Solved Trying to save old videos

[Danbor]

I have several videos that were recorded with a video camera in the mid 1980's. They have since been transferred to VHS tape, then burned to CD's and finally to a directory on an SSD. These were taken while stationed overseas.
I wanted to share them with an old Army buddy as he has terminal cancer and only has a few months left.
When I copied them to a USB drive and tried to play them back, the result was, ..... not very watchable. I would like to cut and splice the things to make them watchable for him. However, I know so little about this topic that I don't even know what to actually search for in the way of what app / apps to use or how to do this.
My computer is running Mint 22.3, but of course I need the finished product to be playable on his windows laptop and his smart tv.
Can anyone sort of point me in the right direction to get started?

 

[NicWelds]

I've used OpenShot video editor to cut and assemble clips into longer videos if that's what you are looking to do.

 

[Rocketing-warp9]

If I may ask, what format or extention are the videos on? This is the main issue that I see. Different standards will be an issue with sharing them between devices. I wish the best for you and your buddy.

 

[Danbor]

Hello all. First, how embarrassing that I had not realised that Avidemux could be used for this. I already had an appimage installed that I used to capture still shots.
Sorry it took so long to respond. The night I got home from visiting my buddy, I had to take the wife to the emergency room. That led to surgery and a week long stay in hospital followed by a week of her having to deal with me trying to help her recover from abdominal surgery. She's doing fine now, probably no thanks to my nursing skill.
Anyway, it took me a bit of practice but avidemux done the trick for me. I kept having problems but was able to get it working to my satisfaction.
Thank you all for the help

 

[bob466]

VHS tapes...something I haven't seen or used for many years.

Getting the tape on the computer would be very hard...I remember years ago buying hardware that plugged into the VHS player and the computer but the result was very poor to say the least as you can't turn a vhs tape into DVD quality.

I use Avidemux and Handbrake for DVDs...great for reducing the size or converting old DVDs from 4.3 to 16.9 and many other things.

 

[KGIII]

Getting the tape on the computer would be very hard...

That depends on your free time. You can get dirt-cheap RCA to USB devices and capture the video. That'd be easy. They even do analog-to-digital conversions for you.

The hard part is that you have to do it in real time.

Yeah... You've got to at least start them manually. You can then miss the ending and cut that when you get around to it.

But a 2-hour VHS is going to take you 2 hours to record.

Here's an example:

https://www.amazon.com/Oassuose-Digital-Converter-Capture-Transfer/dp/B0FJYGBR4J/

They do make devices that will do it at higher speeds. They were pretty expensive back in the day. You might be able to find it cheaper today. If that's the case, it will be even easier.

I sent mine out. I had a bunch of old media recorded with family and friends. I sent out a large box at a time, and they sent them back to me on HDDs. That was expensive, but I value my time more than I value the expense. I didn't have them do movies or anything like that. I'm not sure that they would have.