Gamma Ray Digital, Inc.

02/06/2026

Boston area folks: Check out the new exhibit "Freezing Time" at the MIT Museum. We did some scanning on this (for the Doc Edgerton film "Quicker N' A Wink" - a goofy look from the early 1940s at his work with high speed stroboscopic motion picture film. Very cool stuff.

The museum strives to be a place where science, technology, the humanities, and the arts are all used to frame and reframe problems, enabling it to address the compelling questions of our time in new ways.

11/24/2025

Another day, another deck repaired. This Umatic deck had a really bad video signal, squealed horribly when playing or fast forwarding tapes, and all the rubber inside was badly degraded.

It has been completely cleaned and lubricated, new belts, pinch roller, and drive wheel installed. Everything that's supposed to spin, spins nicely now. But the video still looked bad even after a drum swap. So this morning we moved the video board from a parts deck into this one, and now there's a nice clean signal. Just some last minute tension adjustments to do and then it's into the rack!

11/19/2025

For the past several months we've been trying to get our 1" deck up and running. Had a bit of a breakthrough this past week. We isolated the problem to one of the TBC circuit boards, and then this morning figured out exactly which component failed. Check out this video showing the whole process (well, some of it at least).

https://youtu.be/-Lrp02Is2hs?si=SDNfTuXgql_5g7XU

Now we need to dial it in, get it in a mobile rack with all the other stuff it needs (dedicated Waveform monitor and CRT monitors, A/D converter so we can get SDI audio and video out of it at the deck, and all that. Hopefully we'll have this ready to capture client tapes very soon.

In June 2025 we took delivery of a Sony BVH-2000 1" Type-C open reel VTR. Sadly, it wasn't well shipped and FedEX Freight managed to drop it. They delivered ...

08/26/2025

Now offering Hi8/Video8 tape capture. We used to send this format out to a local facility but they closed up shop this summer. So we just got a deck (well 4 decks, all in various states of disrepair). After a drum assembly replacement last night, we're up and running! Contact us through our web site if you have Hi8 tape to digitize - we offer straight Standard Def as well as Teranex upconverted HD capture from all SD formats.

More videotape formats coming soon!

05/16/2025

And speaking of video, this (pristine looking) dinosaur just arrived. Coming soon: 1/2" EIAJ-1 Open Reel tape capture. Need to get some UHF adapters, figure out how we're going to interface this into our SDI-based router, and then run some tests.

05/13/2025

Our most recent newsletter - did you know that while film is our primary focus, we also capture a boatload of video tape formats? We're adding more, too!

https://mailchi.mp/705001321648/got-old-videotape-we-can-help

12/31/2024

Spent the last day of 2024 getting a 3/4" U-matic SP deck hooked up to our capture setup. Because everything is SDI-based, and U-matic is decidedly not, we have to run the signal through an analog to SDI converter. We had this old Leitch DPS-575 that can only be controlled by a web browser interface but hadn't set it up since buying it used.

But if you don't know the IP address you can't get into it. So that means making your own little network with a laptop, the frame sync and a switch, and using Wireshark, just waiting for the DPS575 to pop up and say hi to the network. Then you can log into it and reset everything.

Once that was done, it had to be configured using a UI designed for Netscape Navigator.

Then the audio from the deck had to be patched into these crazy analog inputs on the back of the DPS575 (Why Euro connectors? Why??), so that meant making custom cables.

Then it could be patched into our Blackmagic Broadcast Videohub, and voila - a 1994 telecine of super 8 Ektachrome living on 3/4" Umatic tape, converted to SDI on a 2002 A/D converter, being captured on a 2011 Mac Pro.

One down, one to go! (there's another umatic deck on the shelf just screaming to be hooked up)

Happy New Year everyone!

10/18/2024

When you don't have 9.5mm cores, but you have a lathe...

We've had the 9.5mm gate for a couple years now but the scanner's hub for 9.5mm film uses the same core diameter as standard 16mm and 35mm hubs, and we didn't have any 9.5mm cores. While we could temporarily put the film on a 16mm core, any warping or twisting of the film becomes problematic and could cause it to telescope off the machine. So we turned a 16mm 2" core down to 9.5mm, and modified some split reels to provide protection that keeps the film from telescoping. Only then could we call in Lasergraphics support to set us up for 9.5.

We'll be doing the same for 28mm and 17.5mm film, which also use the adjustable height core adapter that Lasergraphics supplies.

Scanned on our Lasergraphics ScanStation 6.5k archival scanner at 2k resolution.

Archival 9.5mm print courtesy of Tommy José Stathes/Youtube channel: cartoonsonfilm

Stock music from mixit.co

08/23/2024

Super 8 Fullcoat Mag Resolver update: we need to feed 0-18V back into the deck to control the speed. Lower is slower, higher is faster. But an Arduino can only output 0-5V. So the past couple weeks have been about building a voltage boosting circuit to scale up to the range we need. That now works and this is the first test with the deck connected.

The deck’s speed is slightly variable, so the oscilloscope shows between 21 and 22 fps off of the perf reader. The Arduino is correctly reading the same speed and displaying that on the LCD screen.

The last step in terms of programming is to write a couple lines of code to adjust the output voltage up or down depending what we need to do. And some buttons to change the target speed.

Then it all goes into a 1 rack unit enclosure and we should be ready to capture center track super 8 full coat tape at sync speed.

May make a nice finished PCB for this too, because it’s hideously ugly right now.

08/13/2024

Hey everyone, we need your help! Google has inexplicably decided we're now located within an Acupuncture center that happens to be in the same building. We don't know why, it just started to show up that way recently. If you could take a moment to go to the link below, click on "Suggest an Edit," then "Change Name or Other Details," and X out the "Located In" line that currently shows up as "New England Acupuncture and Healing Center," we would really appreciate it. Everything else (address, etc) is all correct, just that weird Located In line that we apparently have no say over.

A support request sent to google to deal with this was rejected because "we’re not sure of your exact issue" -- AI at its finest.

Oh, and while you're there if you feel like leaving us a 5-star review we won't complain. Thanks!

★★★★★ · Video production service

07/25/2024

Spent the morning with Terry Lockhart, who was at MIT around the time our Super8Sound deck was modified and has done this kind of thing a time or two.

Earlier in the week we printed up the schematics for the Technics RS1500, and within an hour or so, Terry had the problem solved. We now know what we need to feed back into the deck and on which pin, to control the speed. (and it turns out it's easier than we thought it would be - just a simple voltage tweak)

Next up is getting this all wired into an Arduino Uno R4, and then some simple code to resolve the speed until the perf reader locks onto the desired speed. We’ll put all this in a nice self contained rackmount box that sits above the deck, with a simple LED screen to display the current speed and any errors.

05/06/2024

Over the past several months, we graded and restored these for Cauldron Films. Great collection of 80s Italian horror.

The Houses of Doom box now available to pre-order at cauldron-films.com and diabolikdvd.com!