Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I'm the type of person who always looks at the 1-star reviews first to get the real story on a product--so although I would actually rate this digitizer at 4 or 5 stars, I've hidden my review here for those of you who are like me and want to know a legit assessment of this product. I purchased a similar product for $100 less, that only took 5" reels, and after only digitizing six 3" reels, it bellied up. This Wolverine unit offered same day delivery, so I was elated because I had rented a hand rewind and was under a deadline. I've digitized 63 8mm reels ranging from 3" to 7" so far of 50-year-old film. Here is the process I would recommend: - Rent or buy a hand crank rewind. It is necessary to initially clean the film before digitizing and is a faster method of rewinding the film. - Use a product called Film Renew with lint-free cotton cleaning pads (a cut-up t-shirt into 3"x3" squares will work too--professional pads are really expensive), to clean the film before processing. Film Renew is a solvent, so don't breath too much! lol It does a good job of cleaning, as well as conditioning the film. The downside is that it also dissolves adhesive, so any tape splices you may have, especially if they're older, will fail, either during the cleaning or in the machine when digitizing. - For failed spices, I used scotch tape and made it work. If I had to do it over again, I would have purchased a splice box to ensure the sprocket holes aligned properly (this will ensure the film doesn't hang up when digitizing), and either pre-made spice tape, or film glue. The film glue might work better as the tape splice sometimes hangs up due to a slight increase in the width of the film at the splice since I wrap the tape around the non-sprocket-hole end. My film had a few glued spices, and they never failed. - I made one pass with the Film Renew, and then a rewind pass with a clean, dry pad to remove excess solvent, which actually cleaned the film both ways. I folded the 3" pads down to a quarter square and then soaked it almost to the point of dripping with Film Renew before folding it around the film to clean. I would continually check the pad, maybe every 10ft. to see if it was getting dirty, then used a clean fold to continue. I noticed that not only dirt and grime came off the film, but sometimes color too, as I'm guessing oxidation occurred. This will, of course, affect the brightness of colors with the finished product, but I'm figuring I can enhance the color in Premiere when I get to post production--and I'd much rather have it clean to get the best image I can up front. - After letting the film sit out and "breath" (either a few hours, or maybe overnight would be better) so the remaining fumes dissipated, I loaded the film to the digitizer. THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT: You must use the Frame Adjust feature to properly align each reel. I noticed what was aligned to and what I ended up with was a few stops off. In other words, for my unit, the alignment was a little high and to the right. What I would suggest is to align it, digitize for 5 or 10 seconds, then look at what was digitized. If the alignment is off, you can easily make the necessary adjustments before digitizing the entire reel, and if you still need that test clip, you can add it in post, or pull the film back and re-digitize. - The other custom settings I used were EXPOSURE: -.5 to -1, SHARPNESS: High - Most failed spices continued to digitize, and if I wasn't paying attention, a big pile of film ended up on the floor! No worries though; I fixed the splice on the fly making sure a twist hadn't happened in the film, then with the machine still running, put the take-up reel back on which wound the film up nicely. - ALSO VERY IMPORTANT, AND TOOK ME A WHILE TO FIGURE OUT: I started noticing on some of the digitized clips, a brown spot appeared, like someone had put their fingerprint on the lens. Thinking this was something I had done, with much effort, I cleaned the digitizer camera lens with Windex and a modified Q-tip. I then thought maybe it was on the original film, but no. I finally figured out that the film was rubbing off on the illumination plate. Don't know if it was due to the film not being totally dry or what, but I got in the habit of not only cleaning the digitizing tray with compressed air, but also with Windex and a Q-tip, especially the light plate. That fixed it! - The first competitor unit I'd purchased made binding noises, and I saw a post about adding lubricant which worked well until it died. So I decided to add a little WD-40 gel to the sprocket opening of this unit as well. It purrs like a kitten, HOWEVER, when I added a little more, I started experiencing the same problems with the new unit--namely when it turned on, it would just start running the film without recording. Apparently, there are some electronic connections that can get screwed up if you add too much lubricant, so be careful! I know we can all get "lemons" at times, but I'm really happy with my unit, and it is performing as advertised. It is MUCH cheaper than paying someone else to do it and the quality is very good (I know there's another post where the purchaser thought it wasn't very good quality, but if you look closely, the image he provides shows it's due to the original footage, not the performance of the machine. I would suggest getting a progam plug-in like Neat Video to clean up any graininess, film scratches, etc.). One note on the counter--the product is warranted for 1 year or 200 reels digitized. The counter counts how many times the process is started, NOT how many reels are digitized. I've done 63 reels, BUT the counter says 162 because of all the stops and starts. This was mainly due to failed spices. If you plan on starting the unit and walking away for the up to 3 or 4 hours it takes to digitize a 7" reel, unless you want to come back to a pile of film on the floor, or only 25% of your reel getting digitized before it hung up, then FIX ALL THE SPLICES BEFORE YOU START. UNEXPECTED, PLEASANT SURPRISES: At the end of the reel, the unit will eventually stop on its own, I guess it has a sensor that when the frame doesn't change, it will stop, HOWEVER, I've also noticed that if the film is very dark or too light, it will trip the sensor too. No worries, you just have to start it back up again. Also, when your SD card gets full, the unit will stop automatically. One last bit of advice: The film will drift slightly over time, but not by much. If you don't want to see frame lines come into view, I would suggest on the Frame Adjust feature, moving the W function (zooms in or out) to zoom in 1 or 2 more stops--it cuts a little bit of the picture, but it gives the frame a little wiggle room too. Another nice feature is that you can zoom out all the way and digitize the entire frame with sprocket holes, which is a cool effect. What you could also do in post is use a black framed matte to ensure you're seeing as much of the frame as possible. Good luck! One thing I learned is that taking pictures of people really is the only thing that holds up over time. I have a pile of footage on scenery and landscape that were taken by my father and grandfather, and with the exception of seeing downtown Las Vegas back in the day, or a brief clip of a house I used to live in as a boy, the real value is seeing friends and family in their moments in time (especially those who are no longer with us--but remember, Jesus, the ONLY savior of all, promises to those that confess/admit their sins and believe and have put their trust in him for their salvation, that we will see fellow believers again in heaven! Read his God-breathed love letter to you (the Bible) to find out more.) Oceans of blessings to you.