Mission accomplished. After a rather long night, all 23 reels of 8mm movie are now on miniDV, ready for editing. If anyone else is doing this here are some tips:
1. Use some bluetack to stick the feet of the projector to a table. Most old projectors have mechanical switches which take considerable force to operate and this bumps the image out of the video frame when you play or rewind.
2. Use a proper matt screen, but keep the projected image small for better focus. I projected an image about 40cm wide (which filled up about 10% of the screen!)
3. Wait until it is really dark and turn all the lights off but have a 25W reading lamp facing away from the screen. This is so you don't trip over the camera tripod every time you need to switch the lights on (which you need for threading the film etc).
4. On the video camera check the colour balance, if it has image stabilisation turn that off, and adjust the shutter speed so there is no flicker on the video. I used a Panasonic AG-DVX100B camera.
5. Be prepared to swear at least once as the film jams, tears and melts. By the end of the night I had several bits of film lying about.
6. Categorise the reels as you go so you know exactly what order they are on the video.
1. Use some bluetack to stick the feet of the projector to a table. Most old projectors have mechanical switches which take considerable force to operate and this bumps the image out of the video frame when you play or rewind.
2. Use a proper matt screen, but keep the projected image small for better focus. I projected an image about 40cm wide (which filled up about 10% of the screen!)
3. Wait until it is really dark and turn all the lights off but have a 25W reading lamp facing away from the screen. This is so you don't trip over the camera tripod every time you need to switch the lights on (which you need for threading the film etc).
4. On the video camera check the colour balance, if it has image stabilisation turn that off, and adjust the shutter speed so there is no flicker on the video. I used a Panasonic AG-DVX100B camera.
5. Be prepared to swear at least once as the film jams, tears and melts. By the end of the night I had several bits of film lying about.
6. Categorise the reels as you go so you know exactly what order they are on the video.