Driving Directions

8 & Super 8mm Film to DVD Conversion

It should be understood that the finished DVD quality is only going to be as good as the original film’s quality.  Many films are already too far gone to record and achieve satisfactory results.  To get a good indication if your film is in peril, is to trust your nose and smell the film.  If it have a vinegar smell to it, it is definitely in trouble but not unrecoverable.

The first step is to get the film digitized and once this process is accomplished, we can then proceed with editing, and if requested, adjust the colour and brightness for the best possible quality achievable from old film and again, this is totally dependent of the original quality of your film and remove camera shake if requested.

Prior to digitizing your film, we inspect if for tears and cracks and repair such damage wherever possible then the film is cleaned as required and given a final inspection prior to starting the digitizing process.

Once the conversion is completed, we ‘burn’ the resulting product to DVD’s.  Each DVD has a label or picture printed directly to its surface eliminating the use of stick on paper labels that come off in your expensive DVD drives and possibly jamming them up.  Music can be added on request to further enrich the viewing of your memories.  These DVD’s can be played back on your computer and most home entertainment units that will accept the ‘– DVD’ format (most backwards compatible)  Please read the "Things You Should Know" at the bottom of this page.

 PRICING:
Standard, No Sound - $3.20 per minute of finished DVD viewing time to digitize (Minimum charge $20.00). *
Background Music Added - add $.50 per minute of finished DVD viewing time to digitize . *
Film with sound - $ 4.20 per minute of finished DVD viewing time to digitize (Minimum charge $40.00). *

In Addition:

$ 20.00 for each master DVD (Mastering and setting up coloured DVD direct print label graphics - usually only 1 DVD required depending on the amount of film involved - additional master may be required)

$ 10.00 for each additional  DVD copy (direct print colour graphics)

Other:

Colour Correction - $1.00 per minute of DVD Run Time
Removing Camera Shake - $.50 per minute of DVD Run Time

Please allow 2 to 3 weeks for completion depending on the amount of material that requires processing.  All film is returned to the client upon completion of the conversion.  We will archive your project for 1 months just in case you need more copies. 

* Pricing may vary depending on the condition of your submitted films and any required repairs or cleaning. Should your film(s) be beyond saving, please be advised there will be a minimum $40.00 service charge for inspection and is a required deposit.

 Contact:   604-792-679
bios@telus.net

Things You Show Know

When films are transferred to DVD, they will never have the colour quality & clarity that they had originally as a projected image from the old projectors.  This is partly due to the intensity of the light source of the old projectors, film deterioration, dye changes in the film from age and also partly due to the transfer process.  Not much can be done about the film deterioration, and we try to keep the transfer process as faithful to the original as possible. 

Many times, people tended to use film designed for indoor use, outdoors which gives a blue cast to the film, or conversely, using outdoor film indoors which gives a purple cast to the film.  It was just not practical nor recommended to change films to accommodate the two different scenarios.

With specialized software, we are able to correct a good portion of these colour discrepancy's and have the finished product closer to the original colours.  Where dark scenes are evident, we will lighten them as much as possible if requested, but be aware that these images tend to get very grainy simply because the video information is just not available to properly correct these poorly illuminated images.  In saying that, a grainy image is better then no discernable image.  The one thing we cannot correct to any degree is poorly focused or out of focus images.  We can also remove 'Shake' from a video caused by walking with the camera or unsteady conditions during filming.

Super 8mm film with sound presents a few problems, but nothing too serious.  Sound film is subject to the same variations noted above, but now sound is involved.  The old film cameras used a different frame rate then the current NTSC standard for North America.  To accomplish transferring film to DVD the film speed must be adjusted to run somewhat faster then the original film speed to compensate for the high frame rates currently in use, otherwise the finished product will have a very noticeable flicker and to a lesser extend a phenomena called blooming. 

So you should be aware that if you want to include the sound track, you may notice a small difference in the sound pitch in that it will have slightly higher pitched voices etc.  In many cases the sound track quality is  fair to good if it is magnetic, but optical sound tracks can be really bad.  Optical sound tracks are rare and the magnetic sound track is more the norm.

Our prices include minor editing, such as removing leaders, burned images, black or clear images.  Extensive editing, timelines, chronological order etc. adds to the finished cost of the DVD's and pricing is directly affected by the amount of editing the client would like us to do.

Film Reel Sizes

 
REEL SIZE - Regular 8mm Approx Run Time

 3 Inch Reel (50ft)    3 mins 42 secs

4 Inch Reel (100ft)  7 mins 24 secs

  5 Inch Reel (200ft)  14 mins 48 secs

 6 Inch Reel (300ft)  22 mins 13 secs

 7 Inch Reel (400ft)  29 mins 37 secs

 
REEL SIZE - Super 8mm Approx Run Time

3 Inch Reel (50ft)    2 mins 30 secs

4 Inch Reel (100ft)  5 mins 00 secs

  5 Inch Reel (200ft)  10 mins 00 secs

  6 Inch Reel (300ft)  15 mins 00 secs

  7 Inch Reel (400ft)  20 mins 00 secs