Choosing the right format depends on your goal. If you simply want to archive the film and be able to easily play it, then DVD is the best format. Video on DVD will not degrade over time. We use professional DVDs that are scratch proof. These DVDs are 100 times less likely to scratch and will last a minimum of 50 years.

Example DVD Menu: 5 minute chapters Thumbnail picture per chapter Start on any chapter

Editing Formats

We offer the following formats for editing purposes:

Bronze, Silver & Gold Process:  MiniDV, Digital 8, AVI on Hard Drive or DVD
Platinum HD Process:  HDV digital files on a DVD data disk or Hard Drive
for support, click here

Bronze, Silver & Gold Process:

Traditionally, DVD has not been a format that you could edit from. That has now changed with Pinnacle Studio 10 software. Studio 10 now allows you to import the video from a playable DVD. Studio 10 can be purchased at computer retail stores like Best Buy or can be downloaded from their site at http://www.pinnaclesys.com.

Editing footage from DVD is acceptable for most of our customers. It is true that DVD is more compressed than a digital tape. Most customers would never know the difference and you have to write it out to DVD at some point. If, however, you are looking for the very best quality master to edit from, then we offer the following formats: MiniDV Tape, Digital 8 Tape (Requires you to have a MiniDV or Digital 8 Camcorder) and AVI files on an external Hard Drive. You must ship us an external hard drive if you choose AVI files. You'll need about 15 Gigabytes of disk space for every hour of film (800 feet of Reg8, 1000 feet of Super 8, or 2400 feet of 16mm)

You may want to consider getting a copy on a playable DVD in addition to the format you choose to edit from. This way you archive the film and have a format you can edit. If you want to do this, choose the format for editing as the master format and the DVD as the copy format on the order form. Our copies are master quality. We go back to the master file and completely render the video to the copy format. We never make 1 format using another (making the DVD from MiniDV tape) like many other companies do. So, we charge a little more but the quality will be better.

Platinum HD Process:

High definition video is in it's infancy. Because of this, we are limited by the formats we can deliver the video on which the customer can use. High Definition DVDs are coming out soon but have several issues. To start, there are 2 competing HD DVD formats and HD DVD players will only support 1 format. The movie studios and computer manufacturers are split on the two formats. It may be 2-3 years before we have a winner. We don't want to transfer your film to a format that becomes obsolete. So, we most likely won't offer HD DVDs until we are sure who will win the format war.

We currently only offer HDV (High Definition Video) files. HDV is already the industry standard format for high definition video cameras. The HDV files cannot be played by today's DVD players. The files must be read onto a computer for editing. Today, there are a number of programs that support HDV (Pinnacle Studio 10 Plus, Premier Pro, Edius Pro 3, Pinnacle Liquid, Final Cut Pro, and iMovie for example). Your video editor can then write out a regular playable DVD that you can watch now and burn out a HD DVD when the technology has settled in the next few years. If you decide you don't want to edit the material right away, we recommend that you order a copy on a regular playable DVD from us. This way, you can enjoy your film now, and in about 1-2 years would be able to produce your own High Definition DVDs for the same cost that you can produce regular DVDs today.

The HDV files are delivered on DVD data disks or a Hard Drive. If you want them on a hard drive you would need to send us an external hard drive. You'll need about 15 Gigabytes of disk space for every hour of film (800 feet of Reg8, 1000 feet of Super 8, or 2400 feet of 16mm).

By default, if there is no hard drive in the box with your film, we will put the HDV files on a DVD data disk. You simply copy them to your hard drive and import into any video editor that supports HDV (Pinnacle Studio 10 Plus, Premier Pro, Edius Pro 3, Pinnacle Liquid, Final Cut Pro, and iMovie for example).

The HDV video has a resolution of 1920 x 1080 (1080i). The video will have black bars on the left and right in order to maintain the 4x3 film aspect ratio. This ensures that the people and objects on the film look proportionally correct.