the other trick to transferring with home equipment is to use a small mirror box. If you use a larger one, the light intensity is quite a bit less and everything looks washed out. You can't film off of a projector screen because you can't be directly behind the projector or the projector will be in the frame (duh) and if you put the camcorder a little above the projector and shoot down or vice versa, you get a little distortion. The small mirror boxes eliminate that as you are shooting straight on and the light intensity is bright. But you can't get the camera close enough to the box to fill the screen as it will not focus. My 9th grade Graphic Arts teacher gave me a set of close up lens filters for my Pentax K1000 as a gift for being his lab assistant during my study hall periods and they screw perfectly onto the Sony's lens and allow me to put it all but right up against the mirror box. (Thank you Mr. Wolfe - my favorite teacher)

Here is a photo of the camcorder



And here is a link to watch one of my transfers. Granted this is from the newest 8mm film I have so it looks real good. They get progressively worse as they get older and a tiny bit of flicker shows up on some. But it's not distracting at all. Give it a minute or three to load. And you probably need Quicktime to view it

http://www.megocipsa.com/ftpimages/clip2.mov

[JPkempo]

That looks like my first camera. I'll have to find it in the attic.