I figure out how to digitize my Hi8 tapes so you don't have to 📼
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- čas přidán 25. 08. 2024
- It took over 15 years to digitize my old home movies, but I finally did it. I’ll show you how.
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I give you a hi5 for helping me out with my hi8's
Underrated comment
hilarious
This was my "quarantine" project. I got the elgato video capture and bought a hi8 camcorder off eBay and used a vcr for the OLD VHS tapes. I came across stuff I totally forgot about 😊 definitely worth the time and money spent. Buying the camcorder was cheaper than sending them to a digitizing service. In total I spent about $200 for about 20 tapes.
may i ask what camcorder you bought?
I ordered a hitachi hi8 camcorder, I don't remember the model off hand though
@@kristin4277 please try and tell me the model number, its been hard trying to find working camcorders
@@kristin4277 do you have any update what model you bought
OH WOW!!! THIS MIGHT JUST BE MY SOLUTION WITH A BROKEN OLD CAMCORDER!!! THANKS!
Came here for the transfer video but.. hello handsome! You distracted me. Wait let me watch again 😂
Same camera, same amount of years. Thank you!
Which camera is it !!
@@daniellekeane7904sharp viewcam hi8, there are 8mm & digital 8 versions also
I connected my old camera to a DVD recorder, so I recorded all my Hi8 tapes to DVD. Then I connected the DVD to my laptop and transferred it to digital. It takes a lot longer, but it’s cheap compared to these other options in the video
How did you connect the DVD recorder to your laptop? I’ve already recorded the Hi8 tapes to DVD, but the DVDs will only play on the recorder I burnt them on.
@@highwayboy I just put in the disc into the laptop and it played. You can also buy an external DVD drive for your laptop. I used Windows 10 and it worked, but maybe try VLC or something to play it. Just copy the file and export it as MP4. It’s been like 2 years since I did this so my mind is a bit rusty
@@MrIDGAF ahh ok fair enough. That’s my problem, when I put the disc in my laptop it doesn’t acknowledge anything is on it, even using VLC. Appreciate the reply though!
@@highwayboy Your DVD reader could be the issue. Either that or your computer OS. But all I remember is copying the DVD file onto my desktop and converting that into MP4
@@highwayboy needs to be finalized
Great simple walk through. In a similar position as you are at the moment. Bonus points to your old friend for AFI and Agnostic Front t-shirts! AFI footage is actually one of the things I want to digitize.
My buddy sang for Hoods and toured with Agnostic front in like 07. Pretty neato huh?
This is probably the worst way to digitize your videos.
@@Danielfucks69 Your homie is Mikey Hood?
Legend has it that all those videos are stored in Google Photos forever.
Wow your piano skills were incredible!
It's easy if you are fine with just video but the moment you actually start caring about quality you fall into this giant rabbithole of vhs and all the technical details that devour your time.
I'm glad I got into it because the quality can be a million times better than from something like the Elgato capture device and people do not realize that vhs actually looks good
Gotta love preserving memories 👍
I appreciate you so much!!! Easily explained and answered all my questions. I’ve been pondering this for years !! Thanks for being real and making it fun!! Bravo!
I'm in the same boat you were in..just need to do it! Thanks for inspiring
Thanks for the video. I have the extra problem of not even having the camcorder, and they are so expensive online as they are vintage tech now. Would be great if there was a product out there that could play and convert these tapes straight to your PC/Mac.
If ONLY -- I'm in the same boat -- camcorder doesn't work anymore! Need something that doesn't cost a fortune to put this HI8 into and download it into my desktop!!!
That's exactly what I said when looking for a camcorder online. Why isn't there just a machine that can play these tapes without needing the whole camcorder. It's beyond me why that product is not out there
Same problem here, I think I'll have to wait until someone solves that
You need to buy a Hi8 VHS adaptor and then buy a cheap VHS player to record through
The tapes are probably more permanent than the digital versions, but I want to digitize them because waiting for hours worth of tape to rewind is a hastle.
Not a chance. He can make copies of the video and mirror them on the internet. With a python script, he can even schedule it every four years to prevent bit rot.
I only have tapes. Handycam is lost long back. How should i digitize it ?????
I know it's 9 months old.
But tapes deteriorate with age.
Hi8 tapes are EXTREMELY fragile. The tape can stick to itself on the spools, and tear when you try to play it. I work professionally with video digitizing, and see this in around 5% of the Video8/Hi8 tapes. Typically, it affects tapes that have not been stored in their cases and kept cool/dry. If a client walks in with a dusty ziplock bag full of grubby-looking cassettes, not in their cases, I can already predict what comes next! While the tape can be spliced, it will typically tear again just a few minutes further into the video. Often, upon inspecting these "grubby tapes", a few of them are usually already torn! Some people! 🙄🤷♂️
Great motivation for me to also digitize my old Hi8 tapes. Geek alert... if my memory serves me correct RCA wires have a bandwidth of 250 lines of resolution in the y-axis and Hi8 often recorded with 450 lines of resolution in the y-axis. So I'm thinking we should use an S-Video cable or better to transfer our old Hi8 videos, if we want the transfer to be at it's max resolution. Thoughts?
Yeah C Net isn't what it used to be. This video is embarrassing.
Outstanding tip about S-Video vs. RCA.
Wondering the same, my old Hi8 camera has a S-Video output.
Thanks for the heads up!
How would you also get the audio for conversion though?
The hard part is finding a player
3:26 sick AFI shirt
I had the same camera! But now I can't find it and don't know how to get my footage off the tapes 😫
I have the same issue
Ugh! I have mine but it’s broken. I bought a used one and it worked to play one tape:( Are we stuck paying to digitize it?
I wish there was a way to do this with an iPad. My father passed recently and he has a ton of hi8 tapes. I purchased a converter on eBay but my iPad doesn’t respond to it.
What is a hi5? And why r u such a handsome man? Cnet got the mancandy again!
I have an old Hi8 Sony Handycam and a Pinnacle Video Transfer. I have done this, but I have not ever finished all the tapes. I hit play on the tapes, and hit record on the PVT device, and it puts it on a flash drive as mp4 format. I copy it to the computer, Google Photos, and CZcams as my backups. Yea, Facebook too, why not? It will reside there forever.
I thought I was watching this older dude's tutorial until an AFI shirt popped up in one of the tapes.
What are the odds you’re using the same sharp! Thanks man
In the video where you're doing the backflip, the background building kinda looks like the small community college in my hometown in Texas.
Excellent tutorial by the way! Thanks! I also have some very old hi8 home video tapes that i have been wanting to upload to my pc for a long time now!
Very helpful and informative. Thank you. The presentation style and content was enjoyable. 😀
Wrong aspect ratio, not deinterlaced for CZcams, inadequate bitrate and to add insult to injury, incorrect tense in the title - this is a disaster.
This is so helpful! thank you for this
Great introductory video, thanks. With a Hi8 or S-VHS-C camcorder, you should use the S-video, rather than the yellow, connector. It gives better picture quality. I also noticed some interlacing artificers on the digitised videos. There is software that can fix this - either during transfer afterwards. There are a number of videos about this on tube.
1. This is probably the worst way to digitize your videos.
2. Deinterlacing means loss of data, keep it as is, if you want to upload to youtube, prepare separate deinterlaced master.
@@SFtheGreat interesting perspective, thanks. I want to edit and then share videos with my children. I figured that deinterlacing would be easier for all of us - especially as the capture software metadata lies and pretends it is progressive! I have separated the capture from the deinterlacing. I am trying to deinterlace from PAL interlaced 50 fields per second to progressive 50 frames per second, using freeware Hybrid and QTGMC on a Mac. Any thoughts? Thanks.
@@grahamf695 My only thoughts on mac is that it's a paperweight. What converter are you using? With PAL and MAC you can basically get a miniDV camcorder that supports passthrough so it will convert incoming analog signal to digital and output it through FireWire, which you need to connect to FW to ThunderBolt adaptor and MAC should have Thunderbolt port, so that way it will preserve most of the quality and it will be great transfer and the file will be natively interlaced. You don't need to transcode and deinterlace, when you play in VLC, or quicktime it has software deinterlace filters.
@@SFtheGreat thanks for your input. I have connected my DV camcorder via FireWire and it imports well with just iMovie. I am using a Panasonic S-VHS VCR with built-in TBC to play S-VHS-C tapes into a Video2Mac USB adaptor, which takes S-Video and audio cables. I have tried OBS, QuickTime and iMovie to import the data. I am getting some frame dropouts, but actually the quality is pretty good.
@@grahamf695 But you get dropouts. Connect it to miniDV camcorder, see in the manual if it supports passthrough ie the analog to digital conversion on the fly, or the Electric-to-electric mode (names might be different) and it should do the trick and should be better quality without dropouts, this is how I do it.
I guess this is OK if your standards are low. The problem is the video is interlaced and looks terrible if the video is panning a scene. Camcorder direct to tv is not a bad picture but trying to digitize it to a file to play on a large PC monitor and still get a decent picture is hard especially if there is motion.
do you think this would work on Sony hi8 cameras and tapes?
For every single at-home procedure for digitizing my tapes I can see a noticeable drop in quality. I can see your tapes have a problem with interlacing. Any tips on resolving that?
Look at Dazzle by pinnacle . DVC100 or similar. Let me know if it helps.
I need this, find 20 year old hi8 records
Thank you, helped me a lot!
I'm surprised you've found a breakout cable that works the first time. And right you are about cheaping out, that's the primary excuse for not getting it out of the way.
Will search around for the equipment I need to do this, your video very informative so thanks.
This is probably the worst way to digitize your videos.
@@SFtheGreat Okay, what would be the best way?
@@DavidRodriguez-hg6kq The best way, as in preserve as much quality would be studio grade professional VCR recorded to D3 tape, or to lossless YUV. That would also be probably the most expensive and space consuming way.
I really really enjoyed this video. The basic things l have been looking for to understand what the connections are l got because l too have mine sitting in the cupboard. Thank you
Nice job man. You were sure a ladies man, and I guess even now 😉
I have to laugh because our hero has a Hi8 camera but doesn't have a disc drive!
Anybody know how to prevent the aliasing lines from interlaced video? Or how to remove it. My footage looks awful :(
I don’t want to send my tapes to get digitized by someone else but I don’t have a camcorder. I had a bad experience where Walmart almost lost my tapes. I’d rather do it myself now. This process looks simple enough but would you suggest buying a camcorder just to avoid having to send it to a business?
Which camera is this ? I am looking for the exact same effect !!
Wholesome.
Peace be upon you. Can I know the latest Sony 8 mm camera and what is the difference between an 8 mm digital camera and a regular 8 mm camera
Super helpful. Also funny. Thanks!
"So you don't have to"? But you're showing us how to do it for a reason
“..so you don’t have to” Does that mean I can just send my Hi8 tapes to you to do for me, orrr..?
Yes you can send them. I'm down.
@@mevaser770 What's your playback and digitizing setup, and free or is it a commission cost per tape?
@@damian9303 I have a camcorder linked to a av to usb device which works well. Maybe not the most professional but it works. I wish I could do it for free, maybe when I win the lottery :) Its 10/tape and saved onto a USB drive or cloud storage. If you want something local Costco does it as well.
Those sideburns bro
My camera is broken, I cannot afford those expensive services and I cannot locate another camera that will play 8mm and hi8 tapes. I was lousy about labeling then...my husband video taped the birth of my son who passed at age 22, 5 years ago...my husband died in 2012. It just socks I cannot see those precious memories. I will continue to check Goodwill for old HP HANDYCAMS...gonna save this video tho so one day I might get lucky.
I have to recommend EBay , it’s about the only place to reliably find old cam-corders. I really hate to hear that and I hope you can find a solution. If worst comes worst you can always pay someone but it is usually not cheap .
ty
why would even consider getting rid of the tapes. im glad you didn't
I have a Sharp Hi 8 camera like yours. Unfortunately, the problem is not my tapes but my camera. The head just isn't good. All I get is static. And attempts to clean the heads resulting in crunching and eating of blank tapes. I wish there were as many camera services as there were video transfer services. I have the equipment to transfer the videos myself.
I have a bunch of old tapes but my camcorder is long RIP. I’d like to do it as cheap as possible.
"Going to get rid of the tapes" NO! NEVER! NEVER get rid of the original source. I have a sister who digitized all our family photos and then... shredded the original photos. WHAT! WTF????
You never get rid of the source, because the copy may not last forever.
By the way, what are you doing for long term storage? I find that's a bigger issue than the transfer. Putting the output on DVD is fine- but DVD's are disappearing the same way HI-8 did! I have only one machine left that has a DVD drive!
Where do you put the hundreds of GB of video? Cloud? But what if the provider of the cloud disappears?
What happens when tapes decay like they always do lol
Once it's digital you can just make multiple copies and it'll never be lost
Most reliable thing is back up onto SSD
That AFI shirt that your friend had!
why the muzak though?
I swear, you sound like Bob Odenkirk!
man I hope this works for me I was trying to capture it into Premiere pro and media Express with black magic come to find out that most likely it's a time-based correction issue because on my capture it never sounded right it was always clipping and zipping and exerting and doing weird stuff you're recording looked really clean I can't wait to try this
Can you post links to the gear in the description?
Thumbnail shows VHS tape, video about hi8 tapes. Lol.
So we know now that the roxio converter does not deinterlace the footage :/
Need this
I have a Sharp VL-E765 Viewcam 8 DIS which looks like your camera. I have tried the Roxie software and it is not getting any video signal. The breakout cable that came with my camera only has a red and a white connector. Where did you get one with red, white and yellow plugs?
Yap I done same like 10 years back, My Sony had FireWire & also my old laptop had FireWire port.
Converting tapes is easy. But doing a quality conversion requires more than just any random camera and capture card. I see a lot of errors in the converted footage here. It could have been fixed simply by using better hardware (and for not much more cost).
I see the defects too. But what hardware do you recommend? I have an extremely solid hi8 camcorder I can use as deck, but don't know what capture card or other hardware to get. The Roxio ain't it and Elgato captures at 2.4 Mb/ps, lol
Pretty useless comment genius. Why bother making this comment? You don't say what this hardware is that doesn't cost much more...
@@irishjohn1066 Perhaps if you actually read the above comments, you'd see links to two sites where quality hardware is discussed in depth. You clearly don't know what you don't know, as there's no singular suggestion for what "better" is. For example, OS has an impact on which capture cards are used. Additionally, VCR and TBC matters, but it depends entirely on formats and recording modes, as each has different considerations for playback. Again, you can't just randomly grab at hardware, as you'll get random (non)quality results.
@@lordsmurf You really do waffle on without any real substance. You STILL can't give me similarly priced hardware that does a better job here. I bet you love the sound of your own voice
@@irishjohn1066 You want an answer without asking a question. Details are needed. (The initial comment was also left 6 months ago, and I don't remember what the video was rambling on about. So if/when you do get around to asking that question, state a reasonable target budget.)
how to get rid of interlacing ?
I agree with 20 more years, that’s how I am too lol
That's a pretty nasty interlacing effect going on there. Does the software not offer a de-interlacing option?
Most shoes come with lacing. But you can also buy shoes with Velcro, if you are too lazy to tie them 🤷🏻♂️
@@user2144 haha I can decide if I want to say that this made me laugh because you're being funny or cringey lol
*can't
hi, thanks for vid. Did you need to drivers for the camcorder already installed on your mac? thanks
What about deinterlace
Where do you find the link for the direct download? I don't see it on the website.
ok but I don't have the recording software
**EPIC FACEPALM**
The Elgato is the move. I keep finding more tapes to make money back so its really the software your paying for. paid $120
I tried doing this but as I was recording, the color of the video started to fade until it turned black and white, and this happened with all my tapes. Not sure how to fix the issue.
Hey man, I've got a bunch of hi 8 footage I'm skateboarding being a teenager in the 90s and would really be curious to find out what cabling you were able to use, currently my Sony Handycam battery is not functioning because I cannot find the power supply. Please let me know if you have any insight, I'm not necessarily wanting to digitize the footage I would like to at least be able to view it one way or another. Thank you!
i own a hi8 camcorder, the charger cable should be able to directly connect to your camcorder as a direct power source
Buy the power supply on Ebay
How are you supposed to do this if you don't have the camera anymore?
Sending it into a video converting service
when you plug in the camera does a notification pop up or sum?
What format does the software export the video files in?
Can I do this same setup but put the video directly in iMovie or do I need the software?
capturing analogue video is one thing and capturing the lossless is another thing, these cheap USB transferring devices don't capture it the way it should be played like same as direct AV cable to TV, the correct method is a device which can convert analog video to a higher AVI lossless file, it should be transferring through Firewire or HDMI or other high transfer interfaces. I have done it both type (USB and lossless) and I can tell you these USB transferred compressed video files are not the exact copies you should be saving as a future digitizing purpose.
Since you have experience, what are your thoughts on using an AV to HDMI upscaler box, connected to PC via an HDMI to USB converter? Will it give a much better conversion? Do you have any recommendations for a recording software?
Is there any specific equipment you can recommend? I have a somewhat older Dell laptop with an hdmi input. I no longer have the H8mm camcorder, but plan on buying one since I have about 30 tapes to transfer. I don't want to lose any quality if possible. I have an older "Go Video" vhs to dvd recorder, which I was originally going to make dvds of my Hi8 tapes when I purchase the camcorder to play them. I want to get the best possible quality for backups. I don't plan on trashing my original tapes, but know over time (and its already 20 years or so) the tapes will deteriorate. I love the idea of being able to have them on a cloud as well as some sort of easily played media. Would love your advice for the best equipment. Thanks.
@@jo-deegriffith3788 the best way would be to buy an D8 camcorder with backwards compatible Hi8 playback option and with firewire passthrough. I had sony TRV 480 that done it. Other option is to buy a good quality PCI express card like Avermedia capture catd and and use your camcorder to transfer composite signal to PC. But you need a PC with PCI Express slot.
QuickTime does this natively
How do you figure out which cables to get?
What if you got a rca USB adapter? So rca on one side and usb on the other? Could I plug that into my computer?
I have a Slightly Stoopid concert from 2003 I’ve been meaning to transfer for years 🤦♂️...hopefully I’ll do it one of these days
Don’t wait 7 years like I did.. The tapes and their quality are deteriorating. I have one tape that only play audio and I can only see video when I put it in fast forward or rewind..
broo transfer and upload those man i love slightly stoopid loo
Which concert? *NSYNC Britney Spears Michael Jackson ?
I have issue with the colours what should I do??
I have that same camera
did i see this roxio software records in mov format?
What if I only have the mini DV but not the camcorder?
Try buying one (camcorder) on Craigslist. Make sure i works and has all the cables and power adaptor
Do you know what the quality of the file is? How big it is?
This is horribly digitized, I highly recommend redoing it. You can probably fix a lot of it by just downloading handbrake and deinterlacing it. But for archival purposes this is a disaster.
Do you have any recommendations on how to do it better?
What kind of USB-c adapter is that for your Mac?
okay but he didnt need to be THAT hot
0:33 slay
I have same unit but it ejects tapes and shuts off, i wants to transfer to PC
OK, you can't play that song, but can you still do any of those gymnastics moves?!
The longer you hold on to the tapes the more they will deteriorate.
But that mostly depends on storage conditions. Mainly humidity and temperature. Too many shady companies try to scare you with BS about tapes "fading" (nonsense) or somehow rotting away in the shelf in your home.
I did every step as you did. I push play on my camcorder. Nothing comes up on the computer it’s just a black screen. Why.
I have a simple question. The digital copy is of the same quality as the original or worse? If worse, how much?
That entirely depends on the quality/condition of the playback device, the quality of the digitizing device, the codec used, and the skill of the person doing the transfer. For "home movies", something like a $100 Elgato, and minimal skill, will get you decent-enough results. For "perfection", you absolutely need an expert, with high-end gear. Most of those mail-in digitizing services are absolute garbage though. Find a local expert (good luck with that too, though! There aren't many around!).
why do you not export as progressive? These stripes will never come out if you finalize the video the wrong way... the stripes you see in the beginning clip - you should not have them.
Interlacing is an artifact of the actual video. To remove them would be like saying run this through an AI upscaler so it looks better.
@@pacosanchez7216 not true. You can easily remove them on export. If you know what you are doing. No IA involved. Later you can not remove them that easily... If I would pay for this I would ask my money back if it has stripes (if I am not myself a video editor)
what about Hi5 tapes >? able to use it