Changing the media is important if I want to make it accessible. If video is on a jumble of 2-hour tapes sitting in a drawer they are seldom, if ever, viewed. After getting them on a disc that can be easily dropped into the DVD player, I'm more likely to show visitors. Additionally, it's much better to have data in file format for the following reasons:
It's the last reason that is most appealing to me today. Just as the scanner allowed me to showcase photos from my past on this blog, digital video files now allow me to do the same with both movement and sound. For example, I will let you look at a fifty-second clip from more than sixteen years ago.
One need not get out the aging camcorder with the hassles of setting up in order to share the footage. The DVD player is always ready.
On DVD it's possible to record in 10-minute chapters which, along with FF and REV, allows for quick scanning for specific material.
Portability is ensured as just about everybody has a DVD player and the lightweight discs ship easily through the post.
The files are also easy to edit on an ordinary computer.
These were students from my first teaching year in the United Arab Emirates. I taught at the Higher Colleges of Technology and these nationals were in the Foundations program that year. They arranged for a class trip. I believe it was to a hobby family farm in southern Sharjah. We spent a whole day some of which we 4-wheeled through the mountains and wadis.