DiscussWorldIssues - Socio-Economic Religion and Political Uncensored Debate - View Single Post

**Extinimot** · 08-31-2009, 04:05 AM

stache--

I'm sure by now that the early efforts at video tape technology have all deteriorated to pixel dust. The stuff was not made to last forever, but the good thing is that old video can be transferred to new video without seriously degrading the outcome, so the stuff I worked on is probably in a 4th or 5th generation of retapings by now.
It has to be the best way to preserve old film footage, at least until digital came along.

The celluloid / nitrate film stock would deteriorate quickly. I found dozens of film cans where the content was lost forever and the film stock was either brittle and crumbly or had sort of melted into a chemical goo, and these were film cans that were dated from only five, six years earlier...

08-31-2009, 04:05 AM	#4
Extinimot Join Date Nov 2005 Posts 485 Senior Member	stache-- I'm sure by now that the early efforts at video tape technology have all deteriorated to pixel dust. The stuff was not made to last forever, but the good thing is that old video can be transferred to new video without seriously degrading the outcome, so the stuff I worked on is probably in a 4th or 5th generation of retapings by now. It has to be the best way to preserve old film footage, at least until digital came along. The celluloid / nitrate film stock would deteriorate quickly. I found dozens of film cans where the content was lost forever and the film stock was either brittle and crumbly or had sort of melted into a chemical goo, and these were film cans that were dated from only five, six years earlier...
	Quote