I'm looking for a device that will read 8mm home movie film and
convert it into a digital output for making dvd,s

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Request for Question Clarification by endo-ga on 25 Nov 2003 20:28 PST

Hi,

What is your budget?

Thanks.
endo

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Request for Question Clarification by endo-ga on 25 Nov 2003 20:46 PST

And what are the specifications of your PC?
Processor, memory, hard drive space.

Thanks.
endo

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Clarification of Question by lynsa-ga on 26 Nov 2003 14:55 PST

Thanks for the answers. Some of you must be less than 30 years old.
You play 8mm movies (film, not video tape) on a movie projector, thus
digicams are useless.
I have heard of a converter name, or built, by Kuko or Kaku or Kako
but I have not been able to find any info on it.
Any comments?

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Request for Question Clarification by sycophant-ga on 30 Nov 2003 01:42 PST

Hi lynsa, 

Do you own a Digital Video camera and have a computer that can
communicate with it  (with a Firewire connection)?

If so, I have seen some very effective transfers achieved either with
a standard projector, or using a small device like the one owain
mentioned in the comments.

There are a number of steps to take with your video camera when using
this method to ensure the best results. Let me know if your interested
and I will explain them and point you at some resources.

Also, the devise you are thinking of is from Goko, and it's a
'Telecine' the model is TC-20 - there is quite a bit of info available
about it online, which a Google search will reveal.

Regards,
Sycophant-ga

Hi lynsa-ga,

  If you have lot of 8mm tapes to convert, the
easiest way would be to buy a cheap digital-8 sony
handycam and a firewire add-on card.  You could
also get some of the add-on card with software(pinnacle/
pyro etc.) bundles that provide this functionality. 
This will be better, if you already have a miniDV 
camcorder.

Regards
ldavinci-ga

I have the same requirement .... And I'll post a supplementary if
asked but, otherwise ...

Sorry, Leonardo you've lost me ...

What does one play the 8mm movies on?

Bryan
The Cheeky One

This might be of use to you:

http://www.programurl.com/utilities_8mm2avi.htm

The 8mmtoavi software suggested by pinkfreud-ga takes "90 times the
movie duration." to complete the scanning process frame by frame.

Unless there is so much work that it is worth spending on an
adapter/converter (which is basically a lens/screen you point your
projected movie into one end and a digital camera into the other) I
would use a conversion lab. Costs can be very reasonable and the good
ones will use semi-professional telecine equipment.

http://www.pennylane.demon.co.uk/html/cine_film.htm
charges GBP 16 per 400 ft spool

http://www.video2cd.co.uk/cine.html#1
GBP 35 per hour + GBP 5 per reel. "The reel charge is basically a
species of self-defence. It's a real hassle to set up a telecine, and
frankly I'd really rather not do it every 4 minutes. The moral of this
is that you should - where possible - splice together your 3" reels
into 7" or 8" reels. We may be able to do this for you (for a fee,
alas) in the not too distant future. The upside is that the fee will
be less than the reel charge."
A 7"	400 ft reel is 32 mins

That site provides an interesting overview of some of the problems
inclduing the difference in frame rates between cine and video, dull
edges and frame cropping.  "A telecine scans each frame of your cine
film individually, with linear illumination giving excellent
reproduction, and incidentally perfect frame rate conversion; remember
cine is projected at around 18 frames per second, where as PAL DVDs
play at 25fps."

http://www.digitalcopycat.com/prices.html
from about GBP 4 per 50 ft.

These are all UK sites but you should be able to find providers fairly
local to you. Above prices are, I think, for transfer to video.
pennylane.demon charge GBP 25 for transfer to DVD for up to 2 hours.

YOu might also want to research video and photography newsgroups. If
you check Google Groups archive for threads such as
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8&selm=a7hl15%24utb%242%40newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk
and click on 'view entire thread' for a discussion.

Owain

Although you can do the transfer on your own with a telecine type
system, you will never get the quality you would get with a frame to
frame transfer.  This method preserves the images at the highest
resolution and places them on miniDV or DVD.  There is a network of
companies that can do this for you.  Try these groups:

http://www.takeonenetwork.com
http://www.alphavideoservices.com
http://www.tyravideo.com

Cheers!

Videodude