Archiving

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Andrew Tweed
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Joined: Tue Sep 02, 2008 5:32 pm

Archiving

Post by Andrew Tweed »

I'm an infrequent visitor to the forums so excuse me if this has been covered extensively in the past.

I am in the process of transferring lots of old VHS C tapes on to my computer hard drive (initially) and setting up lots of projects in Edius 7 to be tided up and then archived. DVDs are fine but I view these as a medium for viewing and sharing productions, I would much sooner store them on a hard drive but the question is in what format?

My preference today is to film in ACHD 50p on the basis that this is the best available quality, if I have to interlace it later to burn discs so be it. Obviously the VHS tapes are not the same quality, nevertheless I want to preserve the best I can.

Some of my material goes back 55 years (yes when even I was a lad) so it is precious to the family.

So the question is: Of all the presets I have available in Edius 7, which codec should I use to store finished projects on a hard drive?

Thanks in advance.
Andrew Tweed. Member at Potters Bar Cine & Vidio Society
col lamb
Posts: 680
Joined: Tue Oct 16, 2007 9:51 pm
Location: Preston, Lancashire

Re: Archiving

Post by col lamb »

Andrew

I would save twice, once in MP4 format and once using Canopus's own file format which is less compressed.

Then save both files to another hard drive, preferrably an external drive which you only use to archive material.

You may also like to check out Red Giants instant HD software, I have got good results converting my old Video 8 sourced files into 720p mp4 files.
Col Lamb
Preston, Lancashire.
FCPX, Edius6.02, and Premiere CS 5.5 user.
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Andrew Tweed
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Joined: Tue Sep 02, 2008 5:32 pm

Re: Archiving

Post by Andrew Tweed »

Colin Thank you.

Following your comments I've had a play around with a few short clips that lasted only a few (6 or 7) seconds but they included fast movement to see if I could notice any difference. These are my findings:

For Grass Valley read Canopus

Grass Valley uncompressed .avi 1,861,390KB
Grass Valley Lossless .avi 406,212KB
Quicktime Grass Valley HQ .mov 209,776KB
AVI Grass Valley HQX Fine 10bit .avi 125,462KB
AVCHD Panasonic 50i 17mbs .m2ts 27,660KB
H.264 AVC Exporter plugin .mp4 28,002KB

Frankly I couldn't tell any difference on my 21" BenQ monitor.

I couldn't get the quicktime to run on my Windows Media Player or my Cyberlink PowerDVD, I assume I need a plug in to display the .mov files.

The AVCHD and H.264 seem to be exactly the same and I don't mind which I use. (I have a Panasonic X900) but I am unsure which of the .avi options to use. There does not seem much point in using the uncompressed but the Lossless uses 4x as much memory as the HQX.

Another reason for asking these questions is that I offered to run a practical evening at Potters Bar FilmMakers on this subject and I want to be sure I am clear in my mind the background so I can give clear guidance.

Any comments would be welcome.

Regards
Andrew Tweed. Member at Potters Bar Cine & Vidio Society
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Dave Watterson
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Re: Archiving

Post by Dave Watterson »

For your talk, there is another aspect of archiving ...

Remember that hard drives have a limited life. Take a look at their warranties for a rough guide as to how long the manufacturers think they will last. An archive hard disc will get less wear and tear than one in normal use in your computer ... but like any mechanical device you do need to run it regularly to prevent problems. You also have to take into account whether or not the drives will be capable of connecting to equipment in 5, 10 or 15 years. Standards will have changed.

The only sure way is to copy the digital archives every year or so onto the latest storage device.

But also ask people why they want to preserve for all time Aunt Glady's Golden Wedding or Our Holiday in Majorca.

A compromise one of my friends has done is to take the hours of footage of his children as they were growing up and edit them into 10-12 minute pieces with modern titles and soundtrack supplementing anything usable from the originals. As DVDs and stored with an online service like YouTube or Vimeo these are attractive for his now grown-up children to want t watch and keep for their own children.
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TimStannard
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Location: Surrey

Re: Archiving

Post by TimStannard »

Dave Watterson wrote: But also ask people why they want to preserve for all time Aunt Glady's Golden Wedding or Our Holiday in Majorca.
As it happens my "A Day Out in Mallorca" (for which a certain Jan Watterson wrote up the judges comments for the Guernsey Lily) was my first entry into BIAFF and I was very proud of my three stars (obviously it was worth four or possibly five, but that's judges for you) so of course I want to keep it!

But back to the plot. Hard drives. Copied regularly. There are several dual hard drive units on the market which will copy A>B without having to do it via the OS.
Tim
Proud to be an amateur film maker - I do it for the love of it
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