Remastering Old Video

25 years ago I shot this opening scene for a vampire movie with my friend Shimi. It was just us, one light, and so much fog on the Jump-Start stage we could hardly breathe. The movie wasn't very good but I always thought this opening was absolutely beautiful. I came across the video when I was digging through one of my backup drives so I made a vertical version for social media. That got me thinking that maybe I could find the original tape and see what I could do to remaster it.

The original was shot on Digital8. I still have my Sony TRV310 (along with a few other cameras) just so I can access these old tapes. This computer is running the new MacOS 26 which drops support for Firewire. Luckily I have a 2014 MacBook Pro and bunch of dongles so I could still capture the tape. With fresh copies of the video clips I used Topaz Video AI to clean them up and increase the resolution. Then I edited it in Davinci Resolve, using contemporary tools for slow motion and color grading. I think it really came out pretty great.