Convert and Digitize Audio Tapes, VHS, Video Tapes & Film Reels

Video tapes launched in the 1960’s to replace film and were the primary format for broadcast and professional video recordings by the 1980s. Originally on magnetic tape formats, digital video tape formats were widespread by the 1990’s. The most common formats include:

• Betacam SP/SX
• 3/4″ U-Matic
• DVC Cam (and DVC Pro)
  
• 1” Tape
• D-2

Old professional video tape brands include Sony, Panasonic, Fuji, JVC, Ampex, Maxell, 3M/Scotch, Kodak.

After their launch in the mid-late 1970’s, there were many popular consumer focused video tape formats in popular use through the 2000s, including:

• Betamax
• VHS (and S-VHS and VHS-C)
• 8mm film (and Hi-8mm and Digital 8)
• Mini DV

Mastertrack can digitize VHS, 8mm film and all popular old formats of video storage. Regular manufacturers of these consumer video tape formats included Sony, JVC, Canon, Maxell, Panasonic, Polaroid, Fuji, Kodak, Apex, TDK, and BASF.

For nearly 100 years, starting in the early 1900’s, film was the predominant format for motion pictures. Available in professional versions for theatrical releases, consumer film and projectors were also widely popular until the 1970’s and 1980’s before video tapes.

Professional and consumer film reels were popular in numerous sizes from 3″ to 15″ diameter.

Well before the launch of CDs, i-Pods, and mp3 and digital wav files, audio was stored on magnetic tapes, first in reel format in the 1920s and later on audio cassettes. Mastertrack can digitize and convert audio tapes from many older formats:

• 1/4″ reel to reel
• Audio cassette tapes and micro cassette tapes
• DAT
• Mini Disc

Common brand names for old reel and cassette manufacturers include: Akai, Tascam, Technics, Ampex, 3M, BASF, Phillips, Fuji, TDK, Memorex.

Mastertrack will convert your old audio format content for cloud or other digital storage. With our CD production, vinyl pressing and audio cassette duplication services, we can the reproduce your content for distribution and sales.

There are many commercial cloud storage service providers including Apple, Amazon, Box, Dropbox, Google and Microsoft.

Mastertrack can convert and share your digitized files directly into your existing cloud account or create a new cloud account and file system. We encourage cloud storage as a permanent filing and backup system, in addition to portable drives or other physical format on which you save your audio, video and data files.

“Optical discs” refer to CDs, DVD and Blu-ray discs. Disc can serve directly as  file storage, or if your content is properly mastered, as playable versions to be used with audio, DVD and Blu-ray players.

CDs hold up to 700MB, single layer DVD-5s hold up to 4.5GB, and dual layer DVD-9s up to 8.5GB of content. Single layer Blu-ray discs hold up to 25GB and dual layer up to 50GB.

USB Flash Drives (thumb drives) are a convenient and portable means to store content, with easy connection to computers. With storage up to 64GB, flash drives are an effective format to save content from smaller digitizing projects.

Portable hard drives are a popular and practical format to physically store digitized video tape, audio and data content. They easily connect to most computers via a USB port. With current capacities of 1TB to 16TB, external hard drives support the storage needs of most tape digitizing projects.

Provide your own portable hard drive or Mastertrack can provide one.

We can convert standard definition resolution on your older video tapes to high definition as part of the tape digitizing process, so it will play vibrantly on computer monitors and television screens. Using Teranex Hardware Encoders and special software, Mastertrack can up-resolution lower resolution video to 1080p high definition format.

Mastertrack offers digital cinema package preparation services. A Digital Cinema Package (DCP) is the new standard to project movies in theaters versus 35 mm or other film reels.

DCP is a set of digital files used to store and convey digital cinema audio, image, and data streams. It is effectively a container for a film composition(s) and a file structure that together represent a title version.  Digital cinema encoding by our authoring engineers requires high-definition video tapes. The output is on a hard disk designed specifically for digital cinema servers and projectors.

It is common for old tapes to have damage due to age, environmental factors, bad storage or bad luck. Water and mold damage from moisture can cause fading, cracking and make your tapes susceptible to snapping. In addition, mold can eat right through tapes, destroying the content in those sections. Hardware damage can happen to both the outer box or to the tapes if they are mishandled or dropped.

Tapes will deteriorate and the risk of damage increases over time.  If there is already damage, we have treatments to repair your tapes and will work to retain as much of the original content as possible. If you see signs of mold or other damage, we urge you to digitize your tapes now.

We can create physical backups on Linear Tape-Open (LTO), an open format and the current standard for long term physical storage for businesses and institutional archives.

LTO is a magnetic tape, large data storage technology developed in the late 1990s. With a target of 15 to 30 years of archival storage, LTO is widely used as backup for both small and large computer systems. The standard LTO form factor, Ultrium, is currently manufactured by both Fujifilm and Sony with current capacity up to 18 TB.

Cloud storage is a way for consumers and businesses to securely save and store data, which can then be accessed from any location. There are multiple cloud storage services, including popular options from Apple, Amazon, Box, Dropbox, Google and Microsoft.

Storage in the cloud allows individuals and businesses to access, retrieve and share files via internet-connected devices. Cloud services make it easy to scale with changing space needs, provides built-in redundancy, and offers enormous archival capacity, back-up and recovery services.

Mastertrack can upload files directly into your existing cloud account or create a new account and filing system for or with you.

Whether you already have digitized files or want to manufacture and distribute your newly converted tapes and film, Mastertrack offers a full suite of customized media duplication and packaging production:

• USB Flash drive printing and loading
• CD manufacturing
• DVD & Blu-ray duplication
• Vinyl Record pressing
• Audio Cassette duplication

Our website allows easy online 24/7 quoting, ordering and order tracking for all of our media products.

Mastertrack can extract your digital or analog files from certain old format data drives and storage tapes, notably old floppy disks. After their development in the 1960s, floppy disks were a leading form of data storage in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. Floppy disks were so common that many software programs still use a stylized floppy disk as the “save” icon.

Original floppies had a diameter of 8 inches. Later came a 5¼-inch floppy disc and finally a 3½-inch hard-plastic-case version which was the ubiquitous form of data storage and transfer by the late 1990s. However, within 10 years, floppies were displaced by new options with greater capacity and data transfer speeds. Replacement technology included USB flash drives, memory cards, optical discs, portable hard drives and storage through local computer networks and the cloud.

Video has to be encoded and compressed before it can be reproduced and played on DVD or Blu-Ray players. Authoring is the process of creating a DVD or Blu-ray master by formatting video to meet industry specifications to be playable on DVD and Blu-ray players.

Blu-ray and DVD masters are often set up with some form of menu and interactivity. Menu-driven Blu-ray discs and DVDs provide a professional touch, flexibility, and enable benefits like 5.1 surround sound, director cuts, motion menus and more.