We can transfer most vintage PAL and NTSC tape formats to a digital tape or digital file. We have a good number of different machines and usually can find one that will play a tape in poor condition. Quite often there are tracking errors on recorded tapes so it is useful to have a choice of machines for that reason as well.
We cover all types of U-matic formats and have been fortunate to have sourced machines in good working order. Betacam also comes in a variety of analogue and digital formats and we can offer several playback machine options to cover Betacam, Betacam SP, digibeta and beta SX, in PAL and NTSC.
We regards to non-broadcast formats we offer transfer from Betamax, S-VHS (PAL and NTSC), and Hi 8. In fact we often have most trouble with these tapes. In part, because they are fragile and in part because of the way they are often stored. However, to date we have always managed to recover vital footage.
Our machines are maintained in first-class working order, at times it seems to me regardless of cost.
As well as physical issues with tapes, often the image quality and electronic stability are problematic. This is where timebase correctors are so helpful. We have several, all doing things a little differently. We can also convert NTSC to PAL, using proper NTSC video recorders and 4 field standards converters. These enhancements, used wisely ensure that the image is as good as realistically possible.
It is very useful to have a digital tape copy of your material. In addition to archiving, experience shows that play-in from analogue tape is more likely to be successful when done in this manner. We offer capture to digital files via Serial Digital Interface (SDI), as this usually offers the best quality. There are almost limitless possibilities as far as which format to use, in general capturing in the format you propose to edit in makes most sense. Although you may want an uncompressed archive version to keep for future use.
We have kept the pricing simple, based more on time involved rather than which formats are involved etc. Also, you are most welcome to be around during transfers.
