Wolverine MovieMaker Pro 8mm & Super 8 Digital 1080p Converter - Full Review 

Good point.👍🏼

Exactly!!!! I'm fine with lower quality, just never want the original films out of my possession 😉

It's great to hear wolverine has made upgrades on their product from previous versions. I ended up converting over about three and a half hours of my Grandfather's film reels that spaned from the 50s through the early 80s. Sent it out to all of my family members on thumb drives so they can now enjoy the past. Technology is a wonderful thing. Take care and have a great day. 😁

This machine does film transfer the proper way - it pulls each frame into position, photographs it, and moves on. It uses a sharp lens, an even light source, and takes its time. What I don't understand is why the MP4 files it makes are so heavily compressed, adding compression artifacts to the inevitable grain and damage on such old footage. There must be someone out there who can work on the PCB to get the Wolverine to output MP4s at, say, 15 Mbps rather than the ludicrously low 1.5 it's set at. SD cards are cheaper than Kornflakes these days.

Your welcome. 📽😊👍🏼

Is this vinegar syndrome something you can identify from experience? Or is it easily identified? I’ve never been around these types of films, but my wife’s family has SO MANY of these films, and I want to restore them (at least some) for/by Xmas. But I’m TERRIFIED of any of them breaking off.

Did you use software to edit the digitized film on a computer. ? I have some with blank sections among the good ones.

Likely a result of a lack of processing power in the unit. If you could select a higher bit rate (lower compression rate) you would certainly increase that 2 FPS scan rate. I for one would be willing to make that sacrifice in order to get a resulting video without all the artifacts but really would rather see them build a unit with adequate processing power and pay more for it. There's a huge gap in the market place from a $400 dollar unit to a $9000 unit that shouldn't exist.

It does not come with a tray adapter.

I do not 100% remember but I believe it was left it as is.

I'm not 100% sure. I transferred one file at a time during my conversions to PC. 🎞 🖥

Personally I am very satisfied with the quality and output of the product. Most of the film's I converted were my grandfather's from the 50s and 60s. Unfortunately, I was unable to view from an actual projector for comparison.

People sell them on ebay for some reason

Yes, you can copy the files over to the PC hard drive and then use software to write to a DVD. 👍🏼

I used Adobe Premiere.

They sell them on Amazon.

I believe this unit is only capable of converting video.

Is it possible that it's not lined up correctly? Also, try changing the film type to see if it comes up. Good luck. 🤞🏼👍🏼

Audio on 8mm? lol

The Pro can scan in 1080 resolution and takes reels of up to 9 inches. The regular version can scan only up to 720 resolution and takes reels 3 to 5 inches. Hope this helps.

I wish you luck in your conversion. 🤞🏼

@@thegreatgambino thanks. I was scared to send it off and don't know what on there. Apparently this stuff is rare now.

@@miduv82 After you convert it so you have it yourself, you can send the originals to a professional lab. That is what I am going to do with my footage of the May 18, 1980, Mt. St. Helen. eruption. Because that is marketable footage, I will not send off my only copy. I learned the hard way with some 1940s negatives to not do this if I could not find someone local who did it in their own lab/shop versus sending it away. I lost all those precious family negative and had no idea who might even have the original prints so they are lost forever.

No

I wonder if the new Kodak converter will capture sound track ? If not, I will need to run tape film on the original machine and use microphone hookup to capture the sound.

I'm not familiar with single 8 film. If it's similar to Super 8, it should work. I ran both 8mm and super 8mm.

@@thegreatgambino thanks so much for letting me know , appreciate it 😊

That's a good question.

Most people can’t afford the $1000.00 model you wish they would make. For many, even the $400.00for this pro model is too much.

@@robward155 I think you missed my point. I said there should be a product somewhere between this $300 unit and the $9000 Retroscan unit. That doesn't mean they should stop producing this Movie Maker Pro. If you can't afford $1000 then you're more than welcome to buy this unit. I won't because I don't see any point in spending money and time with the end result being a digital artifact filled mess, but I would be more than happy to spend hundreds more on a premium model from Wolverine that could stream the data to a PC through a USB port at a bitrate that would allow for a clean image. It wouldn't be hard to produce. All the mechanics can stay as they are, so there would be almost no retooling on their part. Even the 3.53 megapixel image sensor is fine as is. Just the electronics would require changing. All they need to do is provide a USB interface to allow the user to use a PC for the encoding workload. Their electronics is providing an h.264 MP4 file with a low bitrate. With my PC I could encode an h.264 or even an h.265 file at up to 25Mbs if I felt like it.

@@niknikktm Thanks for your reply. This model might not be totally adequate for someone like yourself who more than most seems to understand the technology involved to a higher degree than most casual users (myself included) who merely want to preserve old family movies and images of lost family members and events. This may be the only affordable device that can accomplish this considering the much much higher cost of sending their movie films to a professional firm to perform this task. I just last week purchased the Wolverine Pro after anguishing for the last two years of what I considered a high cost for this unit ($400). I am a retired 75 year old on a fixed income and $400 is a lot for me as it probably is for many other senior citizens who probably represent the majority ownership of these old films. My children helped by sending me Amazon gift cards and I started by scanning some 1970 era 50’ reels. I am not completely satisfied with my first results of scanning these two Super8 reels using the default settings. The digital MP4 movie is overexposed and one was overexposed and a bit grainy. I am not sure if that is result of the quality of the film being scanned (50 years old) or if I have to 1) Play with the settings to get a better output: 2) Purchase or download free video editing software to enhance the downloaded file. Any suggestions there? I think the video editing software may well be the solution, but I fear the learning curve for how to use these programs may well be steep as well. Although, as I stated, I am 75, I am quite capable of learning new programs. I worked in IT and Engineering for many years and am quite savvy learning and using new software. Since the most time consuming part of all this is the time it takes to scan each film using the device, would you recommend just getting on with scanning all my film first while downloading and learning how to use movie editing software IF that is the only way to improve the outputted movie quality? And what movie editing software (free or $$) would you recommend? You appear to understand this more than neophytes like myself.

@@robward155 The issue seems to be not with editing software but rather the encoding process built into the unit. When you encode video data the data is compressed. The quality of the video is a direct result of the amount of compression used. The more you compress the data, the lower the bitrate and the lower the video quality. At some point the compression causes noticeable digital artifacts in the image. This all boils down to the processing power available and I would be confident in assuming that the lack of processing power in this unit is the culprit. Once the original scan has been compressed too much, there's nothing any editing software can do about it. As far as software for encoding or transcoding video, there's an application called Handbrake that is free and performs all of the basic functions needed to get the job done and is easy to use. As far as my original post I was just trying to point out that there is a huge gap in the marketplace between a $400 dollar unit and a $9000 unit that shouldn't exist. Someone needs to come out with a product to fill that gap that will provide an artifact free result. Kodak recently released the Kodak Reelz scanner that uses an 8MP sensor as opposed to this units 3.53MP sensor, but it too compresses the hell out of the video and produces an artifact filled image from what I've seen demonstrated on youtube thus far.

@@niknikktm Thank you for this explanation. I am great-full for your responses and totally understand what you have said. I will continue on with my scanning and download the free editing software you recommended to maybe see if I can’t improve somewhat on the final scanned files. Have a good day and a Happy Holiday.

How did it work?

@@getout116 It worked great! I use frame adjustment to make sure it is centered and got to be sure it threads through well for a better picture.

@@DragonAgentProd1 --- I was thinking this might be a good service to offer. Target the niche tightly for just 8 mm, be honest, do good work in post, charge 50-75% less. I mean that's just off the top of my head. Could you really start a business with just this machine and some web skills? It would still have to be worth your while. I saw a company was charging 30 cents a foot. for a 7" reel that would be $120. I'd gladly do it for substantially less.

@@NorthTonawanda1 Typically I charge $25 per 3” reel, $35 per 5” reel and $45 per 7” reel. It helps my clients to save money.

I'm not sure what you mean by before and after results. I have given some video Test footage toward the end of the video. I will link another video in the description if you would like. What did you mean by before results?

Lol nah just plain old me.😁

@@thegreatgambino they didnt send you a free unit in exchange for a review?

@@timothy790110 no I payed for this one. My dad sent me a bunch of old films from my Grandfather. This option was cheaper than having someone do it here in LA.😊👍🏼

Then pay $9000.00 for professional model. Most people don’t have that kind of money and only want to preserve parents and grandparents old movies before the film itself disintegrates .

@@robward155 Then better hire someone to professional digitizing. So many companies can transfer film to digital use for example LASERGRAFICS or MILLER HM film scanner. I use them couple time and result was very different.

@@oleggritsev I agree, but cost is prohibitive and so so many reports of damaged or lost original film from many of these video companies creates cause to do it yourself to protect important family artifacts. If you may (or may not) remember watching film back in the day on a projector was not great to begin with. It had jitter and missed frames and the quality was never great. The old adage “shit in/shit out” applies.

@@oleggritsev --- SOME PEOPLE DON'T WAN'T TO PAY $120 per reel for amateur home movies. What, do you own stock in Legacy Box or somehting, jeesh.

@@NorthTonawanda1 I upgrade my Wolverine with new camera sensor module and now i can get up to 6K for 8MM film. It is a lot and not needed so much quality. Also i improoved video compression in software. Now it looks like professional.

It's definitely time consuming.