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Media Organizing
You need a good order and structure for your videos, primarily when your media library gets bigger and bigger. With the size of your library, the requirements will probably change. The structure on this page is the structure I use for my library, so it's possible that yours will be different (especially when you don't get the images yourself). The only important thing is that the software you use must be able to correctly detect the metadata. For this to work, you need to follow some rules defined by the software. Don't panic, most software has (almost) the same requirements.
That's because some formats or codecs already compress the data, and the file archiver therefore simply can not (or not very much) more compress any.
Then why compress it with a file archiver at all?
Because an archived file has more advantages than just compression, e.g.:
- Simplification: If there are multiple files, you have only one archived output file and have it all together.
- Protection: You can add a password to the archive, so third parties won't know what's in it.
Fun fact:
Uncompressed video can go up to 380 MB per second (as of the ARRIRAW format of the Cinema Camera Alexa Mini LF). Many hard drives can not even handle the massive transfer rate or the huge capacity requirements.
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Basic Files
Every TV show and movie has the following basic files. Note that this is not absolutely necessary, as the images can also be provided automatically by the software. I just do it for quality purposes.
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backdrop.jpg
This image is used as the background image when you clicked on a TV show or movie. This image is also used as a placeholder while the video is loading, therefore, the orientation of this image should be landscape.
Tip
- Take an image with the TV show or movie name on it, or place it by yourself on the image. It will look way better.
- For TV shows, use symbolic images instead of screenshots, as this would suggest that you are currently watching this episode while the image is shown on the loading screen.
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poster.jpg
This is the image of the TV show or movie in portrait size. It's shown in the overview of the library. For TV shows, it should be the most symbolic image to identify it, regardless of the season or the episode you are currently watching.
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Movies
The file and folder structure for movies is quite simple. Below is a short example.
movies/
├── Deadpool 2 (2018)/
│ ├── backdrop.jpg
│ ├── Deadpool 2 (2018) - 2160p.mkv
│ └── poster.jpg
├── James Bond 007 - GoldenEye (1995)/
│ ├── backdrop.jpg
│ ├── James Bond 007 - GoldenEye (1995) - 1080p.mkv
│ └── poster.jpg
└── James Bond 007 - Skyfall (2012)/
├── backdrop.jpg
├── James Bond 007 - Skyfall (2012) - 1080p.mkv
└── poster.jpg
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Naming Convention
The path of a movie file is built as follows:
James Bond 007 - GoldenEye (1995)/James Bond 007 - GoldenEye (1995) - 1080p.mkv
James Bond 007 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Film Series (Optional) ─┬─ Folder
GoldenEye ---------------------------------------------------- Movie Name ─────────────┤
(1995) --------------------------------------------- Publishing Year ────────┘
James Bond 007 - GoldenEye (1995) ------------ Full Movie Name ────────┬─ Filename
1080p --- Quality ────────────────┤
.mkv File Type ──────────────┘The tag Quality is not required to look up the correct metadata.
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TV Shows
The structure for TV shows is a little bit more complex than the structure for movies. Below is an example of the folders and file names for TV shows.
series/
├── Lucky Luke (1984)/
│ ├── Season 1/
│ │ ├── cover.jpg
│ │ ├── Lucky Luke (1984) - S01E01 - Ma Dalton - 480p.mkv
│ │ ├── Lucky Luke (1984) - S01E02 - Le Pied-tendre - 480p.mkv
│ │ ...
│ ├── Season 2/
│ │ ├── cover.jpg
│ │ ├── Lucky Luke (1984) - S02E01 - La ville fantôme - 480p.mkv
│ │ ├── Lucky Luke (1984) - S02E02 - Le Juge - 480p.mkv
│ │ ...
│ ├── backdrop.jpg
│ └── poster.jpg
└── Mr. Bean (1990)/
├── Season 1/
│ ├── cover.jpg
│ ├── Mr.Bean (1990) - S01E01 - Mr. Bean - 1080p.mkv
│ ├── Mr.Bean (1990) - S01E02 - The Return of Mr. Bean - 1080p.mkv
│ ...
├── backdrop.jpg
└── poster.jpgIn addition to the basic files, I recommend having a cover.jpg file in every season subfolder.
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cover.jpg
This is the image specifically for the season. For a better experience, this image should be different from the poster, and the image should have a number or other hint about what season it is exactly. In most cases, this is the cover image of the corresponding DVD.
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Naming Convention
The path of an episode is built as follows:
Lucky Luke (1984)\Season 2\Lucky Luke (1984) - S02E02 - Le Juge - 480p.mkv
Lucky Luke --------------------------------------------------------------- TV Show Name ─────────┬─ Mainfolder
(1984) -------------------------------------------------------- First Broadcast Year ─┘
Season 2 ----------------------------------------------- Season ───────────────── Subfolder
Lucky Luke (1984) ----------------------------- Full TV Show Name ────┬─ Filename
S02E02 -------------------- Season And Episode ───┤
Le Juge ---------- Episode Name ─────────┤
480p --- Quality ──────────────┤
.mkv File Type ────────────┘The tag Quality is not required to look up the correct metadata. Neither is the tag Episode Name required, but if you want to access the video file in the explorer or when you copy the file to another drive (for example, when you go on holiday and don't have access to Jellyfin), then it's very nice to see directly the title and not only the episode number.
If you're unsure how to exactly name the files and folders, visit the website of the TheTVDB and search for the TV show. There you will find all the information you need, so that the metadata lookup will find it. If the naming does not consist with the website of TheTVDB, the lookup may not work correctly and you get strange results. For example, the season names of Tom and Jerry (1940) has to be Season 1940, Season 1950 and Season 1960 to work properly with the aired order. Maybe other TV shows will also have such specialties.
