Find someone who has a clue about this stuff whether it be a college kid or someone just starting their own video production company. You might even try the local cable station. Most of them are mandated to provide equipment (some of it state of the art) and access to their viewing area. But whatever you do, don't do it yourself. The public may not be savvy about trains, but they know low-budget tv when they see it. Stay on top of the content so they get it right, and insist on seeing a rough-cut or two before they master the program. This way you'll have the opportunity to have them fix factual errors which will inevitably be made.



SJHussar@aol.com

Is also VERY SOUND!!!

We are in the process of converting our 1989 VHS documentary on the Strasburg RR in our current SRR exhibition to DVD since our original tape copy is getting well-worn with each showing. The DVD transfer will ensure tens of thousands of repeat showings with crystal clear precision and no tape breakage to fret over. Plus the tape can be safely returned to collections storage for preservation purposes. The program is under copyright from a filmmaker (from whom we received permission to reproduce, and they are doing the transfer) and is only being placed on the DVD for educational use, not to be sold commercially in the gift shop or otherwise. Plus we're getting the original master tape transfer directly to the DVD, ensuring the highest possible quality. Greg Scholl's advice, in my opinion, is the best way to go for the future. The era of the videotape is fast approaching an end, I'm afraid.

K.R. Bell

> Is VERY SOUND!!!
> Especially if you are on a budget. On that
> same idea you could have it mastered on
> something better than VHS(say Mini-DV, or
> other), then keep the master locked away
> until you need to make a new VHS copy to run
> as he suggested. Better yet, have 2-3 VHS
> copies made from the original before socking
> it(master)away.

> If you want to step up from that, you can
> have a DVD made in the same manner, that is
> have the 2-3 minute piece put on there
> multiple times. If someone is doing it on a
> non-linear editing system once you make the
> 2-3 minutes you simply add it into the
> timeline over and over, and burn the all to
> one DVD. Make a few extra DVD's, or have
> someone make a few extras (DVD-R) that you
> can copy if you need to. In some instances
> you could even go over 2 hours perhaps.

> Thinking beyond these lines, I have always
> thought museums and tourist operations
> should have their own video to sell. Here
> would be a way to do that. Make up a video
> of your place, then add in to it, some of
> these little 2-3 minute shorts as a bonus on
> your VHS or DVD item you are going to sell.
> The point being you could kill two birds
> with one stone by making a display video and
> a museum video, that in the long run would
> be not only a gift shop item, but a good
> advertisement! All free food for thought!
> Greg Scholl


http://rrmuseumpa.org

The era of the
> videotape is fast approaching an end, I'm
> afraid.

Most certainly it is, just as the end has come about for audio tape.

HOWEVER.......

PLEASE do NOT assume that once one has made a CD or DVD of some archive for a museum that the data is there permanently. In many tech quarters, controversy is arising as to the long-term data durability of recordable CDs and DVDs. Basically, manufacturing imperfections apparently lead to the physical degredation of the data-bearing surface, leading to the possible loss of data and/or clarity in long-term storage. I have already been handed cheap-quality recorded CDs where the poor quality of the material used led to data loss after 3-5 years. Assume that one will have to monitor the CD quality, or go through the expenses of "archival" CD production.

It seems ironic to me that the mint LPs I collected of steam locomotive sounds are still functional today, as long as I find and hook up an LP player, unlike the aforementioned CD!

> The era of the

> Most certainly it is, just as the end has
> come about for audio tape.

> HOWEVER.......

> PLEASE do NOT assume that once one has made
> a CD or DVD of some archive for a museum
> that the data is there permanently. In many
> tech quarters, controversy is arising as to
> the long-term data durability of recordable
> CDs and DVDs. Basically, manufacturing
> imperfections apparently lead to the
> physical degredation of the data-bearing
> surface, leading to the possible loss of
> data and/or clarity in long-term storage. I
> have already been handed cheap-quality
> recorded CDs where the poor quality of the
> material used led to data loss after 3-5
> years. Assume that one will have to monitor
> the CD quality, or go through the expenses
> of "archival" CD production.

> It seems ironic to me that the mint LPs I
> collected of steam locomotive sounds are
> still functional today, as long as I find
> and hook up an LP player, unlike the
> aforementioned CD!

You can't have enough back-up. I am working with my dads old 8mm films, some shot back in 1954. I had them converted to Betacam-Sp(Professional grade format) a few years ago, and that in itself has helped to preserve them. Wathing the films over and over when we were younger didn't help the films as there are lots of scratches, and some shots are better than others.

As for todays material, we still master on Betacam-SP, and since we are editing on non-linear systems, we make 2-4 masters of each program, thus we can send them to different duplicating houses if necessary, and have back-up. If we want to convert an old one to DVD we can access a back-up master for that purpose.

In the 19-20 years I have been doing video, we have seen VHS, Beta, 3/4 inch(u-matic), Betacam, 8mm, Super 8, 16mm, Betacam-SP, Hi-8, DV, DVCpro, Mini-DV, and other formats.

My advice to those working with video, or DVD, or CD is to back-up your work on two different PRO formats, so you can reuse it, or access it down the road and have something of decent quality.

The same can be said of audio tape. A few years ago I bought 50 reel-to-reel audio tapes of train sounds, that went with some of the films I had purchased. I sent them to a sound studio and they put them all on DAT(digital Audio tape). The guy told me this was a good move cause there was some deterioration in the 40-45 year old audio reels. Now these should be put on CD probably, and because they are on DAT they can be done without loss of quality, although the quality is still not near what todays stuff is, due to the equipment it was recorded on. Still, hearing a CPR G3 barrelling along with a freight at 65mph is a nice treat! Best advice as Alexander is implying is to CYA!
Greg Scholl


Videos
sales@gregschollvideo.com