08/03/2023
You can either post with a Reply Paid envelope, or Sunshine Coast drop off / pick up. We can repair tapes. We do not capture either Hi-8 or 8mm formats.
Please read IN FULL the 'What to expect?' and 'General FAQs' prior to submitting your tapes.
What to expect?
After the tapes are received, we will communicate with you again as the job commences and notify you of any issues including tapes that appear broken, mouldy or have other potential issues. You will get a few updates as the job progresses, checking on certain content you may or may not want, and we will give you an indication of what the total hours and cost are likely to be. If a tape requires repair you will be notified before a repair commences - this is at your consent only. We are confident we can fix tapes and have been 100% successful on every repair since starting Sunny Tapes. Almost every job we've completed has few issues and we aim to return your tapes and usbs post haste. We prefer to keep you updated at all stages and set the expectation of what you will get and pay ahead of time. You will have a concise notes file included on the usb which has labels, condition and length noted. Any tapes with no labels will be given a simple small label 'Tape 01' etc. for admin purposes.
General FAQs:
Q: How long does it take?
A: Jobs are completed as quickly as possible. There may be delays due to the volume of work, however if you have a special request prior to a special event please let us know.
Q: How is captured footage charged? What do you capture?
A: Only footage that is captured is charged. This means any blank sections of tapes, entirely blank tapes, episodes of TV shows, or obviously unwanted footage such as network sports will not be captured or charged for. It will be assumed that anything that appears to be a family memory including live people usually captured on a camcorder, that is not a TV show, movies or network sports, will be captured. This usually includes family holidays, Christmases and birthdays, weddings, children growing up, amateur sports, horse-riding, motorbikes, dance eisteddfods and musical performances. The overall amount of hours captured is carefully calculated in a notes file and provided. The total hours are either rounded up or down to the nearest hour. While we aim to communicate with the customer if there's uncertainty about what exactly they want captured, it is assumed the above mentioned are what is wanted - family memories. Our pricing is very reasonable compared to others as you only pay for these actual family memories. Please attempt to only provide tapes you actually know you want footage captured from. If tapes that are received appear to have no family memories or very few, are mostly blank or almost totally full of TV shows, and thus appear to not be worth our while, we reserve the right to abandon the job at any time and you will have your tapes returned with no charge.
Q: What format do you use? Do you use any other format? What is the price for the USBs?
A: The only format we currently use is mp4 files suitable to play on all modern devices, put onto a USB stick large enough to fit them. An hour of footage is usually around 500mb in size. You can provide your own usb stick or HD provided it is large enough to fit the files. Otherwise $10 is charged per usb stick. You can purchase multiple sticks at request i.e. for relatives. If you have more than 20 hours of captured footage currently you will receive two usb sticks at no extra cost.
Q: How can I safeguard my memories?
A: You should save the files to another usb stick or hard drive as soon as possible. Provide them to relatives by copying and pasting the files to their drives. Upload them to online cloud services like Google Drive or video streaming websites like Rumble. Keep the original physical tapes if possible. Be sure not to 'Format' the files especially if you see this on a Smart TV as this literally means you will delete them.
Converting VHS, VHS-C and Mini DV to a digital format. Located in Sippy Downs on the Sunshine Coast,
