Camcorders: Can I Transfer Hi8 videos to PC ?
Can I Transfer Hi8 videos to PC ?
by speedbird2 - 10/1/09 9:23 AMI have hundreds of hours of Hi8 analog tape recordings that I would like to transfer to my PC. Is that possible? The Sony camcorder has analog video/audio outputs but what would I need to do to make the signal digital?
An "analog/digital converter".
by boya84 - 10/1/09 11:14 AM In reply to: Can I Transfer Hi8 videos to PC ? by speedbird2Canopus makes good ones that use a firewire connection (ADVC55 or ADVC110 among others).
If your computer does not have a firewire port, then you can add a one if your computer has an available expansion slot.
Or you can look into the lower-end units that use USB... Pinnacle (Dazzle), Roxio, Hauppage... many others...
Or if there is a local video conversion business that can do the conversion for you - for a fee...
Hundreds of hours of tape won't fit on a PC
by Scott Markowitz - 10/1/09 2:36 PM In reply to: Can I Transfer Hi8 videos to PC ? by speedbird2I recommend that you find a digital 8 camcorder (SONY was the only company to make these)
You could then play back the analog Hi8 tapes and get a MiniDV stream out of the camera.
With a Digital 8 camera acting as a playback machine for those hundreds of tapes, then you won't have to digitize them ALL to your computer's hard drive.
This would be good, because that much footage in a DV codec would take up an awful lot of space.
Likely way more than you would have available on your computer.
Also, the video tape containing your footage is a more reliable archive medium.
(How many hard drives have you gone through while your Hi8 tapes sat by- doing their duty- waiting to be played again? I would guess you've had to replace at least 4 hard drives since the 1990s when you first started using Hi8.)
The other thing I would recommend is to transfer your footage all to MiniDV. You would need to use a digital 8 camera and a miniDV camera to do this. This is what I have done with all my Hi8 footage because I wanted easier access via the miniDV tapes to my footage. (Digital 8 was a short lived format, and is no longer supported by manufacturer.)
SO... check ebay, and see if you can get a digital 8. or see if you know somebody that has one.
Cheers,
Scott Markowitz
http://creativehomemovie.com
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