Using digital storage to preserve your precious memories has many benefits
Today, capturing family videos is easy and quick to do, just using the phone in our pocket. That hasn’t always been the case, however. Before smartphones and analog and digital camcorders, memories were captured on film using video cameras and then saved on tapes. Unfortunately, over time, video tape quality decreases dramatically. The sharpness, quality and color deteriorate. Worst of all, the tape grows brittle and breaks as it’s played. Many people no longer own devices that can play these tapes.
Do you still have boxes in your attic, basement, or home cupboards, filled with old video tapes of family holidays, celebrations and children’s milestones. Whether it’s an album, a shoe box, or a bin we all have some photos and video tapes we’ve been hanging on to. The trouble is, how can anyone enjoy them when they are in your attic? Wouldn’t it be great if those memories could be preserved and shared for generations to come? They can be, if you make the jump to converting them to a digital storage format.
Preserving memorabilia through digital storage
You can convert videos at home, but it is a time intensive process. For the best results, we suggest taking your film to a video editing or production service in your area. Recently, we worked with a video transfer business, Lotus Media, to assist with converting numerous video tapes to digital format.
Unlike services such as LegacyBox, iMemories or even Costco, Lotus Media is local (to the Seattle/Bellevue area), and their turnaround time is days, not weeks. Typical output is in MP4 format; it is easy to edit and can be played across Macs and PCs. Customers receive a link to a Google Drive file. You can download, share and further back up these digital recordings. You also have the option to receive a DVD. Lotus will also make back-up copies of all videos they process, too. If something should go wrong in the first two years, you can get the files back without incurring a monthly cloud storage cost. Even better, think of all the space you will save by not having to store boxes of video tapes any longer!
Whether you have old family photos or boxes of video tapes, now is the time to digitize them! Once you see how quick and easy it is to have higher quality archived memories, you’ll wonder why you didn’t do it sooner!
Need help sorting through your boxes of video tapes or photos and getting them organized to be digitized? Contact us! We’d love to help.
