How to organize video clips

Even though I take a ton of pictures I also shoot quite a few video clips as well. Having small children makes taking video clips a lot of fun since they like to look at video clips as well. Learning better ways to organize my video clips is one of my goals for this year. Over the years I created a very efficient method for organizing my pictures, but when it comes to my video clips, I pretty much place them in the same folders where my pictures are. This is the simplest way, but it might not be best way to organize my video clips. In this article I’m exploring different options for organizing your video clips. I’m not sure what is the best method but here are some options I found to work pretty well.

Resources

Is there a right way to organize video clips?

The real answer is no, because it depends on your situation. But, is there a better way to organize your video clips? I am asking this question especially for those of us that are home photographers, where we take pictures of our families and pretty often take videos clips of our families as well. I think it’s safe to assume that most of us copy the video clips to the same folders where we place our pictures. But, is this right? Is there a better way?

How do you organize your video clips?
old video camera
Photo credit:SXC

Here are some ideas that may work for you if you use the event based organization strategy for your pictures. I personally try using the second option but I get lazy moving my video files to the videos folders and stick with the first option most of the times.

I keep thinking about implementing the third option but I’m not sure I’ll find the time to move all my video clips in the new structure. In addition, I’m not sure what this move will buy me. What do you think?

1) Keep your videos together with your pictures. The advantage is that this is easy to do since you would just transfer all your videos together with your pictures and you already name your folder according to the event, so it makes it somewhat easy to find your videos. The main disadvantage is that if you have lots of events that are around the house or the park, you will have lots of videos to sort through until you find what you’re looking for.

2) Create a videos folder for each year and place it in your pictures folder for that year. Your folder structure would look like this:

My Pictures
	2009
		2009-01-15-grand-canyon-trip
		2009-01-25-playground-kids
		2009-02-28-aquarium-school-trip
		videos-2009 (all videos for 2009)
	2010
		2010-02-12-palm-sprigs-trip
		2010-04-18-disneyland-trip
		videos-2010 (all videos for 2010)

3) Have a separate folder for all your videos and group your videos by events just like your pictures. In this case your folders would look something like:

My Pictures
	2008
	2009
	2010
		2010-04-18-disneyland-trip
		2010-04-19-park-playing (only pictures, no video clips)
		2010-04-21-backyard-kids-painting
My Videos
	2008
	2009
	2010
		2010-04-18-disneyland-trip
		2010-04-21-backyard-kids-painting

How do you organize your video clips?

Have you found a good way to organize your video clips? Please share it below. I am trying to find a better way to organize my video clips myself and I am looking for solutions. I have read a little bit about adding metadata to my video clips, but the software options are pretty much limited to Adobe products which are pretty expensive. I would love to hear your solutions.

Recommended reading:

Share this article:

Additional resources:

{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }

Doug Pederson July 14, 2010 at 12:55 pm: I have developed my own desktop search it enables me to organize my mpeg video.
First it allows for metadata in a text file. This data can be searched and the resultant clip or part of the video can be played. In this text file you can assign a start point and a play length for the video segment or play the entire clip. More recently I added another feature to the video playback. Ie to play the final few seconds of video clips. I had shot some (90) clips of golfers at hole #2 for playback during their supper. I wanted to show these short clips at normal speed and again in slow motion. Even though the clips were short; playing them fully in slow motion was way too slow. The new feature allows me to play just the last 3 seconds (the swing) in slow motion as well as the full video clip. The ability to play just the final few seconds at full speed or slow motion opens the door for cataloging in those last seconds by verbally detailing what the video contained. Then later randomly sample this verbal catalogue and play the entire video if so desired. Without sampling the video now and again, one soon forgets what great video you have. Random and cataloging at the end of the video helps.