The easy answer to preserving these memories seems to be transferring to digital formats. It’s the answer we hear for all types of information these days. Electronic documents. Digital photos. Downloaded music. It would seem that the world has already gone digital and that the whole of human history is available on the closest computer monitor.

While it may be true that much of what is being created is going direct to digital formats, transferring old information is not as simple as it might seem. The biggest issues seem to be the amount of time required to transfer the information to a new format and finding a reasonable, long-lasting way to store data. You’ll face the same challenges moving your memories from VHS to digital.

Losing Its Magnetism

First, let’s look at those video taped gems and why they’re susceptible to damage. Video tape stores information magnetically on the tape. Over time, tape can literally give up some of its magnetic properties, causing video images to “fade” from the tape. Within a few years, the vibrancy and color quality start to fade. Even stored properly, a video tape may only last 10 to 20 years. A friend that knows his video suggests that one way to help preserve video tape is to use it once and awhile; video tape likes its exercise. Rather than leaving your wedding video in a safe deposit box year after year, he suggests you take it out and view it occasionally.

The other issue with video tape is that it doesn’t copy very well. Each generation of copy beyond the original tape has a little less quality. If you’ve ever seen a copy of a copy of a tape, you know that images can look a little blocky and colors can seem faded.

Digital Scores

So, what does digital storage offer? The current delivery format of choice for digital video is DVD. Once your video is in digital format, you can use DVDs or any other digital storage to keep it around. This might include your computer’s hard drive, a TiVo-type recorder or some futuristic way of keeping digital files. I’ve even seen video played on a PalmOne handheld.

Digital files are a series of 1s and 0s strung together. None of those digits disappear when you move them to new devices or players. That means that the first, second, third, even fiftieth copy of a digital file is exactly like the original. The colors in video are the same. The sounds the same. The quality is the same. Plus, the reduction to digits means the files should survive longer. According to Doug Marrison, vice president of sales and marketing at digital video company Sima Products Corp. (http://ww.simacorp.com), “ The deterioration of VHS videos will become evident after several years, whereas DVD videos should not show any signs for a long time.”

Sharing your digital video is hardly a challenge, either. DVD technology went through one of the fastest adoptions by consumers, so you’re probably already buying or renting movies on DVD. That also means that relatives likely have DVD players. So, sending out copies of video on DVD is also viable from the standpoint of the ability to use it almost anywhere.

Facing the Challenges

Digital storage of your video offers several advantages over the old analog way. However, there are several challenges to making the cut over to digital. First of all is the actual time it takes to transfer analog video to digital. “ The transfer from any video source is done in real time,” says Marrison. “For example, if a home video that you are attempting to digitize is 126 minutes, the time for the transfer will be 126 minutes.” That might make obvious sense for your wedding or baby videos. But, you’ll have to consider how much time you want to devote to moving over that trip to the lake, or Christmas at the in-laws. Once you’ve digitized video, though, copying and transferring becomes a faster process.

Another issue is the survivability of the DVDs themselves. Just like music CDs, factory-pressed DVDs are long-lasting and durable. However, the jury is still out on recordable DVDs and their musically-inclined cousins CD-Rs. The materials used to manufacturer the recordable versions are not as durable as pre-recorded types, and are more prone to damage from scratches, labeling and mishandling. Scratches on the top layer of a recordable CD, for example, can actually reach into the recording material, totally destroying the disc.

Transfer Options

If you’re looking to take the plunge and move your analog video files into the digital realm, several options exist. The simplest is to use a DVD-Recorder. While these entered the market a couple years ago at a thousand dollars or more, prices have significantly dropped. Many of the major consumer electronics makers now offer DVD-Recorders, so you have a number of options.

Marrison’s Sima Corp. offers their GoDVD! that helps with some of the finer points of video transfers. GoDVD! helps create crisper copies from your video tape, helps make the connections to a DVD-Recorder, and can accept US and foreign formats (NTSC is the US video format, PAL is used in many other parts of the world).

For the adventurous PC users, there are also video cards and software that let you use your computer as the DVD recorder.

Happy transferring.