I've had outstanding results transferring home movies with a little work. In a dark room (duh) I project the films onto a white screen with the image no larger than 10"x10" and capture the clip using a Sony EX1. Since the Sony's recording at 24p and the film was shot at 16 FPS, by running the film in slow motion on the projector, it's running at 8 FPS so I then compress the final clip in Magix Vegas by 2/3 and it restores the normal speed while also compressing any flicker to virtual invisibility.
I then upscale the output to 8k using Topaz Video AI and then compress that down to 4k to radically trim the file size.
The result loses a little of the grain but enhances the details naturally and provides detail way beyond the original clip.
I'm still tweaking the process and future captures will be in 4k using my Sony A7SII and playing with frame interpolation to smooth the image a bit. They'll never be perfect but with some grading they're coming out quite nicely. So for a modest investment in a camera and projector and some simple playing in an editing program, you can easily convert the movies yourself.
The next task will be capturing the 16mm home movies my grandfather shot in the 1920s. The films have rarely been run, are on Kodak safety nitrate and are perfect: no scratches, no torn sprockets, and no fading. If folks are interested, I'll post the results of those (but it won't be any time soon, unfortunately; not enough time to resume the hobby).
I then upscale the output to 8k using Topaz Video AI and then compress that down to 4k to radically trim the file size.
The result loses a little of the grain but enhances the details naturally and provides detail way beyond the original clip.
I'm still tweaking the process and future captures will be in 4k using my Sony A7SII and playing with frame interpolation to smooth the image a bit. They'll never be perfect but with some grading they're coming out quite nicely. So for a modest investment in a camera and projector and some simple playing in an editing program, you can easily convert the movies yourself.
The next task will be capturing the 16mm home movies my grandfather shot in the 1920s. The films have rarely been run, are on Kodak safety nitrate and are perfect: no scratches, no torn sprockets, and no fading. If folks are interested, I'll post the results of those (but it won't be any time soon, unfortunately; not enough time to resume the hobby).