Video restoration and or repair

CaTaClYsM · Post by **CaTaClYsM** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 2:34 am

I need some BIG help here and anyone with any advice PLEASE[size] post it. I was am and will be a fan of the garfield cartoon show. Many years back there was a special called garfields's 9 lives. It was one of the better thigns in US animation. Each life was a totaly different cat, and the stories were not only of 9 different styles, but 9 different ANIMATION styles, one was a series of (I think) indevidual high detailed paintings. I loved it. Well When it was on I recorded it on my beta tape player and then when the player broke it sat in the bottom of a carboard box with other beta tapes for god only konws how long until I got a new one. Well you can guess which tape I went for and much to my dismay the tape is in much worse shap than when I watched it last. So bad that it is unwatchable. Can anyone recomend any ways for me to fix the tape up enough so that I can at least run it once to capture it onto my comp and burn a XVCD? (this is beta mind you, not VHS.) cuz the only other way I can see me getting to watch it again is by paying 77 bucks for a used VHS tape. (yuck.)

iserlohn · Post by **iserlohn** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 10:01 am

Your best bet is to have someone who's a professional do the digital transfer for you. Frequently pros will have equipment like Time Base Correctors and other cool hardware that can make the signal a bit cleaner and help to restore some, but not all, quality loss from aging tape, etc. I'd recommend Digitransfer, which will do backups of off-air broadcasts and even with a DVD-R transfer are cheaper than buying that $77 used VHS.

That being said, you can only do so much to fix a really old tape, and it may be too late. Still, it's always worth a shot. Good luck!

CaTaClYsM · Post by **CaTaClYsM** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 10:30 am

the thing I am talking about isn't just age, but inexplicable physical damage to the tape that renders 5 or 6 min sections of nothing but static, I mean mondo-bado stuff here. how mich of that would this program fix?

CaTaClYsM · Post by **CaTaClYsM** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 10:31 am

are there any sort of tricks or cleaning tips to brush up the tape? the static could also be caused by things on the tape, I mean, god only knows what the hell happened to it in that box.

CaTaClYsM · Post by **CaTaClYsM** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 10:32 am

god all this talk about betamax. DAMNIT, I FEEL OLD!

iserlohn · Post by **iserlohn** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 11:27 am

sorry, nothing can restore physical damage to a tape. you can't recreate what's just not there.

CaTaClYsM · Post by **CaTaClYsM** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 11:33 am

well that is the weird thing, see I don't know the whole story of what happened to that tape, but I know it isn't all physical damage, but I DO know that most of it is unwatchable, I think I need to go pull out the tape and take a look at it because unless it was put up to a loudspeaker or an electromagnet I can't see how that one tape has been rendered unwatchable through the entire damned show.

CaTaClYsM · Post by **CaTaClYsM** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 11:56 am

then agian, it probably is one big long scratch.

I'm going to pull out that video and look.

dokidoki · Post by **dokidoki** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 2:57 pm

This one is currently $11. One day left.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... egory=1163

Garylisk · Post by **Garylisk** » Sun Jan 19, 2003 3:29 pm

I have the Garfield: His Nine Lives comic. it's different than the cartoon version.