Why Do You Need To Digitize Your Old Videos?

Why Do You Need To Digitize Your Old Videos?

The Problem

You’ve got a huge collection of old family movies that span over 50 years or more. It contains your parent’s or grandparent’s old 16mm or 8mm movie film and then your collection of video tapes probably on the original ½” video format VHS. (VHS stands for Video Home System).

Like most of our customers, they no longer have the equipment to view the old media to see what’s on them. Projector bulbs or belts are broken and VHS players are in disrepair or nonexistent. What’s a home movie fan to do?

In some of our past blogs, we have discussed digitizing videos along with how or where to go to convert home movies to digital.

Why do you need to digitize your old videos?

Today I want to discuss briefly some human healthy beneficial reasons why to digitize memories.

Memories Make Us Feel Better

Granted some people have traumatic memories in their past caused by crime, violence, abuse, etc. that they’d rather not relive. Here, I’m referring to harmless healthy memories of a normal childhood or a positive experience we had in our past that happened to be captured by a friend or family member on film as photographs or home movies on 8mm film or videotapes.

Those positive lovely memories are etched on film or magnetic videotapes and they will differ from what we remember. Not that I’m an expert but we seem to take an event and we cherry-pick it and remember it in our re-creation of that event. Remember humans are living organisms and are heavily influenced by our environment and a keen focus on self interests. 

The memories in our brain are attached to many other feelings or experiences. For instance, when we are 5 years old our brains are still developing as we sense our environment at that time. Not fully developed, yet at some level we are aware of our situation and feel the temperature or weather, we sense the excitement level we felt at that event. These all play into and are associated with how we remember an event.

Often when a person years later watches that event on film it will differ from what they remember. Is that a good thing or not? I believe watching the event, enhances that memory and brings it to life to you in a new way.

Researchers have found that Alzheimer’s patients are stimulated and brain synapses can re-connect and come alive as they see and remember things new again.

My point here is remembering positive aspects of our lives helps us to cope and understand our past and perhaps allows us to foster that same wide-eyed enthusiasm we once had and to help nurture it in younger family members.

Yes, reliving memories is good therapy! Read article from Library of Medicine. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6719713/

What Do We Have?

There may or may not be an avalanche of memories documented on your old media. The only way to make sure is to view them at home (if possible) or turn to a video tape transfer service. 

Digitizing your home movies can seem daunting given the number of tapes or films you have but once you decide to bite the bullet and get them transferred, you’ll be happy not only for yourself but for others that were a part of this slice of history. They will see the event and will remember it from their perspective just as you did. Sharing those thoughts while watching the media will open up a whole other discussion that you weren’t expecting. This happened to my younger sisters and me. After the passing of our parents, we watched and discussed the home movies from each other’s recollections and knowledge at that time.

This helped us to better understand our parents at that point in their lives and helped us to see what they were dealing with or experiencing at that time. Spousal relationship, parenting styles, job, and home life. Needless to say, an eye-opener for all.

Find a Video Transfer Service

When beginning the process to digitize memories you first must decide to do it yourself or to hire a professional video transfer service.

Recommendations are the best because someone has gone through the process before and will give advice on how or who to use and why. Word-of-mouth advertising is still the best referral. Thankfully because of our longevity in this business (nearly 30 years) we have transferred hundreds of thousands of media items for our clients. They are now our best salespeople with their word on the street marketing.

Aside from person-to-person referrals, you can find a local company to digitize old videos. Checking out their reviews online can give you a sense of satisfaction others have had with their services.

Some precautions to consider. Don’t wait too long to get your media transferred. News flash, It’s already too late but move decisively and get the conversions done now as the media continues to degrade every day. Make sure the transfer company has the experience and the correct equipment to make the transformation you are hoping for.

What to Expect

Speed of service and pricing are of concern in any transaction. In another blog, we wrote advice on the speed of service and pricing examples on what to expect so we won’t repeat ourselves here. Link to How To Convert Old Camcorder Tapes To Digital  

https://thevideoeditor.com/blogs/posts/how-to-convert-old-camcorder-tapes-to-digital

Delivery and Viewing Options

You don’t have to spend too much time thinking about what you want your old analog media transferred to. Every item whether it is photographs, 35mm slides, videotape, or 8mm home films should be digitized. Technically it means turning hard copy photos, magnetic audio and videotapes, and movie film into 0s and 1s (digital). These zeros and ones will not fade or discolor, it is locking in colors that won’t fade, have tracking issues, or pops in the audio. Digital is a much more stable option that is future-proofed. It will hold up and still be watchable in the future.

Once you have digitized your old analog media you need to select an output media. Either you want DVDs, a cloud link, or a USB thumb drive to store and watch your media. Some will choose all options but consider how you will be viewing your memories.

If you plan to watch your memories on a TV then maybe a set of DVDs will work for you. Update: DVDs as great as they are can get fingerprints and smudges on the disc that later could cause the playback to freeze or jump.

 If watching your films and old videotapes on a computer then a USB thumb drive will work and can handle all of your media and provide the easiest interface. With a USB you can also transfer to iTunes and then transferred and made watchable on tablets and phones. You can also plug your USB thumb drive into newer TVs. Simply switch the TV input to USB and see a menu list of all your media available.

A final option to consider for your delivery is a cloud link to Google Drive. Here you can share a link with others to view the media on a computer. Anyone with this link will also be able to download the media to their computer. Here at The Video Editor, we offer the cloud link for two months which gives you plenty of time to view and share with others before you must download the media to your computer or your private Google Drive for safe keeping long term.

Hopefully, we have given you enough information to understand why you should digitize your old videos along with the ability to choose a company that will assist you in getting into the digital age. Please refer to our many other blog subjects to keep you informed.