Picture 437 | The VHS Project...

WELLLLL HOOOOWWWDDYY!!!!
How’s the world?
I stopped paying attention.

Oh, everyone gets offended over everything and we hate each other.
GREAT!!
I hate everyone too!!
………………
I need friends…
ANYWAYS!!
We’re just going to get right into it, I don’t feel like typing forever.
I mentioned last week that I got a new piece of equipment.
That new thing is something sooo COOOL!
(You can already tell by looking at this week’s picture.)
IT’S SOMETHING AMAZING!!!
It’s…………………..

A VHS CAMERA!!!
Well, a VHS-C camera.
It’s tiny VHS tapes, not normal ones.
………..
Do I need to explain what a VHS is?
I hope not.
Google it.
So, how did I get this camera?
Well! I STOLE IT!!!
I snatched it off of this old guy down in Florida!
…… ok.
I’m lying.
……………. I stole it from a preacher in Alabama…
HA!!! HAHAHAHA!!
I’m kidding.
My grandfather bought it at an auction.
FOR A DOLLAR!!!
A DOOOOLLLLLLLAAARRRRR!!!
So he says.
It wasn’t the only he gave me.
He also got an old-school film projector!
I don’t have any film, so I focused on the camera.
It didn’t only come with a camera.
It came with the battery, AV cables, wall outlet that doubles as a battery charger, a manual, and lastly…. A REMOTE!
ALL IN A CAMERA BAG!!!
IT’S A COMPLETE PACKAGE!!
I was soooo excited.
I quickly found out that the battery is dead…
…like dead dead.
I found out that this camera was being used in 1997, so that battery is over 20 years old.
Batteries usually start losing the ability to hold a charge after just three years.
And it gets worse as time goes on.
So… it’s safe to say this battery is gone.
But luckily, I found a replacement online that’s on its way.
You might ask…
“How do you know it was used in ’97?”
Well, it was easy.
There were three tapes in the bag!
One of them said Christmas 1997!!
I played through all of them.
THEY… HAD… VIDEOS!!
HOME MOVIES!!!
One had a church sermon from 1999.
That was where the “stealing it from a preacher” joke spawned from.
I don’t know where it was filmed though.
I just guessed Alabama.
Then, another one had a video of a concert down in Florida.
That’s where the “stealing it from an old man” joke spawned from.
He says in the video that it was 2004, so that was the most recent video.
Sadly, I wasn’t able to play the oldest video which was “Christmas ’97”.
The tape was corroded.
I opened it up and the spool of tape was rock hard.
You’ll see all this in the video.
After I looked over everything, I had to make a decision.
I wanted to start shooting my own videos.
That means I’d had to record over something.
I should mention that there are ways to transfer video from a VHS tape to a computer using a special adapter.
So, the smart thing would be to wait for that to come in and transfer the videos.
Then, I wouldn’t feel bad recording over anything and you’d get to see all the videos as well!
But…. I’m not smart sometimes!
I couldn’t wait.
I WANTED TO START RECORDING VIDEOS!!
I WANTED TO FEEL THE NOSTALGIA!!!
So….. I recorded over the church sermon!
I’M SORRY, LORD!
DON’T ZAP ME!!
I did watch it before I did anything and…. it was boring.
I’M SORRY!!!
I CAN FEEL THE LIGHTNING COMING FOR ME!!
I’ll make it up by going to a real church sermon!
Anyways long story short, I recorded almost two hours of video on that tape.
The adapter came it had a few issues during travel.
But it eventually got here and it worked.
I successfully got the videos off the tape and onto the computer.
Then, I tossed in my videos from my normal camera where I talk about the new camera and the other things.
Overall, it was only three hours of video.
Trimming it down from that length was tough.
The videos were all relevant to the topic.
They were all about that camera.
Despite that, I was able to get the video down to 49 minutes.
I want my videos to be shorter, but if it stays on topic and doesn’t tangent into something random, I don’t mind it being long.
With that being said, you can CLICK HERE to see the video or watch it below.



OH!! I ALMOST FORGOT ABOUT THE PHOTO!

I almost did that this week.

I was so focused on the videos that I forgot about the photo!

I thought of the idea of tying the photo with the video and the VHS camera.

So, I made my photo look like it was shot on a VHS CAMERA!!

SIMPLE!

Finding a location for the photo was easy.

I wanted something outside.

The VHS effect was the hard part.

I found tutorials online about how to recreate the look and feel of VHS.

They were manual tutorials where I had to do everything myself.

I thought…. “There must be an easier way.”

Then I remember about Photoshop actions!

A PS action basically does all that manual work… automatically!

So, I researched and actually found one that turns a photo into a VHS photo!

All I had to do was plop the photo into Photoshop and run the action.

AND THAT’S WHAT I DID!!!

COMPARE!

Hover your mouse (the computer one :-P) over the original picture to see the after editing one.
If you're on a touchscreen device, just tap on the picture. You may have to tap more than once.

That compare the cropping, now compare the effect that was applyed...

IT'S AWESOME!!!
Let's try the Image Slider for a split comparison.
CLICK and DRAG the BLUE BAR around to get our own split image.
Or, you can use these presets.
Before FULL, After FULL, 50/50, Before a QUARTER, or After a QUARTER.

Before

After

AIN’T THAT JUST NEAT?!?!?
Overall, I love it!
I love this photo and I love this video!
THIS WAS SOOOOO COOOOOOL!!!
I’ll keep using this camera from here and there.
I do want to shoot an entire BTS video with just that camera.
But I need the new battery before I can do that.
Ok.
What’s next.
I mentioned last week that we went to Cedar Point.
So, that’ll be what the next post is about.
SEE YOU THEN!!!