VHS tapes were once the primary mechanism for preserving family memories. In fact, if you check the closet of any home in the United States, you’ll likely find an old, dusty box of tapes with labels like “Brittany Birthday 1993” or “Paul’s Second Wedding.” In the modern day, however, family videos are increasingly digital affairs, with current-generation cameras creating virtual media that can be imported to a computer or saved to a disc.
There are methods for bringing your VHS tapes directly to DVD – professional conversion services are one option, as are home solutions – but what do you do with those old VHS bricks? Once you’ve completed the transfer of your VHS library, where should all the tapes go?
Here are a few ideas:

Donations
VHS tapes may not be the center of recordable media they once were, but that doesn’t mean people have completely stopped using them. Families that can’t afford a DVD player or don’t spend much time watching movies may still have a VCR, and could possibly find use for your old tapes. Once you’ve converted everything to DVD, blank your tapes and bring them to a nearby thrift store to extend their life.

Recycling
Dumping your VHS tapes into the garbage isn’t the best option—from both a privacy perspective and from that of the environment. Luckily, there are several ways to go about recycling your old tapes and limiting their negative impact on Mother Nature. You can send old tapes to a service like GreenDisk, which will break them down and recycle the various elements, or you can try an organization like Alternative Community Training, which uses recycled goods to help power their community outreach programs.

Arts and Crafts
One man’s trash is another man’s craft material. VHS tapes may not seem like as free a medium as paint or clay, but with a little creativity and a lot of hot glue you’d be surprised at what you can cook up. The plastic cases work well as building materials, and you can use the ribbon-like tape to make images, like what’s above.

At the end of the day, what you do with your old VHS tapes is up to you. After you’ve brought the delicate family events they carry into the digital era through a VHS to DVD or VHS to PC transfer, the fate of the tapes doesn’t matter much. Use your creativity or contribute to an organization that could use some help—either works fine for these relics of a by-gone time.

Your VCR player is gone but you are still hanging on to your favorite Dr. Zhivago or Charlie Chaplin VHS tapes? No problem, just convert them to DVDs, right? Not so quick. Laws on Copyright are strict and you can get fined, even go to jail, according to those warning screens on your commercial VHS tapes. Will you be breaking copyright laws by copying your VHS tapes to DVD?
When our customer brings in commercial copyrighted tapes, we ask them 3 questions. Only if they give the right answer to all 3 questions can we proceed with the VHS to DVD transfer.

Question 1. Do you own the tapes outright? You didn’t borrow the VHS or VCR tapes from the library, a friend, or your school. Did you pay money and own the tapes 100%?
Question 2. Have you tried to see if a DVD version is available online?
Question 3. Is this strictly for personal use? You are not planning to sell the Gone with the Wind DVD on eBay or sell it to your friend, you have no intenion whatsoever to make a profit?
Only if you answer YES to all 3 questions are we allowed to convert your VHS tapes to DVD.

We can now scan large format prints using our new professional, dedicated Epson GT-2000 large format scanner. Don’t have photo prints that large lying around in your house? They are not for photo prints. They are for scanning newspaper articles, travel maps, travel print momentos, and scrapbook pages.

The traditional scrapbook is 12 inch by 12 inch. They need a large format scanner to truly capture edge to edge. Our large format scanning prices are the cheapest in the industry: $4 a page, compared to Staples ($7 a page) or photo shops that charge double digits a page.

The professional scanner we use also has built-in digital enhancement so those faded scrapbook pages perk up. Talking about fading, your photo prints and scrapbook pages have a shelf life. After ten years, they start getting a dull yellowish tinge as the emulsion starts breaking down. Digitize them soon to stop the degradation process. Think of the hours putting together those scrapbooks for your children and your children’s children.

The other advantage of digitizing your scrapbooks and photo prints is that your kids won’t have to fight over them as you can make as many copies as you want. And they can enjoy them digitally on the computer, or we can turn them into coffee-table photobooks for you.

Been hiding your precious scrapbooks in your bedroom closets so they won’t bet abused, torn, or get coffee spills? Now you can be assured that you have a digital master and can re-produce your coffee-table scrapbooks as many times as you want. After all, isn’t scrapbook for viewing and sharing the memories?

If you have questions about your large format scanning projects, please call us at (617) 332-3300. One of our friendly customer managers will be glad to help you.

Still looking for a Valentine’s Day Gift that’s unique, special and meaningful? Show your Sweetheart, Friends or Family how much you really appreciate them with a DVD Photo/Video Movie.

It’s simple: all you need to do is gather your favorite photographs or slides, and/or home videos (VHS, VHS-C, Sony Super 8, 8mm, Hi8 tapes) and bring them to us. We transfer them into a professional DVD that makes for a unique Valentine’s Day gift.

Your Valentine will watch those special moments come to life on a DVD and relive those special memories once more. A DVD Keepsake Video movie makes a great gift for Valentine’s Day, Birthdays, Weddings, Anniversaries, Vacation Trips, or any special occasion.

So gather your photographs, slides and videos and make it a very special Valentine’s Day this year!

Please allow 4-6 days for completion of project. Professional, Reliable and Customer Satisfaction Guarantee. Additional Services also available (see business card)

Call us for any questions on your slides, photos, video and film transfer: (617) 901 4564.