What is the best way to archive old footage (DVD, VHS, Super 8 etc.)

Hello,
I am starting a huge archiving projet of possibley 100-200 hours of footage from all kinds of sources (VHS tapes, Mini DV, Super 8 film).
What is the best way to archive this footage at the highest possible resolution?
What sort of file should be saved?
Im a complete starter at this.
Thank you!

One strategy is to purchase a Canopus ADVC300 analog/dv converter. It has a TBC incorporated.
You connect your original source material (for example - VHS deck) to the Canopus via analog cables then from the Canopus via firewire to your computer. This will turn everything into DV format.
Play the tape through the canopus and record to your hard drive.
Take good notes for each tape. Create a logging sheet and make notes as the system captures.
Once you have the tapes in the computer, break them into 1 hr or less segments by some reasonable system - chronologically, by personalities, locations or whatever makes sense to you.
Then write out each 1 hour segment back to a DV recorder. Give each tape a unique reel number - and make the reel number part of the file name on the computer.
When you are done in a year or two ( lol ) you should have two matching sets of material - one on the hard drives and one on tape - with names that make it easy to cross reference and a binder full of logging information. If you want to be fully digital, look into a nifty application like CatDV. It will help organize a mass of video info like this.
DV runs at ~13-14GB/ hr. Plan you storage accordingly.
Purchase professional quality DV tapes - not drugstore junk.
Good luck.
x

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Hi,
I've been running a Wedding Film-making business for the last 12 months full-time. In that time I've acquired about 4TB of Hard Drive space, but as I get more work coming in the door I'm starting to need to get rid of old Weddings and Corporates I've shot.
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I'm not concerned about needing to return to make changes to the projects at a later stage - these Weddings are locked and will never be changed.
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Well that depends, if you only keep the exported copy and not the raw footage then if someone request some sort of edit change you'd be screwed if you didn't keep all the raw footage and simply kept the exported copy. However if you know that they aren't going to request some sort of change or you let them know up front they won't be able to make anymore changes after a certian point.(For exampel after you give the finished product and it's been approved by them) you can save TONS of space by simply only archiving the exported copy for them incase they need to make them another copy for some reason.
Where I work we always backup EVERYTHING, because we have had clients call back and request raw footage (meaning un-edited footage) almost 2 years after they filmed before. So if this happens to you will probably be happy you didn't keep only a exported edited copy and that you held on to all your source media. So really unless you're just 100 percent positive that this won't ever happen or it just hasn't happened to you as of yet then you can just export the project from premiere and keep only that.
Blu-rays are a good backup option overall and like you mentioned for the amount of space you're currently using it won't be very expensive to just use hard disk. Just remember that you'll need to hook the HD's up at least 1 time per month. The reason is that it's good for them to spin every once in awhile. However in all honesty if you go with a RAID 1 setup or just simply buy two disk you won't run into to many occaisions where both disk fail at once... It hasn't ever happned to me at my job or in my personal business.
One option though that in some ways would give you the best of both worlds would be to use the project mananger feature in Premiere to save everything that is in your timeline to a project folder. (It basically saves all your footage that's in your time-line. It excludes un-used things from the bin unelss you say different) Anyways it will save you space in the end while still saving the entire project to a single folder of your chosing. Then you could export your finished program from Premiere and then burn your disc from the finished file you got and only backup your finished file to say a blu-ray disc and then backup your finished file and your saved project to your hard disc you have to archive stuff on. What used to be 150GB would now probably only be like 25-40GB max. But like I said if someone requested a major change and not something minor you'd be out in the cold... I don't use encore much though so someone else would have to answer your question about backing up a encore project... But I'd assume if you had the backed up premiere exported digital file you could just import it into encore and be ready to roll so you wouldn't really need to backup the encore project unless you make a crazy cool customized menu or something. Then if someone needed only a minor change such as graphics or something you could use your backed up project folder from premiere to make the change and then send it to encore to re-export the product with the requested minor changes.
It all really comes down to what you want to do. I'd recommend at the very least you backup your premiere project the way I described and also save the exported copy of your final project.

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Best way to archive old footages

I have a few hundred VHS, miniDV, 8, and Hi-8 tapes with footages I do not want to lose.
What's the best way to preserve them in the long run? I'm afraid my Canon 8M, Sony Hi-8, and Sony miniDV (with Firewire) cameras won't last for too much longer, and my VCR just died.
Am I better off to:
a. Digitize all of them using FCP or FCE and store the clips using a big hard drive or burn them on DVD's for future use. Any suggestion for a database to store EDL
info?
b. Get another miniDV cam with firewire and just archive the VHS, 8M and Hi-8 tapes using the new miniDV camera. Any suggestion on a good quality one at a reasonable price?
How long do miniDV tapes last anyway? I have several that have been at least 5-6 years old.
Any suggestion will be greatly appreciated. Thanks! /Kenny

Hi Kenny-
From the storage perspective i think StudioX has you covered. I do have a couple of thoughts about my recent experiences to share.
I have been working with a lot of of old (25+ years) VHS and (40+) reel to reel tapes lately. Think about it-that's actually a lot longer than I think any of us actually expected them last. The older VHS tapes tend to become sticky and the plastic mechanisms of the actual VHS shell are breaking down. Physically inspect every tape that you prepare to archive. Press that little button in on the side of the cassette and physically operate the door and look at the tape. Don't forget to remove those little plastic tabs on the back that keep you from recording over the tape-yeah I know but you would be surprised (;>)
Get good at taking apart shells and moving the reels from one cassette to another. Practice splicing. I have a master shell that I modified by removing the door that closes to cover the tape to make one less thing to go wrong.
Dealing with animal p p is another topic altogether so if you need any help there just let me know and I will share.
Luck-
-DaddyPaycheck

What's the best way to set up new imac for logic etc?

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Adding to babowa, enable the system firewall in System Preferences>Security>Firewall tab. Click Advanced and check Stealth Mode.
Lion is a pretty steady and secure operating system, and as there really aren't MANY Mac viruses, there ARE viruses out there still. OS X is pretty good about letting you know if you do accidently download a virus, and it will help you throw it away if it detects one, such as the MACDefender virus. OS X has built in security features such as sandboxing that doesn't allow viruses in as easily as a Windows PC. As for hackers, as long as you have the firewall enabled and a secure password (for your computer and email accounts), then you should be fine.
It's the user that lets the virus in, not the computer (unless there's some untold serious vulnerability in OS X, which is highly unlikely). Keep your apps up to date, don't download pirated software, and be street smart on the internet. Don't download things or visit websites that you don't think are real. Safari includes a Phishing feature that automatically detects known phishing sites, protecting you from that big problem. Keep your passwords secure and you should be fine.
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What is the best way to archive large mailboxes

I am using Mail on Mavericks 10.9.5 with my corporate mail (Exchange 2007). I am getting issues trying to archive my email, and remove it from the Exchange Server. I usually divide mail into years, e.g mailbox for 2012, 13 etc.
I have 2 years of mail with about 14000 messages, and I want to migrate it off. I have taken the usual steps of creating a new mail box local to my mac and moving mail this way. However, unless I pick a very small no of messages, this method crashes mail. I have tried this over a few different versions of Mail, 10.8.x and 10.9.x and I get the same result.
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Hi,
Are you asking with regards to on-premises Exchange? With Microsoft Online SaaS services (aka Exchange Online) there is no control and no need to control which data center a mailbox resides in.
With regard to on-premises Exchange, you have two choices: you can move it over the WAN in which case you would either do a native mailbox move (assuming you have Exchange 2010 or later you can suspend the move after the copy so you can control the
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The other choice is to move is out of band which would usually involve an offline seed of the database (you could conceivably move via PST file but that would disrupt access to the mailbox and is not really the 'best way').
In general, Exchange on-premises questions are best asked on the Exchange forum: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/office/en-US/home?category=exchangeserver
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Guy

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Hey
I've started to accumulate more and more video content of client projects, but I don't want to delete it in case they come back a year later looking for an update on the video product I made them.
So, what's he best way to store FCP projects and video files?
I thought maybe a BluRay burner might do the trick.
Any suggestions?
Sam

Since you're using RAW files you might peruse the DAM Forum to learn about possible other DAM (digital asset management) software and workflows. There is a wealth of information at that site.
I useMedia Expression for my primary DAM application and iPhoto for special projects like books, calendars, etc.

What is the best way of archive inactive contacts?

I have a few hundred number of contacts that aren' t active but I want to keep for historical reasons instead of deleting. I put them into an archive folder but they still get in my way because they are in the All contacts group. is the best way to get them out of the way is to use the Contacts backup feature my contacts to a file and put that file someplace safe like in the cloud?
It it to would be nice to drag them into the archive folder and have them not appear in contact searches Tthe only way I've gotten that to work is with smart groups, which are great until you get on an iOS device and discover they aren't supported over icloud sync.
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Presuming your menus aren't complicated(include audio or video) the total size for the MPG-2 and AC3 files should probably be under 8GB for a dual layer disk. The inspector will tell you the estimated size. 2-pass varible bit rate would be recommended.
Trying to fit 3 hours on a DVD-5 will only bring very noticable quality hits. Compressor will let you change the average bit rate so that you can fit 174 minutes but trade-off isn't worth it in my opinion.
Be aware that dual-layer -R and +R media may not play well for everyone everywhere.
I presume you are not making 1000 or more copies? If you were replication could solve this.
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What is the best way to archive and store old mail using Apple Mail?

Hi,
I have a number of older emails that I would like to archive and store for potential future access. Even though I have mails from earlier Lotus Notes accounts and Microsoft Office accounts, I am referring in this case only to apple mail data that I ave 'stored on my mac'.
Any advice would be great. At the moment I am using predominantly gmail, so if things go haywire, rebuilding my mail is relatively easy. That said, I tend to file and save locally important messages.
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This is from Mail's help:
Archive messages
You can store messages in an Archive mailbox so that you can quickly find them later when you’re ready to take action.
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You can customize the Mail toolbar to include the Archive icon.

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I have an old library that I created in iPhoto 4 so that my parents could see their vacation pics. I want it off my hard drive and don't need it anymore anyway. Can I just drag and drop the whole library in the Trash? I'm using iPhoto 8 now, so it's been converting my old libraries into ones organized the way it is.

That will work.
Regards
TD

What is the best way to scale Red footage in FCX?

Hi everyone,
I'm currently editing a feature film in Final Cut X Pro (10.0.9). I've edited on FCX in the past, but this is my first feature project with it. The feature was shot on two cameras. Camera A was a Red Epic (5K). Camera B was a Red Scarlet (4K). An assistant editor was in charge of getting the project set up. I'm the co-director, so I didn't come on board the edit until a few weeks after he had everything imported, in sync, and properly structured in keyword folders per scene number. The guy did a great job and organized the **** out of everything. He then cut a few assemblies for us.
Now I'm working on it on my own and it's been going great, but I have two questions which have dogged me:
1. There's been a handful of shots I've wanted to enlarge / scale / zoom-in on. A good example is a medium shot, which I prefer to now be a CU of the actor's face. The way I've been doing this up until now, is by selecting the clip in the timeline, going to the Video inspector window in the top right, and changing the Scale percentage. I usually find though that, if I go beyond 150%, I lose a lot of quality. Now, at first I thought this was just because I was using Proxy Media (only for Playback) in my edit. So I did a test and opened the same clip in a separate project reel. I then scaled the clip again to 175% but de-selected 'Use Proxy media for Playback.' So in essence, I did an 'online' to see the raw media in my timeline. And after doing this, the scaled clip's quality definitely improved. But not enough to give me the confidence to do this often throughout the film.
So my question is, is there a better / smarter way to do this? I've been reading PDFs lately about tbe best practices for a Red workflow with FCX. And I see that they recommend making tweaks to files using the 'RED Raw Settings Control.' I confess, I've never dabbled with this. To me, any sort of RED tweaking will happen during the mastering phase. Not during the basic edit. But would this option be better for scaling clips? Or is scaling clips something I should hold off on for now and do in the more final stages of mastering.
2. This second question sort of ties into my basic Project Property settings. So first, a recap of the workflow we used to get the project into FCX:
- Imported all RED Raw footage from both cameras.
- Synced up audio and multi-cam clips.
- Playback settings are 'Use proxy media.' (no Optimized media was created and as far as I know now, Optimized / Proxy media wasn't creating during Import, nor were Import folders / keyword collections created at that point.)
Now, when I look at my Project Properties, it says my 'Video Properties' are in 5K. And my Render Format is Apple ProRes 422 (Proxy). So the way I read that, any straight up Export I do of the default video file is going to be 5K. That includes any sort of Apple ProRes export.
So is this correct? Even though I'm viewing my reel as a Proxy for Playback, is it okay that my Project Properites video size is still 5K? Or should've that been changed to 1080p before I did any editing on this project? Is the 5K project setting slowing me down? Or adding on more time to my Vimeo Shares and straight Exports?
I know I'm asking a lot of questions here, so perhaps it will be easier if someone can explain what their workflow is with 5K footage in 5K. We're doing a small screening of the rough cut tonight for friends and I wanted to export an Apple ProRes 422, but it's like 300GB big! So it seems the only option I have is to use the Apple Devices preset and export an H.264.
Thank you in advance to anyone that can provide me some advice.

What Luis said: set the project to 4k or smaller .... whatever is good enough for the output you require. Editing in 5k already requires you to upscale the 4k footage.
The RED Raw settings have nothing to do with the scaling. They are meant to dial in white balance, color, saturation and other parameters.
Dennis Widmyer wrote:
So is this correct? Even though I'm viewing my reel as a Proxy for Playback, is it okay that my Project Properites video size is still 5K? Or should've that been changed to 1080p before I did any editing on this project? Is the 5K project setting slowing me down?
Wether the 5k project is slowing you down depends on the specs of your hardware. Do you intend the output to be 1080? Then your scaling problems are over.

What is the best way to conform 60fps footage to 24fps without slowing it down?

So I understand how to time remap and how to reinterpret frame rate of 60fps footage to slow it down, but I am at a loss as to how I can make it 24fps without just rendering it as such, which will give a stuttered export.
I am shooting on a Rebel t3i which only allows me to shoot in 720p at 60fps. Is there any way to drop the frame rate of footage without changing the duration while maintaining the quality?
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Shiraz

After Effects would probably do a better job, since its frame interpolation algorithms are capable of smoother results, at the expense of greater processing time. It's a similar process there--drop the 60p clip in a 24p comp, and enable Frame Blending for the footage item and comp. Frame Mix is approximately what Premiere Pro does, but Pixel Motion is more sophisticated: Adobe After Effects CS5 & CS5.5 * Frame blending
There's also the Time Warp plug-in in AE, as well as third-party plugs like Twixtor.

What is the best way to archive old footage (DVD, VHS, Super 8 etc.)

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