Australian film - Federation of Australian Movie Makers

Jottings From Neal Reville
How are we going to store our precious material into the future?
Neal Reville looks at some possible answers
We are beginning to gather quite a few High-definition files on our edit computer. After all, it’s
around two years since we got the camera (!!).There has been just one problem – we had no way of looking
at them in HD. That problem was solved about six months ago when, at a clearout sale, we acquired a modest
HD projector. So, that’s it! Not quite.
The limitation now was that we had to play them off tape in the camera. While the picture quality was outstanding,
it was not much use for practical editing and display. Everything we did had to be burned to a
standard-definition disc or re-recorded to tape for viewing. This was not the original idea at all. We had
expected that, by the time we had edited our first item, Blu-ray players would have fallen to affordable levels
(which they have) and blank discs would cost about fifty cents (which they certainly do not).
Some time ago, I had decided that the answer had to be a jukebox like the ones that Queensland Movie
Makers and the Gold Coast club have been happily using for some time. The “juke-box” is a hard-drive
with some conversion circuitry to allow output to a “display device”. They work fine. They cost over $500
at my last pricing. For quite a while, I have had over 500 reasons not to buy one!
Then, the other day, I came across a new gadget. It was half a “juke-box”. In fact, a “juke-box” without the
hard drive. This was no problem – I had accumulated a couple of drives over the years. The temptation was
too great, so off I went to investigate. It’s called the “WD TV HD Media Player” (I kid you not), it’s made
by Western Digital and it appears to be just what I have wanted. One edits a video and renders it to an
MPEG2 (VOB) file, among many others, then saves the file to an external hard drive (USB2). One then
plugs this drive into the little black box and hooks it to one’s projector or TV via HDMI. Voila! A HD picture.
The same applies to stills, or even music. And it costs under $200.
To cut what is becoming a rather long story short, after first obtaining ministerial permission, I am now the
owner of such a gadget. It looks very promising. Does it work? Well, I don’t know – I’ve only just got the
thing, but it looks fine sitting on the bench, so I am full of hope. If it doesn’t work, be sure you will hear
about it!
Back to the future …
Have you ever wondered how you will store your video masterpieces for the next ten, twenty, fifty or hundred
years? And, what are your masterpieces? For many, it is family movies – home movies, if you like.
Mum and Dad, where we lived, the children when young. Everything. Four generations from now, how
valuable such records will be to our great, great, great grandchildren. But, how to store them.
What are our options? With a bit of quick thought, I came up with –
Tape
DVD
Hard discs
Various solid-state memory devices (flash-cards. Etc.)
Page 10
Australian film & video