Mass Productions

08/05/2025

These just arrived, remember laser discs?

07/21/2025

Mass Productions recently completed a multi year project to digitize over 700 VHS videotapes of performances for the Boston Ballet. A number of videotapes were sticky AMPEX brand. They required baking in a lab oven for two weeks before the tapes could be played one more time for digitization. The past performances are now easily accessible from anywhere by instructors and dancers.

07/21/2025

He's listening to records we digitized 😁

07/04/2025

Happy 4th of July!

06/13/2025

The SONY CV-2000 from 1965. The first consumer video tape recorder! It used half inch videotape on reels that recorded a half hour of black and white video on a 5 inch reel. We can transfer these CV format tapes.

06/02/2025

These Panasonic audio reels from the 1960's were leaving behind a white residue all over the tape transport on our decks. It turns out to be failing silicon lubricant and it's flaking off the tape. We gently cleaned the tapes with a special silicon impregnated cleaning cloth to wipe off the old loose silicon and apply a new coat. The tapes then played perfectly and did not leave behind any more residue.

05/29/2025

Our master electronics technician is busy getting a 1" EV format videotape deck up and running. We have 4 of them, so we have plenty of parts to work with. This format was used as a semi pro format in the late 1960's and into the 1970s. It was replaced with 1" Type C in the mid 70's. We have 40 of these rare tapes to transfer for a cable access channel in Vancouver. Their 1" EV deck stopped working decades ago, so nobody has seen the programs on the tapes in a very long time!

05/22/2025

Mass Productions will be recovering 40 of these rare 1" EV format videotapes for the VIVO arts Centre in Vancouver BC this summer. The tapes will be baked, cleaned and digitized to files on a hard drive. VIVO will then archive the files and broadcast them on their Public Access TV station.

05/20/2025

Mass Productions can now scan 8mm, Super 8mm, 9.5mm, 16mm, and 35mm film with optical or magnetic sound in resolutions up to 4K!

03/24/2025

I love it when neat stuff like this shows up in unmarked film cans!
Some still frames from a film we recovered for Phillips Academy. They didn’t even know what they had! It was a 35mm safety copy of a film from the 1920’s ( the original nitrate film would have been dust or burst in flames by now) It turned out to be President Calvin Coolidge giving a speech at a graduation at Phillips Academy, somewhere in the 1920s. It was broadcast by WEEI radio from Boston. I love the cool old microphones and the tons of broadcasting gear.

03/15/2025

The deadline for applications for the next round of CLIR Recordings at Risk grants is due soon on April 14th! Contact us for an estimate right away!

Resources to assist applicants to CLIR's Recordings at Risk grant program

02/11/2025

We rescued every second of audio from this early cassette tape. The last few seconds of tape was fused to the hubs inside at both ends, which had caused the tape to break decades ago. We dismantled the tape, found the ends, carefully peeled the tape off the hubs, spliced the broken ends back together, and transferred the repaired reel of tape into a new cassette shell. Then we immediately digitized it to a high resolution file to preserve it. This is an excellent example of why it’s so important to preserve old media!