____twoism

I just returned from my local secondhand shop, bearing 24 VHS tapes and a VCR. The VCR I bought today is my second (working) model, purchased for the purpose of dubbing VHS tapes back and forth - a project which is best explained by watching these two YouTube videos. 1 2

Cool stuff.

and YAY William Basinski in the second video!

This is awesome! I really hope you come out with more

Just think: If Basinski had recorded his disintegration loops on VHS tapes they would have been a lot shorter

Amo Bishop Roden wrote:Just think: If Basinski had recorded his disintegration loops on VHS tapes they would have been a lot shorter

LOL, this is true.

Amo Bishop Roden wrote: If Basinski had recorded his disintegration loops on VHS tapes they would have been a lot shorter

hahaha

In another life I watched both of these videos and considered working with generation loss, how curious it is when things arrive where they started.

It's fascinating - there was a TV programme shown here in around 1990 that was all about VCRs and their history... They did a generation loss test, I'm not sure that they used VHS - possibly an older machine - but similar results. Colour went first, then the image quality dropped along with vertical edges becoming noisy, and sound both deteriorated and distorted more with each successive copy, 'streaks' of noise cluttered the picture and eventually it lost sync and could no longer be viewed or heard.

The tapes themselves will deteriorate with the passage of time - but at least the whole tape doesn't fail to play if there is one little problem area, like some digital files or discs might do...

VHS has got to be the best domestic format for really smudging-up video. Most people couldn't afford to make proper tape copies way back when. Copying to S-VHS would've been alright, but alas, was a bit pricey.

I'm building a nice VHS collection, I have two working VCR to be sure I can watch them at least for the next 10 years to come. After that, it will be pretty much it.

VHS are now so cheap, most of them I buy new & used for 0.99$. I always looks for rarities, underground movies & even art films.

I should buy a converter to convert them into digital files (DVD or Blu-Ray).

Yay for this thread!


I collect VHS's. Once a week I go clean out the 3-4 Goodwills within driving distance.


I just enjoy the vibe so much more than DVD's et all.


Anyway, cheers

Spambot5000 wrote:Yay for this thread!


I collect VHS's. Once a week I go clean out the 3-4 Goodwills within driving distance.


I just enjoy the vibe so much more than DVD's et all.


Anyway, cheers

I agree entirely.

Have you found anything particularly interesting during those weekly Goodwill trips?

Pianoforte you inspired me to try this out with some old super 8 footage I acquired.

Safe to say the results are awesome, so thank you for the inspiration.

Will post the result when I get the files back into digital

fujee wrote:Pianoforte you inspired me to try this out with some old super 8 footage I acquired.

Safe to say the results are awesome, so thank you for the inspiration.

Will post the result when I get the files back into digital

Any time. I can't wait to see what you have done!

My first experiment was only a 10 second loop for a few minutes onto 16 generations, got a bit destroyed by the end! Will upload asap.

pianoforte wrote:I just returned from my local secondhand shop, bearing 24 VHS tapes and a VCR. The VCR I bought today is my second (working) model, purchased for the purpose of dubbing VHS tapes back and forth - a project which is best explained by watching these two YouTube videos. 1 2

I need to get a new VCR. One that doesn't require video to record an audio signal. I've been trying for a while now to run my mixes through VHS tape, but I always end up just getting visual static, and nothing more. I ruined a few good tapes in the process.

Anyway, looking forward to your upcoming creations!

bearhead wrote:I need to get a new VCR. One that doesn't require video to record an audio signal. I've been trying for a while now to run my mixes through VHS tape, but I always end up just getting visual static, and nothing more. I ruined a few good tapes in the process.

Have you tried using a 1/8-inch>rca cable? That's what I use, and it works for me on my ancient JVC VCR.

pianoforte wrote:

bearhead wrote:I need to get a new VCR. One that doesn't require video to record an audio signal. I've been trying for a while now to run my mixes through VHS tape, but I always end up just getting visual static, and nothing more. I ruined a few good tapes in the process.

Have you tried using a 1/8-inch>rca cable? That's what I use, and it works for me on my ancient JVC VCR.

Yours probably doesn't require video signal to record audio. Is a 4 head?

Here is a little experiment I did with 14 generations, not too bad, I added a little soundscape with it as well.

It's got potential, need to sit down and edit it properly soon.

fujee wrote:

Here is a little experiment I did with 14 generations, not too bad, I added a little soundscape with it as well.

It's got potential, need to sit down and edit it properly soon.

That was really neat!

Cheers man, gonna do something longer soon! The only problem with this technique is it takes alot of time. Cool effect though huh?

I volunteer in a small library. The woman who runs it knows of my interest in analog media and allows me to have any VHS tapes which are not usable or not of good quality, in exchange for my going through their VHS holdings. This is what I came away with a few days ago.