I just did exactly that about an hour ago hahahaha Ok but I was sitting outside at a cafe with a bmpcc og in a 15lbs rig with matte box, external monitor and everything like a total hipster douchebag 🤣
@@uhuhno6441 If went outside in public with that rig, I could be sure I'd get a number of people coming up to me asking if I was recording footage for the news as that has happened to me multiple times in the past when I have taken my cameras, shotgun mic, audio recorder and tripod out to get videos in different places.
While Sony the company probably won't look back on MicroMV with warm fuzzy feelings, I can assure you that the engineers who solved the problems required to realise it would be thrilled to know that you appreciated their work. I still get emails thanking me for some of the stuff I worked on decades ago, and it is one of the most wonderful things.
Hands down, one of the best Techmoan videos ever. There is something about *mechanical* miniaturisation that can still generate awe, the tolerances in that cassette mechanism must have been incredible. The fact that it still works two decades later - presumably without service - also impresses. I think another reason this format failed was because flash storage got very cheap, very quickly. People might forget that when the iPod mini was introduced, Steve Jobs' speech bemoaned the flash based competition, yet 18 months later he was asking "ever wonder what this pocket is for?" and pulling out an iPod nano. Finally - in a nice irony, the first Techmoan video I ever watched was about Sony Elcaset. Another technologically superior failed format - but without it, I wouldn't subscribe to this channel.
Ah, Microdrives. That 1" 1gb spinning hard drive in the early iPods was also available as a thing for CF-card-based cameras, we had a couple at the newspaper I shot for at the turn of the century. They were not well-regarded, basically only to be used if you were going out into the wilderness -- in practice, we used a 256mb CF card and just found time to get to the office and dump it to the computer between assignments (yes, we had one or two per camera, that's how expensive flash cards were back then that made tiny HDDs a thing).
@@oikos_9000 "Cyberpunk" is a great way to put it, future versions of 80s tech are so much more aesthetically pleasing than the iPhoneification of everything these days.
I absolutely loved MiniDV myself and did lots of cool stuff with it, but it was definitely fragile. A couple cameras and a deck all failed. And unlike TechMoan I suck at repair
This was one of those videos where you feel like you're in a friend's living room while he tells you a story of something interesting. One of the best videos in the channel.
Although I have little interest in consumer camcorders I also feel this was one of your best videos and well worth the wait. As you touched on each phase of your serendipitous path to becoming an accidental UA-cam creator I started to remember portions of other videos where you had alluded to this journey. Thank you.
It's Sony, the lineage would be U-Matic, Betamax/Betacam, Video8, MiniDV, microMV. You could also see the digital compressed video from D1 (Sony, uncompressed), Digital Betacam (Intra-frame compression, like DV), and Betacam SX (MPEG-2).
It really is amazing to think of how camcorders have evolved over the years. From a huge thing that rested on your shoulder, to a small handheld digital tape unit, to what we have now. Back in the late 90's and early 2000's would we ever imagine that in 20 years time we would all be walking round with a device always in our pocket capable of recording hours of cinema quality video that could be instantly shared with people around the world on that same device. Then to think that most of that high tech capability would be used to shoot cat videos in a vertical format.
Late 90's/early 00's was such a high point for Sony consumer electronics, for ergonomics, design, and user interfaces. Thanks for all your memory lane videos! 🙂
I still have my Sony CMT-MD1 micro system from the late 90s and Sony camcorder from the early 00s - both too beautiful to get rid of but yeah they sure went downhill design wise as we moved into the 21st Century which is odd seeing they were the cutting edge in aesthetics for decades. I remember when they unveiled the Playstation 3 and thought it was one of the ugliest pieces of technology I'd ever seen.
@@MichaelPybus Yeah, typically anything minidisc related was a winner - still regret selling my MD-R90 walkman to buy the hard drive walkman (A3000). Gave up a lovely lightweight mechanical product to get something nice looking but heavy and with awful software 😭
There is a point beyond which Sony management begin to look about as incompetent as British Leyland did here in the UK. I have a DCR-PC9 Mini DV camcorder somewhere. Beautiful well engineered machine and very small for its time. 📹
Same! It’s rather lovely to see the clips. Maybe it’s just nostalgia but seeing the shots of his holiday made my heart swell a little. I think I miss it!
I had a job repairing Sony Camcorders and digital cameras. It was a lot of fun. I bought myself a broken microMV camcorder off ebay and fixed it myself. I can tell you from experience that rebuilding the tape mechanism on this model requires a steady hand, a magnification device, and tweezers. I was successful though. I came across this during one of my recent basement expeditions. Now I want to dig it out and see if I can bring it back to life again!
This is why I love your channel. You bring back memories of long forgotten technology. These days we take it all for granted. Our phones do everything for us. I miss the days when you could look forward to the next new thing in technology. I can't thing of one tech item I got existed over being released in the last 5 years. Living with tech through the 80s, 90s and early 2000s makes you realise just how much we moved on in a short time. Keep doing what you are doing. Thank you 😊
The thing you said about progress not always being progress really resonates with me today. I ran across my first smartphone, an OG Motorola Droid, in the drawer where it's rested ever since it was retired, and was reminded of how much nicer it was to use than pretty much any of its replacements. Sure, the screen is microscopic by today's standards (as are, more metaphorically, the processing power and battery life), but IMO it had the best user experience _and_ the best accessory ecosystem of any Android smartphone... well, basically ever, and I miss it.
Feel the same way. My first smartphone was a Galaxy Nexus, a year or so after it came out so not too expensive. But it was fast enough, had enough storage. Big thing I miss on modern smartphones is being able to load most of an app to a micro SD card, with just the launcher left on built in memory. And my favorite cars were my Saturn sc2 and my 84 town car.
What really was a negative development in mobile technology was the pervasive aspect of social media. When phones were for making phone calls and sending text messages to people you know, they were good and useful. I agree that additions of GPS functionality were good, like Verizon's Navigator, and then later Google Maps. It's when we started using the phones for bad things that should have given us all pause to consider what we were doing. Take Twitter, for example. it's like sending a text message to the entire world... And the world apparently is filled with entitled assholes that want to constantly fight with someone. 🤣 Bringing smartphones back to personal interaction only would make the world a better place.
@@michaelf.2449 I had one, and I loved it. They were great. They were also more durable than I expected. A friend of mine drove over his with a trailer truck (not on purpose) and the thing worked afterwards. 🤣
Imagine if someone told you 20 years ago that the vacation footage you were shooting would be played for an audience of 1 million+ … what a strange world…
The last cassette "walkman" I owned was an Aiwa one with electronic buttons, pressing play or rewind and seeing the device do it electronically instead of mechanically was magical. That's what I was thinking when you were putting that little tape in. I know it's not a big deal but I really do enjoy that kind of thing.
My last portable cassette player was also an electronic controlled Aiwa. I should still have it. I might make a mixed tape and bring it to the gym if it still works.
Yup. My JVC CXF5K was pure magic: Auto reverse, one AA battery, and not much bigger than the tape it held. I wish I still had it, but it got stolen in high school and the CXF7 I replaced it with (same guts in a restyled and slightly chunkier case) never looked or felt as magical.
That's amazing that all those adaptors strung together actually work and work 100% for you, I wish I had such luck getting outdated equipment to talk to modern equipment! I still have an old Compaq LTE Lite 25c laptop that I've got other similar Compaq laptops in the past to keep it going with spares, I've even replaced the 3.5 inch floppy drive belt twice. But the speed of the PC and the old M$ DOS 3.1 OS is the only platform my old equipment will still work with. Even DOS in Windows 7 will not work. I have another project coming up very soon and I only pray that the old Compaq LTE Lite 25c laptop will still boot up and the serial port still works, the serial port is the only interface my old kit talks to at 9k6,N,8,1 Thank you for the fantastic video on the old recorders and how you have managed to still today get to read the tapes and get the "footage" into a modern format you can use on a modern PC, it is quite something to be proud of, IMHO!
You are my favourite time travel machine, brother. Your hypnotic voice and your knowledge about what you talk about is like going back to school, only that it's on subjects we all love and not algebra 😄. You are an oasis for us Gen Xs! Please never give up. You remind us all (Gen xs) that life still has some good things to remember and enjoy about those wonderful days and the tech available then. Big cheers from Guatemala, in Central America.
Sat here in New York watching this video and am genuinely impressed with the quality of this camera from almost 20 years ago. Some great archive footage of the great city!
It's almost spooky how ephemeral the footage is. All of these people living life and not really aware he was filming, intersecting for a moment of time and then probably never again. I'm really glad he shared so much footage.
Very personal video from you Matt! We all appreciate for sure the story in it but more than that... you talk to us like you are having a dialog with a very good friend. Thank you as always!!
I can’t imagine you tube without this channel… Thank you Sony!… Maybe you could do an episode telling the story of now this channel has grown ?… I think it would fascinating ! Keep up the awesome work
It's crazy how the early 2000s look more and more like the 1990s which by now are pretty much indistinguishable from the 1980s. Thanks for the video Mat, it's great to have you around.
I think the 1990s is still highly distinguishable from the 1980s. The 90s and early 2000 onwards are so much more drab in comparison to the 70s and 80s, like the difference between the 70s and 90s is so much bigger than the difference between 2000 and 2022 if you were to compare some random on the street filming.
To be honest I really love the video aesthetics of the early to mid 2000's, regardless of their crappy resolution and quality by today's standard. I could watch those recordings for hours, even if its just random street scenes or birds in a park. I don't know how to describe it better, but to me they have a certain "dreamyness" to it, like a promise of things to come that came very differently...
As well as being a good story, I really like your 2004 US footage - I went to New York for the first and only time in 2005 so that helps bring my photos to life. I had stopped using a camcorder at that point as I was worried I was spending too much time filming and not enough enjoying the moment, so I didn't have anything between VHS-C and SD card when I changed my mind - so it's fascinating to hear about these optimised mini tape formats.
Well, this morning I didn't know that MicroMV existed. Tonight, I am very grateful that it did, because without it, I wouldn't have one of my favorite UA-cam channels.
@@_Super_Hans_ I didn’t like my own comment - someone else must have but since you mentioned it, I’ll go and like it now anyway… I’ll like yours too because I’m a nice chap.
Thanks so much for sharing the background, it's great! I was a Hi-8 user back in the day and just always loved that old Sony feel and know exactly what you mean about the way that zoom control feels. I wish things were still made in that way.
re: progress in every direction, I agree; it's one of the causes of hesitation I have buying a new car.. everything being touch panels seems a significant backwards step compared to the muscle memory and tactile feedback available when reaching for a dial to change the temperature, or pressing the power knob to turn off a car stereo. loved the video. thanks.
it just makes me smile imagining Matt being so pleased and happy with his cute, hand-sized, brand new camcorder on the holiday he was saving up for for a long time :)
29:00 that mechanism is like... very Japanese sci-fi feels. Incredibly intricate tiny parts like clocks. Yea, it really feels magical to have such "physical" interactions, totally different from what we have today that are all static.
I loved this video. Seeing your journey from walking into a store and buying a camcorder to editing videos today was very enjoyable. They really don't make camcorders like that anymore. Even though camera quality is top notch nowadays, there's something cool about having a dedicated device for filming videos.
Mat, you are always a delight, but I do have to say... Please don't amputate your finger for us or anyone else!! It's not worth it!! Love your sense of humor and always looking forward to the next chapter in the Techmoan saga! Cheers!
I have the same camcorder - used it to shoot video when I took a trip down to San Diego in 2002 with the GF at the time. I then burned the footage to a DVD on my Compaq laptop at the time using I think MovieMaker software and a DVD burning program. Printed some custom DVD labels on my color inkjet and even got a blank DVD case and printed a case cover for it. The end result looked just like an expensive DVD movie you would buy in a store, except it was all original and all custom. I admit I had fun with my little camcorder until one day the eject mechanism broke as I was inserting a tape - those things were crazy delicate. I carried mine not in a pocket but in a belt case designed for a point-and-shoot. Had the spare batteries and spare tapes too. The thing to remember about Sony was that they were an innovator. Many of the formats that came about were thanks to tech that they had developed. MicroMV was not so much a failure as it was a stopgap between miniDV tape and the solid state digital recording formats that came later in things like the HP iPaq smartphone in 2004 and HTC Touch Pro 2 in 2008, two devices that I also owned. Then of course once the first iPhone came out the handheld camcorder was dead and smartphones would take over. And Sony is still at it. Their Xperia Pro 512 smartphone introduced last year is an imaging beast that puts all other smartphone cameras to shame. Indeed if I was in the market for a new one this would be at the top of my list.
This is a great reminder of how much we take modern image stabilization for granted -- and it hasn't even been around that long. That said, the MV did a pretty nice job.
Thank you Sainsbury's for blowing out camcorders at 50% off on 17 September 2004. As a direct result, we have enjoyed countless hours of heartwarming entertainment. You may have lost money on your business endeavour, but you have inadvertently enriched the lives of millions.
Well....that is a new one on me! I have worked in AV retail for 30 years this month and it is the first I have heard of it! You learn something new everyday!
The quality for a camera this size and 2004 is more than amazing, my local cable TV station at the time was worse with S-VHS quality stuff and we're talking about ''professionals'' :)
This is seriously one of the best channels on UA-cam. I always learn something and there’s just something about Mat that I love. The way he presents things is very conversational and natural and he has a good sense of humor. He’s a natural at this.
Really enjoy your videos Mat. You not only talk about the old tech, but you also tell us about how that tech has impacted your life, which is something a lot of other youtubers who just focus on the technology seem to miss. I'm really glad you bought that MicroMV camera at Sainsbury's back in the day!
I really love how you talk about how much you enjoy the editing, and then have a scene transition where the next image is blurred in, right as you adjust your glasses at 23:28 I hope that was on purpose!
There's some amazing technology around today but it doesn't come from no-where. It's been centuries of trial & error & innovation to get to this point with a few lost gems along the way. As a child of the 60's with an interest in technology, it's been a fascinating journey for me. Thank you Techmoan for eloquently sharing your journey.
This was one of my favorite videos of yours. Informative, personal, and a trip down memory lane for myself as well. The whole thing felt like we were just sitting in a pub shooting the breeze. Thanks so much for this. Cheers! 🍻
Little bit of in-fill on the data chip shown at 30:45 - This looks virtually identical (But of course physically smaller) to the RF chips used for similar purposes in Ultrium LTO data cartridges, a standard that emerged around 2006 and which Sony was involved in the development of. 🛠 If you look very carefully at 30:21 you can _just_ see the chip standing on end next to Mats' thumb, and the chips used in Ultrium cartridges occupy the same position (Opposite end from the write protect switch) as shown here. 📼↙😇 Many thanks for another awesome video, Mat...And not only for demonstrating yet another piece of brilliant technology, but also for detailing the steps which started at home video recordings and ended in one of the most successful channels on UA-cam! 🎞🏆👍
Totally agree, I went with the Canon XL-1 instead of the smaller Sony stuff. I used it here and there, but everyone thought I was the media so I stopped using it in public. Amazingly the XL-1 was the last camcorder I ever bought.
New subscriber here. I love all niche audio/video stuff you unearth and show! Being born in 64 and started reading audiophile magazines in the 70s, you have really hit a great subject. Keep up the great content and , Thank You!
One of the best parts of a Saturday - watching Techmoan. This was a good one as others have said I loved the story of your journey. I found that footage still looks just fine by the way. This one ticked all the boxes
I remember my Sony 8 MM Camcorder in 1986, which also attracted attention when my parents and I traveled for 3 weeks, doing 7000 miles from New York to Vancouver for EXPO 86. We went west through many provinces and then back to the US at Seattle WA, then through the Western US, which we stopped at Custer's Battlefield, Devils 😈 Tower, Mt Rushmore, and to Denver and Colorado Springs where we saw the US Air Force Academy and Manitou where they go up to Pikes Peak. East of there it was boring across 😴 the Great Plains, and not much to see until we returned home to New York in early October 1986. It was a memorable trio and the only disadvantage of the Sony Camcorder, while small, it was only a point and shot unit, and to play the tapes back one had to use a small tape deck. Thanks 😊 for your review.
Filmed a lot of my daughter's jump lessons and competitions (aboard a horse of course) with a similar model of a Sony. Loved it. Didn't need a lot of space for extra tapes and batteries - generally didn't need to bring them, in fact. (Note: There was no scoffing on my part.) (Another note: Adobe Premiere Pro did well with the tape's format, learned to love that tool. My PC has a built-in Firewire connection making transfer very simple.)
even by today video image quality standards, those MV tape footage aren't that bad really ... also, we see some really high quality upscaled video imagery in really amazing ways, converted into 4K for example with very little quality loss!
Hahaha, I remember seeing that giant green hand in NYC when we went to see the Lion King on Broadway when I was 9! I didn't remember anything else, though, so I didn't think I'd EVER get context for something so obscure! Best video yet, Tech!
Once again, another wonder episode from Techmoan. While I didn’t get that particular format back in the early ’00s, I remember my first foray into digital video recording was through the Cannon Sureshot. The very idea of being able to record video on a SD card was absolutely fascinating to my father and I. He was born in 1950, so he grew up starting with the 8mm format through vhs camcorders to mini-vhs to finally SD video via the Cannon Sureshot. Sadly, he suffered a massive stroke/heart attack in early ‘11 and was bedridden, half paralyzed, and brain damaged for the remaining six years of his life. I remember when I got my first Smartphone in ‘15 (a Nokia 530 Windows Phone). I was quite happy that I could not only record digital video, but easily upload these videos on UA-cam. I only wish my father could appreciate it now.
Absolutely one of my favorite videos of yours. I think it points out one thing that you do extremely well: Technology isn't a story about the gadgets or gizmos, it's a decision that someone made making it, and a decision that someone made buying it. Most of the time both of them are in the hypothetical since you're well after the use (like your old Mr. Dengon video or the paper card recorder) but in this case the person is you. Top notch stuff Mat.
It's lovely when you can track a massive life change to a single moment in time. I have a couple of those moments and it's always a pleasure just to think how lucky one is for that change (when it's good, obviously). Thanks for the story! Can't understand how anyone subscribe to this channel would complain about you telling it!
I love it when you find a bargain offer and impulse buy and it becomes one of your best purchases ever made on tech. I have just brought a 2nd hand bridge camera and its been the best tech purchase in a long while.
It really is amazing to think how much stuff became completely obsolete when flash memory really started scaling up in storage capacity and USB really started scaling up in transfer speed. Cassettepunk is going to be the next retro-future fad. That Sony MicroMV camcorder you got is a beautiful item. I love the those late-90s/early-2000s bead-blasted aluminum casings on electronic devices. My smartphone is vastly more useful but doesn't look half as good.
Ha first camcorder we ever used took a full sized VHS tape 😂 We rented it from a local shop and took it on a football tour with us. It weighed a ton, was fantastic though & a great laugh to use cos it was such a novelty at the time 😂
Very interesting to both see your journey and as a reminder of video in the noughties. Also a great reminder of how hit-and-miss Sony can be with their products.
Mat, i didn't expect to see a small piece of my home country in this video. Been watching your videos for years. Small world I guess. If anyone is wondering at 9:23 you can see a little section near the port in Oranjestad Aruba and also at 17:57 the main street in Oranjestad. That area doesn't even look like that anymore so this really took me back. Got a very nostalgic feeling from this. Really makes me wanna go home for a bit. Been living and working in the Netherlanda for almost 10 years now.
No doubt Mat that Sony learned a lot from the DAT era, where they really did push the boundaries of mechanical miniaturisation. Your footage is quite good given I too started with MiniDV and found it excellent then, but now the footage is quite terrible. I did the DVD route as well, so it’s time to recapture my tapes and store them digitally!!! As usual, great video.
I think I speak for everyone when I say we are so glad you bought that camera, I adore your content and I feel comfort when watching your videos and seeing you share your enthusiasm with the world. You are not just a youtuber, you are one of the best
Thoroughly enjoyed this, memories of editing and mucking about with DV cameras, editing etc. Loved your story about how this ultimately pushed you into being what you are now with this channel... the history started to sound like the nursery rhyme "The House that Jack built" 😂😂
I love this video. The part where you talk about learning to shoot video resonated with me. I think we're all guilty of being overzealous with the zoom on a new camera toy! I'm guilty! Hearing you speak of your journey from shooting video to editing was a joy to hear. Keep following your heart and we'll be here watching and listening!
I was introduced to Vegas way back at Version-4. I was skeptical but wound up falling in love with it quite quickly. It handled widescreen video quite well (you just have to tell the software you're using widescreen), though I was using MiniDV at the time so maybe that makes a difference. Any way, I'm currently using V 18 and all other editors feel very frustrating by comparison. This is coming from a guy who was forced to use Premiere and Final Cut for his 8-year stint in broadcast television.
23:33 -> editinception Very lovely story about how different technologies can have an effect on our lives. Very impressive format also, seriously, it was a time were all the best things were made in Japan. It's the swiss watch of digital video tapes. I also love the fact that dongle after dongles, adapters adapted to another adapter, you can still use old tech on todays hardware. Remember me of someone (think it was LGR? ) who tried for fun to use floppy disks with an USB floppy drive to play DOS games on an emulator running on an android smartphone...
It's incredible to think just how many things had to occur in a series of events to lead us to where we are today. Glad you decided to go shopping that morning! Is there any chance we can see a full video of your NYC travel footage? Quite a bit has changed since then, and it's always fun to look back at what the city was.
In general I like these videos. This one in particular was really spot on. I was using the Hi-8 and MiniDV when it came out expencive cameras and it is hard to use the material today but still. Was top of the line then and fun as hell to run around with those smaller things.
I fell in love with SVHS as it was going away. I have since shot live footage on a mac tablets. Hate it there needs to be a blue tooth handle you can strap a tablet to. Holding up what is basically a picture frame is dumb ergonomics. That was what you were hitting on in your video. The new device had a mic where your finger wants to go. Moving the zoom moves the whole camera. When I first started taking pics on smartphones I pushed too hard and nearly pushed the thing out of my fingers. I have entertained putting together a shoulder platform to shoot video from. 3D printed to hold my main video device with a finger tightened screw and a place to mount a shotgun mic or omni mic.
Some of the most truthful and relevant things in this video are your comments about the usefulness, or lack thereof, of a video camera that's better but never used because it's too big/heavy/a PITA to use. I have an SLR, it takes much nicer pictures than my phone, but I rarely use it - I have to really want to do so, and commit to it, whereas my phone's always with me. There is so much truth to the adage that the best camera is the one that you have with you, and it seems that this MicroMV video camera was very much that for you.
Co-incidentally, I'm currently in the process of transferring a drawer-full of MiniDV tapes. I worked in TV and corporate video production back in the late 90s and early 2000s and one of the projects I created a video for was celebrating its 20th anniversary and wanted a HD upscaled version of the original video for the celebration. All of my original camera and editing masters have sat un-touched in a box in a filing cabinet drawer since I switch to HD production. The email about the 20th anniversary project lead me to borrowing my brother's DV camera (mine died and was thrown out two house moves ago) and cobbling together a process using a generic firewire card and some *VERY* dodgy drivers that still worked on Windows 10 to capture the digital video in a series of AVI (!) files. I was then able to transfer them to my Mac editing system and use a combination of Hybrid AI deinterlacing and Topaz AI upscaling to create 1080p ProRes files that I could import into DaVinci Resolve (my editor of choice) and colour-correct and clean up the audio for the final release. The project made me realise that with data costs being so low today, it would only cost me a little bit of time to transfer all of the original tapes while I still have the opportunity. I don't know if they will ever be of any use, but all I really have to do is press play, let the capture software (ScenealyzerLive) capture the video and split it into scenes and back up the captured video to my NAS and rinse and repeat 60 minutes later.
Now's the time to save any MiniDV you have. I transferred our circa 2002-2006 tapes in 2020, and dropouts were starting. Some tapes required a re-read or two.
Oh man, Scenalyzer. I haven’t thought about that program in a long time. That’s what I used for my own Firewire video captures from a Canopus analog to digital converter. (It conveniently removed Macrovision, so I’ve been able to archive quite a few old movies that have never been released on DVD or Blu-ray.)
Enjoyed this video tremendously, end to end. I love the idea of looking back down the path that lead us to the present. Life is full of surprises! Thanks.
Another brilliant slice of Techmoan on a Saturday morn. I’ve still got all my old DV cassettes so it’s remind me to get on with a job I keep putting off. Procrastination thieving time and all that 😂
You’re bang on about the compromise between size and quality. I think it was my old photographic science lecturer who said “the best camera is the one you have with you”, and that is something that I’ve remembered to this day. That’s why smartphone photography is so natural now.
I just found him on one of these tapes as I was transferring it - I don’t remember recording this, but I thought it was a good way to show how big some of those Sharp viewcam camcorders got, they definitely didn't fit in a pocket - not even one in a white jumpsuit. It also shows what other camcorders your typical person in the street was using at the time I had my DCR-IP1 (j/k)
I like the idea that this whole channel is really just an evolution of you having to explain your camcorder to passers-by on the street.
I just did exactly that about an hour ago hahahaha
Ok but I was sitting outside at a cafe with a bmpcc og in a 15lbs rig with matte box, external monitor and everything like a total hipster douchebag 🤣
Ha ha ha! 🤣
I feel like he's justifying it to his wife. What a success the channel had been!
@@uhuhno6441 If went outside in public with that rig, I could be sure I'd get a number of people coming up to me asking if I was recording footage for the news as that has happened to me multiple times in the past when I have taken my cameras, shotgun mic, audio recorder and tripod out to get videos in different places.
I figured the channel was created to justify his 'collecting hobby' to his wife...😊
While Sony the company probably won't look back on MicroMV with warm fuzzy feelings, I can assure you that the engineers who solved the problems required to realise it would be thrilled to know that you appreciated their work. I still get emails thanking me for some of the stuff I worked on decades ago, and it is one of the most wonderful things.
If you don't mind me asking, what sort of things did you work on?
So.
Would you mind elaborating on that? Expand a bit please.
Hmm weird, emails for stuff you worked on decades ago....
@XxDemon23xX He was one of the lead engineers of the Fleshlight mk1.
Polystyrene cups maybe?
Hands down, one of the best Techmoan videos ever. There is something about *mechanical* miniaturisation that can still generate awe, the tolerances in that cassette mechanism must have been incredible. The fact that it still works two decades later - presumably without service - also impresses.
I think another reason this format failed was because flash storage got very cheap, very quickly.
People might forget that when the iPod mini was introduced, Steve Jobs' speech bemoaned the flash based competition, yet 18 months later he was asking "ever wonder what this pocket is for?" and pulling out an iPod nano.
Finally - in a nice irony, the first Techmoan video I ever watched was about Sony Elcaset. Another technologically superior failed format - but without it, I wouldn't subscribe to this channel.
Ah, Microdrives. That 1" 1gb spinning hard drive in the early iPods was also available as a thing for CF-card-based cameras, we had a couple at the newspaper I shot for at the turn of the century. They were not well-regarded, basically only to be used if you were going out into the wilderness -- in practice, we used a 256mb CF card and just found time to get to the office and dump it to the computer between assignments (yes, we had one or two per camera, that's how expensive flash cards were back then that made tiny HDDs a thing).
Tiny camcorder tapes are cyberpunk as anything.
@@oikos_9000 "Cyberpunk" is a great way to put it, future versions of 80s tech are so much more aesthetically pleasing than the iPhoneification of everything these days.
@@DeliveryMcGee Dude, that's fascinating! Didn't know about those.
I absolutely loved MiniDV myself and did lots of cool stuff with it, but it was definitely fragile. A couple cameras and a deck all failed. And unlike TechMoan I suck at repair
I just love origin story films. This is one of my favorite Techmoan videos. "Not every failure is a failure for everyone." Thank you, Matt.
Techmoan gold. One of the best for sure
Exactly. Just a different form of "one man's trash..."
This was one of those videos where you feel like you're in a friend's living room while he tells you a story of something interesting. One of the best videos in the channel.
18:25 I never ever thought Techmoan and Xzibit would ever be in the same room.
Although I have little interest in consumer camcorders I also feel this was one of your best videos and well worth the wait. As you touched on each phase of your serendipitous path to becoming an accidental UA-cam creator I started to remember portions of other videos where you had alluded to this journey. Thank you.
I agree and feel the same way.
Very wholesome vidya 🥰
The fact that the microMV mechanism is basically a tiny replica of a full sized VHS mechanism is amazing in itself!
*MiniDV mechanism
It's Sony, the lineage would be U-Matic, Betamax/Betacam, Video8, MiniDV, microMV. You could also see the digital compressed video from D1 (Sony, uncompressed), Digital Betacam (Intra-frame compression, like DV), and Betacam SX (MPEG-2).
Even seeing tiny sellotape rolls brings me joy so I find tiny video tapes incredible.
@@phelissimo_ No, MicroMV was the smallest.
Did it still use helical recording though?
One of the classic axioms of photography: "The best camera is the one you have with you."
It really is amazing to think of how camcorders have evolved over the years. From a huge thing that rested on your shoulder, to a small handheld digital tape unit, to what we have now.
Back in the late 90's and early 2000's would we ever imagine that in 20 years time we would all be walking round with a device always in our pocket capable of recording hours of cinema quality video that could be instantly shared with people around the world on that same device. Then to think that most of that high tech capability would be used to shoot cat videos in a vertical format.
"Stop VVS!"
Late 90's/early 00's was such a high point for Sony consumer electronics, for ergonomics, design, and user interfaces. Thanks for all your memory lane videos! 🙂
It only went downhill from there 😑
I still have my Sony CMT-MD1 micro system from the late 90s and Sony camcorder from the early 00s - both too beautiful to get rid of but yeah they sure went downhill design wise as we moved into the 21st Century which is odd seeing they were the cutting edge in aesthetics for decades. I remember when they unveiled the Playstation 3 and thought it was one of the ugliest pieces of technology I'd ever seen.
@@MichaelPybus Yeah, typically anything minidisc related was a winner - still regret selling my MD-R90 walkman to buy the hard drive walkman (A3000). Gave up a lovely lightweight mechanical product to get something nice looking but heavy and with awful software 😭
shocking what companies have and then allow to get forgotten.
There is a point beyond which Sony management begin to look about as incompetent as British Leyland did here in the UK.
I have a DCR-PC9 Mini DV camcorder somewhere. Beautiful well engineered machine and very small for its time. 📹
I wouldn't mind seeing a few hours of your raw MicroMV footage from 2004. It looks fascinating.
Same! It’s rather lovely to see the clips. Maybe it’s just nostalgia but seeing the shots of his holiday made my heart swell a little. I think I miss it!
I’ve got a raw micromv transfer from 2001-ish. DCR-IP7. I’ll see if I can upload to UA-cam.
"The Birth of a Legend". Thanks for this one, Mat. Great journey, and one that we're all glad you started.
This old footage can be enhanced to 4k using AI.
@@HOLLASOUNDS please don't; I'd feel like it'd lose its magic.
@@FiXato I'm not going to do it to Techmoans videos, but definitely something I'm open to for My own old videos.
Great shout 👍
@@FiXato all p pp
I had a job repairing Sony Camcorders and digital cameras. It was a lot of fun. I bought myself a broken microMV camcorder off ebay and fixed it myself. I can tell you from experience that rebuilding the tape mechanism on this model requires a steady hand, a magnification device, and tweezers. I was successful though. I came across this during one of my recent basement expeditions. Now I want to dig it out and see if I can bring it back to life again!
This is why I love your channel. You bring back memories of long forgotten technology. These days we take it all for granted. Our phones do everything for us. I miss the days when you could look forward to the next new thing in technology. I can't thing of one tech item I got existed over being released in the last 5 years. Living with tech through the 80s, 90s and early 2000s makes you realise just how much we moved on in a short time. Keep doing what you are doing. Thank you 😊
And to think fromt the Wright bros first flight in 1903 to man stepping on the moon was only 66 years......
I miss being genuinely impressed by a new phone or game console.
The thing you said about progress not always being progress really resonates with me today. I ran across my first smartphone, an OG Motorola Droid, in the drawer where it's rested ever since it was retired, and was reminded of how much nicer it was to use than pretty much any of its replacements. Sure, the screen is microscopic by today's standards (as are, more metaphorically, the processing power and battery life), but IMO it had the best user experience _and_ the best accessory ecosystem of any Android smartphone... well, basically ever, and I miss it.
I drive a 60 year old car and sure it is way worse in some areas.. but it is also better than modern cars in other areas.
Feel the same way. My first smartphone was a Galaxy Nexus, a year or so after it came out so not too expensive. But it was fast enough, had enough storage. Big thing I miss on modern smartphones is being able to load most of an app to a micro SD card, with just the launcher left on built in memory. And my favorite cars were my Saturn sc2 and my 84 town car.
What really was a negative development in mobile technology was the pervasive aspect of social media. When phones were for making phone calls and sending text messages to people you know, they were good and useful. I agree that additions of GPS functionality were good, like Verizon's Navigator, and then later Google Maps.
It's when we started using the phones for bad things that should have given us all pause to consider what we were doing. Take Twitter, for example. it's like sending a text message to the entire world... And the world apparently is filled with entitled assholes that want to constantly fight with someone. 🤣 Bringing smartphones back to personal interaction only would make the world a better place.
The best phone I always wanted growing up was a Motorola RAZR those slick flip phones were soo cool
@@michaelf.2449 I had one, and I loved it. They were great. They were also more durable than I expected. A friend of mine drove over his with a trailer truck (not on purpose) and the thing worked afterwards. 🤣
Imagine if someone told you 20 years ago that the vacation footage you were shooting would be played for an audience of 1 million+ … what a strange world…
The last cassette "walkman" I owned was an Aiwa one with electronic buttons, pressing play or rewind and seeing the device do it electronically instead of mechanically was magical. That's what I was thinking when you were putting that little tape in. I know it's not a big deal but I really do enjoy that kind of thing.
Agreed, that tiny tape mechanism is really satisfying.
Clicking noises it made while doing it where also cool.
My last portable cassette player was also an electronic controlled Aiwa. I should still have it. I might make a mixed tape and bring it to the gym if it still works.
I gave My one to My mum who never used it and that was 15 years ago, it's a collector's item now.
Yup. My JVC CXF5K was pure magic: Auto reverse, one AA battery, and not much bigger than the tape it held.
I wish I still had it, but it got stolen in high school and the CXF7 I replaced it with (same guts in a restyled and slightly chunkier case) never looked or felt as magical.
That's amazing that all those adaptors strung together actually work and work 100% for you, I wish I had such luck getting outdated equipment to talk to modern equipment!
I still have an old Compaq LTE Lite 25c laptop that I've got other similar Compaq laptops in the past to keep it going with spares, I've even replaced the 3.5 inch floppy drive belt twice.
But the speed of the PC and the old M$ DOS 3.1 OS is the only platform my old equipment will still work with. Even DOS in Windows 7 will not work.
I have another project coming up very soon and I only pray that the old Compaq LTE Lite 25c laptop will still boot up and the serial port still works, the serial port is the only interface my old kit talks to at 9k6,N,8,1
Thank you for the fantastic video on the old recorders and how you have managed to still today get to read the tapes and get the "footage" into a modern format you can use on a modern PC, it is quite something to be proud of, IMHO!
The Micro MV came out when I worked at Sony. I used to have a camera with it. I still have several tapes in storage. Thanks for covering it Mat!
You are my favourite time travel machine, brother. Your hypnotic voice and your knowledge about what you talk about is like going back to school, only that it's on subjects we all love and not algebra 😄. You are an oasis for us Gen Xs! Please never give up. You remind us all (Gen xs) that life still has some good things to remember and enjoy about those wonderful days and the tech available then. Big cheers from Guatemala, in Central America.
Sat here in New York watching this video and am genuinely impressed with the quality of this camera from almost 20 years ago. Some great archive footage of the great city!
It's almost spooky how ephemeral the footage is. All of these people living life and not really aware he was filming, intersecting for a moment of time and then probably never again. I'm really glad he shared so much footage.
One of the best Techmoan vids ever. Also gotta love how there’s never ads in the middle of your videos, no begging for likes/subs, just pure quality.
Very personal video from you Matt! We all appreciate for sure the story in it but more than that... you talk to us like you are having a dialog with a very good friend. Thank you as always!!
The quality is so much better than most vertical video on UA-cam. Way less shake, blurr, and better framing
The quality genuinely is pretty good - the low light performance is much better than what was on most smartphones for a good few years prior.
Smartphones have only flat Lenses. It's normal, that they don't catch as many Light as bigger Lenses.
I can’t imagine you tube without this channel…
Thank you Sony!…
Maybe you could do an episode telling the story of now this channel has grown ?…
I think it would fascinating !
Keep up the awesome work
It's crazy how the early 2000s look more and more like the 1990s which by now are pretty much indistinguishable from the 1980s.
Thanks for the video Mat, it's great to have you around.
I think the 1990s is still highly distinguishable from the 1980s. The 90s and early 2000 onwards are so much more drab in comparison to the 70s and 80s, like the difference between the 70s and 90s is so much bigger than the difference between 2000 and 2022 if you were to compare some random on the street filming.
@@DriveCancelDC 100% Luke
You're being delusional
That's just your dementia developing.
@@DriveCancelDC TRUTH!
To be honest I really love the video aesthetics of the early to mid 2000's, regardless of their crappy resolution and quality by today's standard. I could watch those recordings for hours, even if its just random street scenes or birds in a park. I don't know how to describe it better, but to me they have a certain "dreamyness" to it, like a promise of things to come that came very differently...
Fantastic to hear the Techmoan origin story, a story well told. Glad all these serendipitous moments happened for you Mat!
As well as being a good story, I really like your 2004 US footage - I went to New York for the first and only time in 2005 so that helps bring my photos to life. I had stopped using a camcorder at that point as I was worried I was spending too much time filming and not enough enjoying the moment, so I didn't have anything between VHS-C and SD card when I changed my mind - so it's fascinating to hear about these optimised mini tape formats.
The FW adapter setup is ingenious and SO techmoan. Kudos!
Buying an old Mac mini from back in the day would probably have been cheap than all those adapters
Well, this morning I didn't know that MicroMV existed. Tonight, I am very grateful that it did, because without it, I wouldn't have one of my favorite UA-cam channels.
I cannot express in mere words how much I LOVE this kind of stuff so I’ll leave it there then…
Why bother liking your own comment? It's a bit sad isn't it?
@@_Super_Hans_ I didn’t like my own comment - someone else must have but since you mentioned it, I’ll go and like it now anyway… I’ll like yours too because I’m a nice chap.
Thanks so much for sharing the background, it's great! I was a Hi-8 user back in the day and just always loved that old Sony feel and know exactly what you mean about the way that zoom control feels. I wish things were still made in that way.
re: progress in every direction, I agree; it's one of the causes of hesitation I have buying a new car.. everything being touch panels seems a significant backwards step compared to the muscle memory and tactile feedback available when reaching for a dial to change the temperature, or pressing the power knob to turn off a car stereo. loved the video. thanks.
it just makes me smile imagining Matt being so pleased and happy with his cute, hand-sized, brand new camcorder on the holiday he was saving up for for a long time :)
29:00 that mechanism is like... very Japanese sci-fi feels. Incredibly intricate tiny parts like clocks. Yea, it really feels magical to have such "physical" interactions, totally different from what we have today that are all static.
I loved this video. Seeing your journey from walking into a store and buying a camcorder to editing videos today was very enjoyable. They really don't make camcorders like that anymore. Even though camera quality is top notch nowadays, there's something cool about having a dedicated device for filming videos.
This is one of my favourite videos of yours. iMovie was a game-changer for so many of us.
Mat, you are always a delight, but I do have to say... Please don't amputate your finger for us or anyone else!! It's not worth it!! Love your sense of humor and always looking forward to the next chapter in the Techmoan saga! Cheers!
FYI: at the full hour, a church clock chimes four times (once for each quarter hour) pauses briefly and then chimes as often as the hour of day.
I have the same camcorder - used it to shoot video when I took a trip down to San Diego in 2002 with the GF at the time. I then burned the footage to a DVD on my Compaq laptop at the time using I think MovieMaker software and a DVD burning program. Printed some custom DVD labels on my color inkjet and even got a blank DVD case and printed a case cover for it. The end result looked just like an expensive DVD movie you would buy in a store, except it was all original and all custom. I admit I had fun with my little camcorder until one day the eject mechanism broke as I was inserting a tape - those things were crazy delicate. I carried mine not in a pocket but in a belt case designed for a point-and-shoot. Had the spare batteries and spare tapes too.
The thing to remember about Sony was that they were an innovator. Many of the formats that came about were thanks to tech that they had developed. MicroMV was not so much a failure as it was a stopgap between miniDV tape and the solid state digital recording formats that came later in things like the HP iPaq smartphone in 2004 and HTC Touch Pro 2 in 2008, two devices that I also owned. Then of course once the first iPhone came out the handheld camcorder was dead and smartphones would take over.
And Sony is still at it. Their Xperia Pro 512 smartphone introduced last year is an imaging beast that puts all other smartphone cameras to shame. Indeed if I was in the market for a new one this would be at the top of my list.
This is a great reminder of how much we take modern image stabilization for granted -- and it hasn't even been around that long. That said, the MV did a pretty nice job.
Thank you Sainsbury's for blowing out camcorders at 50% off on 17 September 2004. As a direct result, we have enjoyed countless hours of heartwarming entertainment. You may have lost money on your business endeavour, but you have inadvertently enriched the lives of millions.
Well....that is a new one on me! I have worked in AV retail for 30 years this month and it is the first I have heard of it! You learn something new everyday!
The quality for a camera this size and 2004 is more than amazing, my local cable TV station at the time was worse with S-VHS quality stuff and we're talking about ''professionals'' :)
Awesome trip down the memory lane. Elvis and his bulky camcorder made my day.
Oh my God that dongle situation is hilarious, the fact that it works!
Technology is amazing, I love it
I’ve never laughed so hard at one of your videos before the daisychain of adapter dongles in this one. Matt, you’re the best! 😂😂
I'm impressed, though. I've been subscribed to your channel for about1/2 a decade, and your story touched me. Thanks for making this!
This is seriously one of the best channels on UA-cam. I always learn something and there’s just something about Mat that I love. The way he presents things is very conversational and natural and he has a good sense of humor. He’s a natural at this.
To be honest, I'm really impressed by the quality from that camcorder. Looks great even after youtube compression !
You are still the Man for this type of content. I doff my cap to you Sir. Great channel. May you live long and prosper.
Really enjoy your videos Mat. You not only talk about the old tech, but you also tell us about how that tech has impacted your life, which is something a lot of other youtubers who just focus on the technology seem to miss. I'm really glad you bought that MicroMV camera at Sainsbury's back in the day!
I really love how you talk about how much you enjoy the editing, and then have a scene transition where the next image is blurred in, right as you adjust your glasses at 23:28
I hope that was on purpose!
There's some amazing technology around today but it doesn't come from no-where. It's been centuries of trial & error & innovation to get to this point with a few lost gems along the way. As a child of the 60's with an interest in technology, it's been a fascinating journey for me. Thank you Techmoan for eloquently sharing your journey.
This was one of my favorite videos of yours. Informative, personal, and a trip down memory lane for myself as well. The whole thing felt like we were just sitting in a pub shooting the breeze. Thanks so much for this. Cheers! 🍻
Little bit of in-fill on the data chip shown at 30:45 - This looks virtually identical (But of course physically smaller) to the RF chips used for similar purposes in Ultrium LTO data cartridges, a standard that emerged around 2006 and which Sony was involved in the development of. 🛠
If you look very carefully at 30:21 you can _just_ see the chip standing on end next to Mats' thumb, and the chips used in Ultrium cartridges occupy the same position (Opposite end from the write protect switch) as shown here. 📼↙😇
Many thanks for another awesome video, Mat...And not only for demonstrating yet another piece of brilliant technology, but also for detailing the steps which started at home video recordings and ended in one of the most successful channels on UA-cam! 🎞🏆👍
Totally agree, I went with the Canon XL-1 instead of the smaller Sony stuff. I used it here and there, but everyone thought I was the media so I stopped using it in public. Amazingly the XL-1 was the last camcorder I ever bought.
New subscriber here. I love all niche audio/video stuff you unearth and show! Being born in 64 and started reading audiophile magazines in the 70s, you have really hit a great subject.
Keep up the great content and , Thank You!
One of the best parts of a Saturday - watching Techmoan. This was a good one as others have said I loved the story of your journey. I found that footage still looks just fine by the way. This one ticked all the boxes
I remember my Sony 8 MM Camcorder in
1986, which also attracted attention when
my parents and I traveled for 3 weeks, doing
7000 miles from New York to Vancouver for
EXPO 86. We went west through many provinces and then back to the US at Seattle
WA, then through the Western US, which we
stopped at Custer's Battlefield, Devils 😈
Tower, Mt Rushmore, and to Denver and
Colorado Springs where we saw the US
Air Force Academy and Manitou where
they go up to Pikes Peak. East of there
it was boring across 😴 the Great Plains,
and not much to see until we returned home
to New York in early October 1986. It was
a memorable trio and the only disadvantage
of the Sony Camcorder, while small, it was
only a point and shot unit, and to play the
tapes back one had to use a small tape deck. Thanks 😊 for your review.
Filmed a lot of my daughter's jump lessons and competitions (aboard a horse of course) with a similar model of a Sony. Loved it. Didn't need a lot of space for extra tapes and batteries - generally didn't need to bring them, in fact. (Note: There was no scoffing on my part.) (Another note: Adobe Premiere Pro did well with the tape's format, learned to love that tool. My PC has a built-in Firewire connection making transfer very simple.)
Big thanks for the way you present it. Both fascinating and very warm friendly feeling
even by today video image quality standards, those MV tape footage aren't that bad really ... also, we see some really high quality upscaled video imagery in really amazing ways, converted into 4K for example with very little quality loss!
Hahaha, I remember seeing that giant green hand in NYC when we went to see the Lion King on Broadway when I was 9! I didn't remember anything else, though, so I didn't think I'd EVER get context for something so obscure! Best video yet, Tech!
Once again, another wonder episode from Techmoan. While I didn’t get that particular format back in the early ’00s, I remember my first foray into digital video recording was through the Cannon Sureshot.
The very idea of being able to record video on a SD card was absolutely fascinating to my father and I. He was born in 1950, so he grew up starting with the 8mm format through vhs camcorders to mini-vhs to finally SD video via the Cannon Sureshot. Sadly, he suffered a massive stroke/heart attack in early ‘11 and was bedridden, half paralyzed, and brain damaged for the remaining six years of his life.
I remember when I got my first Smartphone in ‘15 (a Nokia 530 Windows Phone). I was quite happy that I could not only record digital video, but easily upload these videos on UA-cam. I only wish my father could appreciate it now.
So sorry for your loss. Truly great technology can inspire emotion though, something I think few vendors but Apple seem to understand anymore.
Absolutely one of my favorite videos of yours. I think it points out one thing that you do extremely well: Technology isn't a story about the gadgets or gizmos, it's a decision that someone made making it, and a decision that someone made buying it. Most of the time both of them are in the hypothetical since you're well after the use (like your old Mr. Dengon video or the paper card recorder) but in this case the person is you.
Top notch stuff Mat.
It's lovely when you can track a massive life change to a single moment in time. I have a couple of those moments and it's always a pleasure just to think how lucky one is for that change (when it's good, obviously). Thanks for the story! Can't understand how anyone subscribe to this channel would complain about you telling it!
I love it when you find a bargain offer and impulse buy and it becomes one of your best purchases ever made on tech. I have just brought a 2nd hand bridge camera and its been the best tech purchase in a long while.
It really is amazing to think how much stuff became completely obsolete when flash memory really started scaling up in storage capacity and USB really started scaling up in transfer speed. Cassettepunk is going to be the next retro-future fad.
That Sony MicroMV camcorder you got is a beautiful item. I love the those late-90s/early-2000s bead-blasted aluminum casings on electronic devices. My smartphone is vastly more useful but doesn't look half as good.
"Thanks for watching!" And thanks for sharing; all the myriad ways, eh? A pleasure to watch for sure.
Ha first camcorder we ever used took a full sized VHS tape 😂 We rented it from a local shop and took it on a football tour with us. It weighed a ton, was fantastic though & a great laugh to use cos it was such a novelty at the time 😂
Thank you Sony for Techmoan.
Now there's a combination of words I couldn't have predicted.
For me Mat's videos are a work of art that I didn't knew I need it in my life and for my soul. Thank you, Techmoan! 🙏💯
How unknowingly some minor events change the course of life is insane
But we're grateful for having u grandpa
Amazing to see good used ones for sale for around £75. Almost worth getting one just for the hell of it!
28:53 The beautifully over engineered loading mechanism reminds me of Innerspace and the robot arm loading the miniaturization chip.
Very interesting to both see your journey and as a reminder of video in the noughties. Also a great reminder of how hit-and-miss Sony can be with their products.
Mat, i didn't expect to see a small piece of my home country in this video. Been watching your videos for years. Small world I guess. If anyone is wondering at 9:23 you can see a little section near the port in Oranjestad Aruba and also at 17:57 the main street in Oranjestad. That area doesn't even look like that anymore so this really took me back. Got a very nostalgic feeling from this. Really makes me wanna go home for a bit. Been living and working in the Netherlanda for almost 10 years now.
No doubt Mat that Sony learned a lot from the DAT era, where they really did push the boundaries of mechanical miniaturisation.
Your footage is quite good given I too started with MiniDV and found it excellent then, but now the footage is quite terrible. I did the DVD route as well, so it’s time to recapture my tapes and store them digitally!!!
As usual, great video.
I think I speak for everyone when I say we are so glad you bought that camera, I adore your content and I feel comfort when watching your videos and seeing you share your enthusiasm with the world.
You are not just a youtuber, you are one of the best
Thoroughly enjoyed this, memories of editing and mucking about with DV cameras, editing etc. Loved your story about how this ultimately pushed you into being what you are now with this channel... the history started to sound like the nursery rhyme "The House that Jack built" 😂😂
In our disposable culture I think is wonderful you continue to bring us these gems. I love the design of this unit.
I love this video. The part where you talk about learning to shoot video resonated with me. I think we're all guilty of being overzealous with the zoom on a new camera toy! I'm guilty! Hearing you speak of your journey from shooting video to editing was a joy to hear. Keep following your heart and we'll be here watching and listening!
Very pleased to see you actually do keep your receipts, for your records, as advised.
I was introduced to Vegas way back at Version-4. I was skeptical but wound up falling in love with it quite quickly. It handled widescreen video quite well (you just have to tell the software you're using widescreen), though I was using MiniDV at the time so maybe that makes a difference. Any way, I'm currently using V 18 and all other editors feel very frustrating by comparison. This is coming from a guy who was forced to use Premiere and Final Cut for his 8-year stint in broadcast television.
23:33 -> editinception
Very lovely story about how different technologies can have an effect on our lives.
Very impressive format also, seriously, it was a time were all the best things were made in Japan. It's the swiss watch of digital video tapes.
I also love the fact that dongle after dongles, adapters adapted to another adapter, you can still use old tech on todays hardware. Remember me of someone (think it was LGR? ) who tried for fun to use floppy disks with an USB floppy drive to play DOS games on an emulator running on an android smartphone...
It's incredible to think just how many things had to occur in a series of events to lead us to where we are today. Glad you decided to go shopping that morning!
Is there any chance we can see a full video of your NYC travel footage? Quite a bit has changed since then, and it's always fun to look back at what the city was.
It's so cool to see the NY footage from 2004!
I visited NY in 2009 and so most of my footage was on my terrible phone camera and my dsi !
In general I like these videos. This one in particular was really spot on. I was using the Hi-8 and MiniDV when it came out expencive cameras and it is hard to use the material today but still. Was top of the line then and fun as hell to run around with those smaller things.
I fell in love with SVHS as it was going away. I have since shot live footage on a mac tablets. Hate it there needs to be a blue tooth handle you can strap a tablet to. Holding up what is basically a picture frame is dumb ergonomics. That was what you were hitting on in your video. The new device had a mic where your finger wants to go. Moving the zoom moves the whole camera. When I first started taking pics on smartphones I pushed too hard and nearly pushed the thing out of my fingers. I have entertained putting together a shoulder platform to shoot video from. 3D printed to hold my main video device with a finger tightened screw and a place to mount a shotgun mic or omni mic.
the screen in itself was amazing. I cant remember there being touchscreens that small or at all widely available at the time!
If only xzibit knew at the time he was so close the celebrity of Techmoan, internet sensation!
Some of the most truthful and relevant things in this video are your comments about the usefulness, or lack thereof, of a video camera that's better but never used because it's too big/heavy/a PITA to use. I have an SLR, it takes much nicer pictures than my phone, but I rarely use it - I have to really want to do so, and commit to it, whereas my phone's always with me. There is so much truth to the adage that the best camera is the one that you have with you, and it seems that this MicroMV video camera was very much that for you.
Co-incidentally, I'm currently in the process of transferring a drawer-full of MiniDV tapes. I worked in TV and corporate video production back in the late 90s and early 2000s and one of the projects I created a video for was celebrating its 20th anniversary and wanted a HD upscaled version of the original video for the celebration. All of my original camera and editing masters have sat un-touched in a box in a filing cabinet drawer since I switch to HD production.
The email about the 20th anniversary project lead me to borrowing my brother's DV camera (mine died and was thrown out two house moves ago) and cobbling together a process using a generic firewire card and some *VERY* dodgy drivers that still worked on Windows 10 to capture the digital video in a series of AVI (!) files. I was then able to transfer them to my Mac editing system and use a combination of Hybrid AI deinterlacing and Topaz AI upscaling to create 1080p ProRes files that I could import into DaVinci Resolve (my editor of choice) and colour-correct and clean up the audio for the final release.
The project made me realise that with data costs being so low today, it would only cost me a little bit of time to transfer all of the original tapes while I still have the opportunity. I don't know if they will ever be of any use, but all I really have to do is press play, let the capture software (ScenealyzerLive) capture the video and split it into scenes and back up the captured video to my NAS and rinse and repeat 60 minutes later.
Now's the time to save any MiniDV you have. I transferred our circa 2002-2006 tapes in 2020, and dropouts were starting. Some tapes required a re-read or two.
Oh man, Scenalyzer. I haven’t thought about that program in a long time. That’s what I used for my own Firewire video captures from a Canopus analog to digital converter. (It conveniently removed Macrovision, so I’ve been able to archive quite a few old movies that have never been released on DVD or Blu-ray.)
I have a ton of MiniDV I need to digitize. Hopefully a local school near me still has a dedicated tape deck to offload.
Enjoyed this video tremendously, end to end. I love the idea of looking back down the path that lead us to the present. Life is full of surprises! Thanks.
Another brilliant slice of Techmoan on a Saturday morn. I’ve still got all my old DV cassettes so it’s remind me to get on with a job I keep putting off. Procrastination thieving time and all that 😂
You’re bang on about the compromise between size and quality. I think it was my old photographic science lecturer who said “the best camera is the one you have with you”, and that is something that I’ve remembered to this day. That’s why smartphone photography is so natural now.
@13:33 Really going to need the details of the Indian Elvis spotting.
I just found him on one of these tapes as I was transferring it - I don’t remember recording this, but I thought it was a good way to show how big some of those Sharp viewcam camcorders got, they definitely didn't fit in a pocket - not even one in a white jumpsuit.
It also shows what other camcorders your typical person in the street was using at the time I had my DCR-IP1 (j/k)