- Have you ever wondered if there's a way
for all your old CAMS to come in HANDY
in your modern day live streams, calls, and videos?
Well, this is my old eight millimeter Sony Handycam
originally manufactured in May of 2000.
And today I'll show you how to easily use this analog camera
with an HDMI capture card to capture some
authentically rad vintage vibes.
(authentically rad 80's music)
And this whole process begins with this
analog to HDMI adapter that I found on Amazon.
There are a million different versions of these.
So I think if you just get the cheapest one
that has decent reviews, you'll be fine.
I will put a link to this exact one that I got
down in the description.
And I actually ordered a second one so that I can use
a second old Handycam with my ATEM Mini.
Basically what it is is a little tiny box
that runs on USB power,
and you connect your analog RCA inputs over here.
You then have an HDMI cable
that runs out into your capture card.
And there's a little switch on the side as well,
that lets you choose between 720 and 1080p.
Now this isn't going to perform any miracles
and make your no K camera look like 4K,
but it can still upscale things to work with your existing
1080 or even higher resolution workflow.
And remember, trying to get high resolution video
out of these old cameras is totally not the point.
That's the opposite of the point.
What we want to do is actually capture
what these old school cameras looked like.
That's the fun of this whole process.
At least I think it is.
The adapter will come with an HDMI cable
and then also a USB cable to power it.
That's pretty much everything.
Now I'm using mine with the ATEM Mini Extreme ISO,
which is an extremely over the top thing to have,
just in general.
However, you can use this with any HDMI capture card.
So even something like an Elgato CamLink would work great.
The reason I love the ATEM Mini is because
it does let you switch between different sources.
And that's actually how this whole idea got started
when I upgraded to the ATEM Mini Extreme ISO,
it has eight inputs and I don't have eight cameras.
So I started looking around for all of my old analog cameras
or, you know, digital cameras that still take tapes
that are pretty much just sitting on shelves as decorations
at this point, or sitting in boxes, not being used.
And I thought, maybe there's a way that I can breathe
some new life into this old gear.
And you'll be happy to hear,
that I was able to do exactly that.
And this looks super weird by the way,
because it's the old Handycam video,
but with the audio from the RODE VideoMic Pro NTG.
So it's like sort of mind melting in a weird way.
Can I use the audio from the Handycam?
So, if I'm not mistaken,
[audio quality drastically reduced] this now should be the audio from the Handycam.
So now you're seeing and hearing late nineties,
early two thousands technology.
Welcome back to my middle school years.
Anyway.
[audio quality drastically improves] Welcome back to modern times.
It's nice to have you here.
And once you've got the converter plugged in and powered on
before you connect your camera source, you're going to see a
blue screen pop up on whatever software you're using,
in this case I'm using Ecamm Live.
And then you can let the blue screen nostalgia
whisk you away to a time of four by three aspect ratios,
low resolution, and "be kind rewind."
(Good life advice.)
And the HDMI signal you're using will include audio,
[audio from Handycam] but as someone who doesn't want to subject my audience
to bad audio, so they don't say "adios" to my video,
I usually don't worry about connecting the audio cables
and I stick with just using the yellow video cable.
[back to better audio] That way, I can keep using the high quality audio
from my modern equipment,
with the old visuals from the old analog cameras.
Super fun, super weird,
kind of melts your mind 'cause it looks bad and sounds good.
(Just like me.)
And another benefit to using these older camcorders is that
even though the batteries might not be in great shape
anymore 'cause they could have deteriorated over time,
they usually came with AC power adapters
so you can plug it into the wall,
that's what I have this camera running on right now,
and then it will just run, basically forever.
And it's perfect for streaming, and for long form video,
and stuff like that.
And in this case, this is actually my 2005 Handycam,
which is technically a digital camera
but it's still recorded to MiniDV tapes.
However, it's a little more futuristic
because it had the ability to natively shoot
in a 16 by 9 aspect ratio.
Even the flip out screen is 16 by 9.
My old eight millimeter Handycam, which is the one that,
you know, I made all of my like high school student films
on and stuff like that, was a four by three aspect ratio.
But it does, as do a lot of these older cameras,
have the ability to switch on an option to do
16 by 9 wide which, on the camera's display,
makes everything look squished.
But when you're looking at it,
it actually conforms to 16 by 9 in your final output.
So again, it works great with more modern cameras
and modern technology and, and stuff like that.
And even though I'm using this adapter
with my old camcorders, it's important to remember
that it is just an analog converter.
So it will take any RCA, red, yellow, green, green.
Red, yellow, white connectors, and convert them to digital.
That means this can actually work great
with something like an old VCR.
So if you wanted to play back old VHS tapes
as part of a current video, or livestream,
or conference call or something, you could actually do that.
You could have taped sources in your current streams.
And that actually brings me to another point
beyond live streaming.
There's another really great use for these converters.
A while ago, I made a video about how to convert your
VHS tapes to digital using the Elgato video capture card,
which is still a great option if you're starting
from scratch, it's a converter,
it's a higher quality converter.
And then it also includes some software
that lets you import your tapes
and all your old stuff and save them digitally.
It works great.
Definitely recommend that.
But if you're already using streaming software
like Ecamm or OBS, and you've already got this converter,
you can actually then put a tape in your camera
or put a tape in your VCR, play that back,
and then record it in Ecamm or OBS.
And that way you can actually then easily convert your old
analog tapes which is a really, really worthwhile project
if you've got boxes of tapes, just sitting around,
kind of rotting away.
This is probably more information than you need to know,
but I spent about six months doing that
with all of my own tapes a few years ago,
when I made the video that I mentioned earlier.
And I'm really glad I did,
because even though I still have the tapes,
you can watch them on an iPad and stuff like that.
And last summer, my dad passed away, and that sucked.
And when that happened,
it was really cool to have all of those old videos,
like on my iPad.
I could just sit on the couch and rewatch things,
and hear his voice, and see him, and easily send that
to family members and stuff like that.
It was absolutely amazing and totally worth the cost
of the time and the equipment to save those memories
that could have been lost forever otherwise.
And since this setup is not designed specifically
to save old tapes and record that way,
you'd probably have to run some experiments
using whatever software you're using,
to see if you can get decent quality for audio and video
but it shouldn't be too difficult.
And like I said, it's totally worth the effort
and the time you put into it.
And if you're watching this video
and you want to give this a try
but you don't have a working old school
or analog camcorder, there are a bunch of them
on eBay that are still in working condition for really,
really cheap and affordable prices for like $100 or $200.
You can get pretty neat old cameras that really
don't have a lot of use for people anymore.
But now, instead of all that cool gear
just sitting there doing nothing, you can get it,
put it to use, and give it a second life.
And as someone who grew up with this kind of technology,
I think it's amazing that it can still be used
in some way today.
So now that we've gone through this
and breathed some new life into your old camera,
let's breathe some new life
into your live streams with this amazingly helpful playlist
of all kinds of livestream tips and tricks.
So check that out and I'll see you in one of those videos.
(more rad 80's music vibes)