Umatic ¾ inch and Umatic SP ¾ inch video tape
Umatic is a ¾ inch analogue video recording format first introduced by Sony in 1971. The format was widely adopted by the broadcast and professional video industry and was “the standard” for many years until eventually being superseded by Sony Betacam.
Umatic found it’s way to almost every corner of television and has proven to be very reliable despite being the better part of 50 years old.
Umatic tapes were available in two sizes, the small tape (marked with KCS) for use in portable recorders with a run time of up to 20 minutes. The larger cassette (marked with KCA) was used in studio based VTR’s and have run times of up to 60 minutes.
A high band version was also introduced in later years and is more commonly known as Umatic SP. Umatic SP has better colour rendition and due to the higher bandwidth, a better recording quality.
We have fully functional UMATIC VTR’s and can convert both sizes of tape as well as PAL and NTSC variants of the format.
Standards conversion from NTSC 3.58 and NTSC 4.43 to PAL for most of the analogue video formats we support. The NTSC format applies to tapes recorded in countries such as USA, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Philippines (to name a few).
Umatic video tapes are very susceptible to damage from moisture and incorrect storage. Long term exposure to moisture can cause irreversible damage. If there are signs of mould on the tape, consider getting them digitized sooner rather than later. Mould damaged tape can be saved, see our tape repair page.
Umatic to digital file transfer
We can transfer Umatic and Umatic SP to digital files for use in archiving or editing applications.
Output file type options include (but are not limited to) the following
- Compressed MP4 – H264
- Uncompressed MOV
- Custom file types – contact us with your requirements.
Contact us for more information on this service.