Help needed: How do you convert an American videotape to work under European standards?
 

We sent a copy of our taped travels video to a couple of German friends. They can't watch it; all that appears is a black screen with no sound. <BR> <BR>My friend says that there are two different recordings techniques between the U.S. and Germany, PAL and SECAM . They used PAL <BR>in Germany. <BR> <BR>Do you have any suggestions? Experiences? Any input is appreciated.

Hi, Maira, <BR> This happens to us all the time with our travel videos filmed in Spain that we want our Spanish relatives to see. <BR>The European system is PAL, which is incompatable with the American system, as your friend has told you. Also, the videos we purchase in Spain at El Corte Ingles need to be converted for us to watch here in the US. <BR> Luckily we have a camera shop near by that offers a conversion service (not inexpensive, by the way). They do not have a conversion device on premises, so they send our tapes out to be converted (for a set fee per tape), and in a week we have them back and then either send them or take them to our family in Spain in the summer. <BR>I suggest that you call the camera shops in your area to see if they offer this service, or if they know of company that does. As soon as I can find my camera shop's price list for this service, I'll e-mail it to you. (May take a day or two...) <BR>Regards, <BR>Maribel

Maribel, thank you very much for the advice and the offer. I will be checking with the local camera shops as well. <BR> <BR>THANKS again!!!

maybe it's not an option in this case, but in Europe you can buy vcr's which play both types of videos. In North America it's hard to find, and costs at least twice as much

If you can't find a camera shop to do this, try looking up Video Production Services or Video Tape Duplication and Transfer in your yellow pages. I can't remember what it cost us to do this so I'm guessing at somewhere between $20 - $40 (Canadian dollars). More likely the higher figure.