Featured on #Instructables: www.instructables.com/Smart-Phone-Operated-Chicken-Coop-Door-/ and #HackADay: hackaday.io/project/179648-view-master-reel-scanner
This is amazing! I can’t believe you don’t have more views on this. I am looking at buying a large box of old viewmaster reels here in Japan and this would be exactly what I need to scan them.
Thank you! Not a huge crowd for view master I guess. Did you check out the Reel3D channel? When buying a large lot of reels I usually try for $.50 a reel. But lately things have been going up. Let me know if you have any questions about the scanner. 👍
INCREDIBLE! It's amazing how you figured everything out and problem solved. Thank you for sharing! I just got into Viewmaster about a year ago. LOVED them when I was a kid- I'm 60 now and and still find them extremely appealing - maybe I'm trying to recapture my youth🤔. I will be subscribing. Keep up the great work!
I’m impressed in HOW UNDERRATED is your channel and videos!! Your are incredible! You created something VERY important. PLEASE!! Try to sell it to other ViewMaster collections in order to preserve this treasure of our history that will soon be gone… as the slides are getting older and older with time… thank you so much for your work.
Awesome project! I'm a scanning nerd, working with high end drum scanners and flatbed scanners. Just a little tip for improving the image quality relatively cheap and easy: I would replace the LEDs with high CRI white LEDs or use the RGB LEDs as single channels and combine the three images to balance out the color. Lots of scanners scan in RGB, as in the past white LEDs weren't as color accurate
Thanks so much for watching. This is a really cool idea. How do I combine the RGB scanned back to a single image? Also, do you use a program to remove dust and color correction?
Dude, this is amazing! I have a tiny ASMR channel that features assorted collections. On deck is a collection of several dozen view master reels, so I came to RU-vid to see how I can "scan" them for viewers. Your invention is far beyond my abilities to use, but it's really awesome!
Thank you so much 😊 Your audio on your channel is pretty amazing. You must have a very sensitive mic. If you would like, I can send you some scans so you can make a video. I most likely will have the reel you will have in your video too. Just let me know what reel you will be using and I’ll try to help.
@@CodeMakesItGo wow, that is such a kind offer! If I had a bigger channel I would totally take you up on it. But my videos don't get enough views to warrant that level of effort. With your permission, I'll link your video in my description box though!
@@CodeMakesItGo I will check it out for sure! That's so kind of you and I'll for sure take you up on it if I find ones that match ones in my collection :)
I very much look forward to see that !@@CodeMakesItGo. Also - have you considered making the videos of your scans flagged with youtube's 3D metainfo - so it will show up in 3D if using a VR headset (or as anaglyph on a PC)
Hello, we saw your video, liked it and subscribed to your channel. We are also fascinated by the 3D-VIEW-MASTER and Stereography. We read the VM-booklets on our channel to the reels.
Thank you, I subscribed to your channel too with the Reel3D. Unbelievable how many videos you have created. Have you tried text-to-voice tools? www.descript.com Maybe we can work together if you want to dub the story over the videos I create? Let me know. Thanks for subscribing!
@@CodeMakesItGo We have linked your channel with our channel banner (lower right banner-corner): ru-vid.com/show-UClCK7LZi1eVhlfnnFirKwtw and here, at the links: ru-vid.com/show-UClCK7LZi1eVhlfnnFirKwtw/about
Awesome Futu-Retro-Tech! What's next on the list? Here are my suggestions. 1) 8 Track to MP3 converter. Probably too simple. 2) CNC controlled Manual to Automatic shifter that depresses the clutch and shifts the gears depending on RPM. 3) Control Line RC Airplane whose control line is Radio Controlled. Loved the intro.
Thanks! You have some interesting ideas. I was planning to make an automated machine to fly a stunt kite and I think it will also work well for your tethered airplane control. I’ll let you know when I start that one. Maybe we can do a collaborative effort to get it working? Thanks for watching and the suggestions. 👍
Wow, that's a great project. My 85 yr old mother-in-law just showed me some viewmaster reels taken of her wedding in 1958 and asked if there was anything I could do with them. There are about ten reels. Started searching and your project came up. It does seem like a fun project but also a lot of time and effort for just 10 reels. Do you know of anyone who could do the scanning for her? Thanks for posting!
Reely cool project! I love how much of the process you managed to automate. The process of masking to determine the crop and orientation reminded me of digital ICE to remove dust spots wonder if it would work using no backlight and external light to make a mask of dust spots to be removed? Awesome
Haha yes! I thought of that when I first did the threshold image. And I have implemented it in a cheap way. Basically the white areas of the threshold become transparent on the original image. Then I scan over the image and replace all transparent pixels with the last valid previous color. Even though it isn’t as elegant as ICE it actually does a decent job for small defects. Thanks for watching and the comment. 👍
This is cool. The first thing I thought of was scanning disk film. Disk film is a format that came out in the 1980's and it was exactly like it sounds. There are some videos on it. A round disk of film on a hard plastic center inside a plastic cassette. Kind of like an old 3.5" floppy or Zip disk. The format wasn't very good, IMO. The negative area was less than a 110 format, I think. The photos were not very good. If I remember correctly, there were only 15 exposures to a disk. I'm in the process of looking at what I need to scan family photos and ran across a few of these in my box of pictures shortly before seeing this video. While I don't think only a few disks is worth developing something for just those few, I can see it being useful for those that may have shot a bunch of these. Something you would mount the disk on and have it rotate and record each frame. Then process each frame in something like GIMP.
I’ve been looking for disk films on eBay just to see what they look like. Seems this solution can be adapted to work with them. So many cool vintage things most people never knew about. Thanks for letting me know these exist. If I get my hands on one I’ll let you know if I can get it to work. Thanks for watching!
I’d probably buy one too! Or if you offered a service for a reasonable price where we could send you reels, you make a video that we can just upload to our own RU-vid channel, that would be cool too.
Thanks so much for watching! Really appreciate the comment. I’ve built and sold 1 of these without cameras for $100. The major cost are the cameras at nearly $100 each. The biggest issue was getting the custom software to work. Im currently building a new revision that should resolve some of these issues. But, the cost is still higher than most people want to spend to scan reels. So unless there are some major breakthroughs to reduce cost, it isn’t viable to sell in my opinion.
@@CodeMakesItGo Thanks a lot! I`m a huge Star Trek fan and I have watched everything 3D and/or VR related to Star Trek, except View Master reels, 'cause I just learned about their existence today!
Next week the Star Trek slides will be up. And another the week after (9th and the 16th). One set of the star trek slides I had wasn't complete so I bought another on ebay so it will have the complete story for you. I'm scanning these in at 4K now. So this will be the first batch at this resolution. Hope you enjoy.
This will be 'The Omega Glory' and the animated 'Mr. Spock's time trek'. I don't have the wrath of Khan but when I run across it I'll be sure to let you know.
The cameras were the most expensive. I'm now scanning the slides in at 4K so each camera cost about $85. The rest was about $30 in total. But spent a lot of time with the software. Here is the last camera I purchased, works pretty good but the lens they provide is crap. amzn.to/3B5GqbX Looks like on your channel you are converting 8mm film to digital? Curious how you are going about doing that. I have some 8mm reels I'd like to convert over. Thinking about building a rig for that too. Let me know if you have any secrets to share.
@@CodeMakesItGo I bought a DigitNow Projector. It does an awesome job on the conversions except I have to slow the videos down using VLC media player and rerecord them using OBS Studio.
I have several hundred reels that I would love to scan. The images were made by by grandfather over a 15 year period. Can I buy one of these systems ready made? Or do you have detailed plans I could buy? This would be amazing, as many of the people in the images are in their 80s now.
That sounds really cool, I bet they would love to relive these memories.Yes you can make this yourself. I’ll put the stl files on GitHub so you can print them. I don’t usually sell things I make but will gladly help you make one. You can email me at jason.altice@codemakesitgo.com if you have questions.
@@CodeMakesItGo Thank you. I am planning on downloading them today, and then workin g on this project over the next couple of weeks. I counted reels today, 27 books of 30 reels each, over 5000 images of my mom’s family adventures. Her dad was an engineer for P&G, and they traveled a lot. I’ve been trying to find a way forward for 2 years. THANK YOU!!
Sounds like a fun project indeed. I can customize the software for you when you get to that point. Whatever you might need. Also, I would suggest getting the jewel LED instead of the ring. More even lighting. Good luck, here to help.
@@CodeMakesItGo Thank you for all your effort and sharing your discovery. However there is no "one" social media that can show these in all 3d formats (parallel, crossview, anaglyph) RU-vid USED to have a player that had more options. If you're interested, you can embed your videos with ffmpeg code to make it 3d for VR, or the same player will play 2d, and anaglyph options. Then you can post again in parallel (like you do now) and you'll have everyone covered. :-)
Great video. I am doing a similar project right now and this gave me some ideas. How do you cope with the copyright issue? arent they still falling under copyright law?
I put the copyright in the description but just assume the channel and or individual videos will be taken down one day or will be demonetized if it ever qualifies. I’m not selling or profiting off their material or preventing the sale of reels made in the 1950s so I don’t have any moral issues with it. That’s how I cope with it, I don’t feel like I’m stealing their work just allowing people to experience their work through a different medium. But, I also didn’t get their permission to put these on RU-vid. Good question and I don’t have a clear answer but my personal reasoning allows me to sleep at night. Thanks for watching and let me know when yours is complete, would like to see it work if you post a video.
@@CodeMakesItGo will try to think of you when it's done. It's for batch digitising slides. I am using a pro micro so I can control a Canon camera on a pc through with HID via USB and safe directly to the computer without sd card. Tried the wheel like you did but too much errors due to the differend slide frames.
@@CodeMakesItGo Such a great video I thoroughly enjoyed it and it helped me to figure out ways of digitizing Viewmaster and also old stereo photo cards as well. I think if you use pre-1980 be masters there probably isn’t much trouble with copyright issues, most are probably in the public domain especially travel photos. It’s clear that you’re not doing it for commercial purposes that it is something falls under the “fair use” guidelines as documentary, or that it is simply your system of saving a copy of the images for your own records in case the originals get destroyed or deleted. The ones I would have concerned about or anything that is Disney related. Like Disneyland and Disney world reels, and of course things like Mickey Mouse and many other characters that they hold copyright and trademark on for many years to come. Thanks again for such a well-made video, H.M., founder Highway Cinema
Thanks for the comment and feedback. I’m happy the video helped. I’m going to experiment with a solution for the tru-vue film strips too. So far everything I have is pre 1980. I’ll have to look up what stereo photo cards are. Sounds interesting, thanks for mentioning it. Good luck with your digitizing!
