For many people, photos, negatives, videos, and films of their loved ones are where all their memories are held. The idea of losing those memories is unthinkable. Fortunately, technological advances mean that these items can easily be digitized, preserving them in a convenient, safe, and shareable way.

The availability of devices that can convert film, negatives, and photographs to a digital medium may have some people thinking that this is a project they can tackle themselves. But there are several reasons why working with a reputable conversion service is ideal. Consider some benefits of using a professional company to safeguard your precious memories by making them digital.

Size Matters

Professionals use highly technical and precise equipment to convert documents, photos, negatives, film, and video to digital files. The devices available to the layman to convert digital files may be more affordable, but they may compress the size of files during conversion. This can lead to a lower resolution, fuzzier images, or – in the case of moving pictures – loss of clarity while playing. With photos, the higher the resolution, the better quality for any prints wanted in the future. Remember that sharing files will often cause further compression, so beginning with the best quality digital file possible is essential.

Staying Neat and Clean

Let’s face it, many items that need to be converted to digital files have not been kept in optimal conditions. Photographs may have tears or watermarks, and films or videos have likely not been kept in archival vaults. Add to this the problem with many video tapes — those plastic covers used by so many can contribute to causing more moisture to accumulate on the tapes. This can cause a gummy situation known as “sticky shed” that, if not handled properly, will make conversion impossible. Not only can sticky shed ruin videos, but it can also destroy any VCR used for conversion. Professional services, like ARS Video, understand how to deal with this issue. We have the proper equipment, materials, and expertise to deal with sticky shed and save memories on videotape.

The Out of the Ordinary

Film and video come in many different formats. Finding equipment to convert less popular film formats can take time and effort. Still, ARS Video can convert whatever format holds a family’s memories, including VHS, VHS-C, Hi-8, MicroMV and Betamax, MiniDV, DVCAM, HDV, Betacam SP, U-Matic Tape, and DVC Pro.

Color Us Happy

The chemicals used to show color in photographs, negatives, videos, and film can fade over time. The older the item being converted, the more likely that some form of color correction will be needed. If the plan is to convert files to digital and save the best version of each image, working with a professional video services company like ARS Video is essential. Professional color correction is nearly impossible to duplicate in a do-it-yourself effort.

Sounding Off

Just as preserving or enhancing color on converted items is a specialized skill, so is optimizing the sound for any film or video. Work with a professional who understands that memories should be seen and heard.

Staying Organized

Even the most organized do-it-yourselfer could get lost in a large digital conversion project. Working with a professional allows them to take their best practices and collaborate with each customer to develop a system that will allow for fast, easy retrieval of files once they are digitized. Since most programs that organize digital files have search capabilities, finding digitized pictures becomes much easier than searching through boxes in the back of a closet!

Memories In, Memories Out

In the process of digitizing, there are opportunities to edit and reuse those files. ARS Video can preserve the video of a child’s recital and edit out the reruns of Doogie Howser, MD, at the end of that tape. Plus, ARS Video’s expertise allows editing many memory files into one high-quality presentation that can be used to celebrate birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, or other significant family milestones.

Why Digitizing is Important

Digitizing family memories has so many benefits. Years of accumulated photos, films, and videos can all be stored on a device as small as a flash drive. For additional safety, saving these files on the cloud means you’ll never have to worry about a fire, natural disaster, or de-cluttering to compromise your memories. Plus, you’ll be able to view and share these files from anywhere with an internet connection. Sharing family history becomes much easier on ancestry sites and social media. And with high-quality images, like those digitally preserved by ARS Video, anyone with access to these files can easily make their own prints in the size that works for them.

Memories are too significant and precious to trust to unqualified hands. Just because your uncle watched a few videos on YouTube about preservation doesn’t mean he can handle the scope of digitizing the most important memories for your family.

Why ARS Video?

Since we began preserving memories over 35 years ago, ARS Video has been a family-owned, high-tech company. Because of our experience, expertise, and focus on customer service, we understand the importance of every project entrusted to us. We stay current on the latest technology and use it to provide a quality product. Excellent customer service is a priority; our pricing is upfront and fair, with no hidden costs.

ARS Video

Since 1987, the ARS Video team has been preserving precious memories and valuable archival footage through video transfer, film digitization and more media services for customers across the USA. Our team is always watching for new technology trends and is proud to have been at the forefront of analog media conversions for many years. Committed to customer service excellence and to delivering a great final product for our customers – many of whom are repeat partners over the years – we blog about trends in digitization,  high tech vs low tech, culture milestones, and tips for getting the most out of your valuable recorded media. Thanks for reading!

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How VHS Digitization Works?

If you are looking for a way to digitize your VHS movies at home, you are going to need a good VCR (Video Cassette Recorder), Analog to Digital Converter (ADC) hardware and a computer with the necessary software. First, you need to make sure you have a working VCR. Even though they are not impossible to find, the one you have sitting in your attic may not work anymore. There are three possible outputs from the VHS VCR, they are composite, S-Video and component. Most consumer ADCs accept composite (yellow RCA cord) and S-Video (special S-Video cord). If your VCR has S-Video output, you will get better quality using that. Professionals use component out. Connect the video out, composite or S-Video and the audio output to the Analog to Digital Converter.

The ADC unit will then connect to your computer with a USB wire. Software will need to be installed and can usually be downloaded from the web site of the company from which you purchased the ADC. With the software you will be able to monitor the picture and adjust the VCR tracking and the audio levels. Here is a Pro Tip, if you do not hear the audio try changing the VCR audio from stereo to normal, it can be done with the VCR remote control or in the VCR menu.

The software will create video files. The file types are important based on how you want to use them. For editing on a PC, you will want to select .AVI. AVI files are large because they have less compression, and they are very good quality. For editing on an Apple computer select .MOV for the same reasons. For compatibility with TVs and video sharing services like YouTube and Facebook select MP4. We do not recommend going to DVD as they are old technology, but if you want to burn DVDs select the format that your DVD burning software requires and don’t forget you will need a DVD burner.

After this, you need to inspect the video tape for damage or mold, put the tape into the VCR and rewind it to the beginning. Next, press play on your VCR, and hit the record button on your computer software program. This will get the VHS cassette to start converting. It is going to be done at real time so if it is a full 2 hours tape it will take 2 hours. Be sure to check the recording from time to time and adjust the tracking as needed. When the video is finished press stop on the computer software or you will record a lot of extra junk that will make the file bigger. Name the file and save it in a folder so you can find it later.

The files can now be copied, uploaded to the internet, played back on the computer or played back on your TV. Laptops have HDMI outputs so you can connect it directly to your TV. Flash drives can be formatted to plug directly into the TV USB port and viewed. Pro Tip, there are three different formats for flash drives, Fat 32, exFat, and NTFS, Apple computers prefer exFat and TVs prefer NTFS, check your manual.

It might be difficult for you to track down all of this equipment, and you need to make sure the equipment can talk to each other. If you are patient, and you are willing to invest in this, you may be able to do this on your own. Ultimately, it would probably be better to use a professional service.

The Best Method for Reliable Results

Clearly, there is a lot of equipment you need to purchase if you would like to digitize your VHS tapes on your own. Furthermore, this is going to take a tremendous amount of time, which is probably better spent elsewhere. Of course, you still need to make sure your VHS video footage is protected, which is where we can help you. Here at ARS Video, we have a tremendous amount of experience digitizing VHS footage of all genres. We already have the professional equipment ready, and we have a tremendous amount of experience we can use to help you. We will repair your tapes, if necessary, upscale them to High-Definition MP4 files delivered to you on a Flash drive for your TV/PC, and archive them in case you need more copies. We are always open, honest, and transparent about our services. It would be our honor to help you as well. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you digitize your VHS movies!

Sean McCreary

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