FILM
We use the only digitizing process that meets the standards of the most demanding grant foundations and of the Library of Congress — frame-by-frame 2K scans with creation of a separate uncompressed .TIFF file of each individual frame.
This preserves the traditional way that a film is built up out of individual frames, while simultaneously enabling the use of the most sophisticated digital image restoration tools.
Our film scanner advances under gentle tension — no potentially damaging sprockets or claws.
And nothing but light touches the image area.
We can resolve both optical and magnetic soundtracks.
And as with all media, we always preserve the original archival scans, doing any modifications for restoration purposes to a copy only.
SOUND MEDIA
Working with only one master at a time, we replicate the original playback speed of each source.
The only exception is to protect media that would be damaged by real-time playback. In those rare cases, we preserve the master archival file and then correct the speed on a copy, preserving both versions.
We digitize each master recording as a 96kHz /24-bit monaural WAV file or a 192Khz/24-bit stereo .WAV file. We do not manipulate, equalize, or add any noise reduction to this archival file.
We do offer sound enhancing and restoration services, but only to a copy of the file.
We never alter the original archival recording.
VIDEOTAPE
We only work on one master at a time and preserve the unaltered primary digitized file.
We can provide .MP4 files for easy access, or, for archiving, particularly if metadata is required, we can provide 1080 XDCAM.
In either case, we make a separate copy for modifications such as image enhancement, up-res for compatibility with modern digital editing systems, or down-res to web file.
