Q. How long have you been in business?
A. We have been in business since 1980.
Q. Do you have an actual location? if so, where is it?
A. Yes, we do have a office, not just a PO Box, webpage or running out of a basement. Visit the Contact Info section for more details of our location and directions.
Q. Do you have any other locations?
A. No, our Toronto office is our only location currently.
Q. Do you send your work overseas?
A. No! our company name comes from our primary business of video standards conversions. We do not send any work outside of our Toronto facility.
Q. Can I bring in my order any time?
A. Yes, you may bring in your work during our business hours.
Q. I'm not a big company or television studio, can I still bring my work to Overseas Video Lab?
A. Absolutely, we offer all of our services to the general public using our high end equipment.
Q. How does your company differ from others?
A. Our experience, our price and our quality of equipment is our advantage. We have invested millions of dollars in the latest technology and continue to keep our lab up to date with current trends. If we can not provide a service, we make a note to invest in it if demand requires us to. Most small companies can not do this. In addition, all of our services are done in house. This allows us to maintain the highest quality and low prices and eliminates any chance of your order being lost or damaged. These are some of the reasons why tens of thousands of customers keep using our many services.
Q. How safe are my originals with your company?
A. All of our clients originals and finished work are kept in a climate controlled room and carefully tracked until the order is returned to the customer. A quick e-mail or phone call can be made to us for an update on the status of your order.
Q. What types of payments do you accept?
A. We accept: Cash (in store only), Credit Cards, Debit, certified checks & money order.
Q. How do you ship the orders?
A. We use XpressPost with in Canada. For international orders, we use FedEx and UPS. We can also ship using your preferred method if necessary.
Q. Can I tour your facilities?
A. Due to insurance and security purposes, only employees are allowed inside the work area of our lab.
Q. Can't I do many of your services myself?
A. Absolutely! However, first consider the following: Time, Cost and Quality. Here are just some reasons:
- Time: Due to the fast pace life now, most people are hard pressed to get the time to go out and buy equipment, set it up and learn how to work with it. Even small jobs can take hours to do when using cheaper, non dedicated equipment. Not to mention all the time lost troubleshooting.
- Cost: Very few individuals/companies can afford the high end equipment we use. Why can we afford them? Simple, this is our business, this is what we do. Furthermore, we have trained staff who operate these specialized equipment on a daily basis for the jobs we receive. It is not practical for an end user to buy equipment that they will use only a few times.
- Quality. Because quality is our number one priority, we purchase the most high end equipment. TV stations, Government departments and Large corporations have very high standards of quality that only a few companies such as ours can provide. We spend countless hours researching what the next trends are in technology and make our purchases accordingly.
Q. What video formats can you transfer to/from?
A. VHS, SVHS, DVD, VCD, Video8, Hi8, Digital8, MiniDV, DVCPro, HDV, 3/4 UMatic, Betacam, Betacam SP, Digital Betacam, 1 inch, XDCam, Regular 8 film, Super8 film, 16mm film and more.
Q. I have a projector and video camera, can transfer my 8mm film myself?
A. This is by far the worst possible method of transferring the film to video. Apart from the very poor quality, the flicker will make the video almost unviewable. We have special dedicated telecine machines for this very purpose that produce very high end results by scanning frame by frame digitally.