Film Transfer Facts

Fact #1: you can't take garbage and turn it into gold (and this goes for life too). I'm sorry to say, but if your film is in poor condition, you will NOT get a good image. Likewise, film is a very low-resolution source of media, and you CANNOT make it high-definition no matter what you do. Sure, you can burn it to a blu-ray disc, but that doesn't mean it's a high-def image. It just means you can store more of it on that particular disc (and now you can't play it on a standard DVD player or a computer).Out-of-focus, overexposed, underexposed, pop/scratches, etc. are all part of your film and cannot be "corrected in post."

Fact #2: there is a quality difference in all transfer methods. Frame-by-frame is NOT the same as projection methods. Sure, projection is faster and cheaper. But there IS a noticeable difference between the two. First, ring around the edge that is inherent in projection is usually noticeable and second is flicker. You get both in projection. Not so with frame-by-frame. See the link here to the video at the end of the this blog post for a real comparison between the two methods. Keep in mind that the cheap discount and warehouse/wholesale operations (names withheld) use a service provider that employs projection methods (and as a sidenote your film usually ends up in Mexico for the actual transfer). And for the record, I believe that high-def transfer that I see some others offering is a marketing ploy and not worth the extra cost. I have run an in-studio comparison and I notice absolutely NO difference-if I did, we would be offering it.

Fact #3: McKenna Video is the only company in Puyallup that has been continually transferring for the last 8 years. The ONLY company! Everyone else has either folded, discontinued this business segment, or is late to the game. Do you want to trust someone you just started doing this, or someone who has transferred almost 2 million feet of film? Do you want to have your film sent to Mexico to be transferred or do you want to keep it in the U.S.? Do you want lower quality or higher quality?

See our website for more information www.mckennavideo.com .

I hope this helps as your consider your options on who to have transfer your precious memories to DVD.

Blessings,

Chris. 

http://vimeo.com/9953255