Home Video Studio – Portland

I had high hopes for working with Philip and HVS… lots of old family 8 mm and Super8 home movies that I wanted to preserve to DVD. Philip is a very nice person, and made me feel comfortable leaving my treasured, original home movies with him. He suggested he work on 2 «test reels» as sample of his work, which I left with him. The results were ok. I was surprised when I took the time to go to his house (where he has his studio) and he had merely transferred the vids to DVD, but had done none of the color/​light/​quality correction I had been promised. I was surprised that he would have me cover over just to tell me he hadn’t done THAT part yet, even though it had been a more than reasonable time, and he was trying to sell himself and his services. He did do the correction work and sent it to me later (via dropbox).
The work was good quality, therefore, I chalked it up to a possible miscommunication and a mismatch of expectations and had him begin work on all my reels. He estimated it would take, at the longest, 6 – 8 weeks, as I was not in a hurry. However, after 8 weeks, I’d heard nothing… sent emails… nothing. Had to begin calling often and sending more emails and finally, after another month, he responded, claiming he’d had technical problems in his studio. Long story short, there were a lot of «technical problems» over the next number of weeks, as my project was still not yet done.
When it finally was finished (a lot longer than the «longest» estimated timeframe it was supposed to have been), I advised I was going to be paying by credit card (as offered by his business) when I was coming to pick up the finished product. Coincidentally, his Square Trade (or whichever «plug it into your iPhone to charge things add-​on» was not working, and he asked if a check would work. Given that I was not prepared to shell out that much cash (essentially) all at once from my bank account, I told him I’d wait until he fixed his iPhone charge slider device. What do you know? It all of a sudden started working again, so I picked up my project the following morning. He claimed he was having trouble with «bad spots» and his wi-​fi around his house. I’m not saying this was a less-​than-​honest claim, just sayin’ though.
When I got my project home, and finally began viewing the individual files, I was quite disappointed that about 25– 50A% of the final product was not the quality he had promised, or had demonstrated. Rather, the films appeared to have been lazily copied over, without the appropriate color correction, aspect ratio corrections, etc. I explained that, had I wanted a basic, no-​correction transfer, I’d have taken the films to Walgreens or Costco, but that was not what I had contracted, and waited months for.
When confronted, Philip was decent about it and promised to make it right. I just wish I hadn’t had to go through all that, because I believe he DOES have the ability to do what he does very well… unfortunately, I was not the guy to cut corners with, and I was up front and honest with him about that from our first meeting. Although, in the end, I ended up with what I had contracted for, it took far more of my time and effort than I had been promised, including for being flexible along the way.
Even though the final product turned out ok (and some of it very good), I cannot recommend due to excessive «miscommunications… technical difficulties» and what seemed simply like unprofessional excuses. Nice work potential, unfortunately not so nice experience.

Wonderful and fast service. Thank you! Had our unprofessional wedding VHS and 8 mm tapes transferred to DVD. Great quality despite the age. Thank you for allowing us the ability to watch our wedding and have the memories so many years later!

Extremely happy with the outcome of transferring two VHS tapes from the 1980’s onto DVDs. Pricing was reasonable and I had absolutely no issues with the DVDs. Highly recommended… quick service and accommodating. Rock on…

For my mom’s Christmas present this year, I took some home movies that started as 8 mm and were transferred to VHS, and I had them transferred to DVD. Simulacra-​licious.
Philip at Home Video Studios was super helpful. He even picked up the original tape from my front porch, and made the delivery in time for Christmas.
Unfortunately, I ran into a little bit of trouble with two of the three disks (one of the video DVDs froze at a certain point, and the data DVD wouldn’t launch), but when I let them know, they very kindly burned replacements and sent them right out.
I’m sure I could have taken the time to figure out how to do it myself, but the thing is: I didn’t want to. I thought about how much I’d charge myself per hour, plus supplies, plus pain and suffering, and I said to myself, «Actually? No.»
I didn’t want to have to find envelopes, stamps, or a post office to send it halfway across the country, either.
I just wanted it to be easy and inexpensive. And I just wanted it to be done. Thanks to these folks, that’s just what I got.