Kodak - REELS Film Scanner and Converter for 8mm and Super 8 Film - Black

Got his to digitize our parents 8mm and our Super 8 movies. It does an excellent job in capturing our films to an SD card. If you're at all handy it isn't too hard to set up and use. Most fidgety is getting the film under the four tabs in the capture area. And take the time to check out all the options in the operating display. You use it to choose the capture function and center the film in the window. There is even some level of brightness, contrast and sharpness adjustments. Single roll films only take 10 mins or so. Bigger reels can take much longer. I have two SD cards (128G) so I can record to one while I transfer to PC with the other, I use the free OpenShot Video Editor to add titles and otherwise improve the saved files. The only thing I don't like about the Kodak is that every time you change the SD card, you have to restart the machine. Based on what I've seen online, this Kodak is all-around better than the Asian knockoffs. Glad we got this so now we can save our movies before they degrade further and now we can share with our kids and family.

The scanner is very easy to use, and I'm overall satisfied. It's relatively inexpensive and I think most consumers would be happy. However, for prosumer or professional use, the final output just has too much digital noise. Not film grain, but digital noise from compression. For those curious, the captured file is an MP4 at 1728x1296, 20 FPS, and a bitrate of 8.7 Mbps.

Make sure you load it correctly (ie film goes under the 4 tabs). A good value if you have several reels to transfer. It does take time (about 4.5 hrs for a 400 ft reel). Quality is pretty good, but it is MP4. A 400 ft reel ends up being a little under 2gigs.

Love this device! You set this up by loading the film the same as you would thread it into a projector, and it then automatically converts the film to a digital MPEG4 movie at the push of a button. Converts both Super 8mm and standard 8mm. Trouble free operation, I have converted more than a dozen reels so far without a hitch. I then transfer the files over to my computer, and watch the movies on our big screen tv in the livingroom. Price is good, it will pay for itself if you convert your own films instead of sending them out and pay for conversions. I would recommend the Kodak Reels as an easy and cost effective solution.

Good equipment. Well worth the price. Cost much less than shipment to third party for processing and risking vintage family film that cannot be replaced.