Buttloads of video files that need to be sorted quickly by tags/genres/etc. What to use?

[TheAM-Dol]

Hey LTT folks,

Just joined the forum hoping the smart folks here can help me with a problem I am having.
I have boat loads of video files sort of just...haphazardly thrown on my drive. I have tried some conventional methods of organizing, from creating a repository folder that links shortcuts to "genre" folders, to using Windows tags (btw, I'm on Windows) to search for the files I need, to hoping maybe, just maybe VLC might have some library management options built in...but, so far no luck.

• The shortcut folder option is a bit slow to put together. Each time I get a new video file, I have to first move it to the repository folder, then create a shortcut for it, then move that shortcut to the corresponding "genre" folder.
• Windows tag is a bit slow to search in the default folder search. The fastest way is setting the explore view option to "details", go to the tag column, and only tick the box with the appropriate tag, but 2 problems here is: 1) in detail view, I don't get a thumbnail of the video, 2) the list of tick boxes will become cumbersome to scroll through as more genres and tags get added.
• As for VLC, I couldn't find anything in vanilla VLC for library management. Perhaps a plugin exists, but scrolling through 3 or 4 pages of VLC plugins, as well as a handful of google searches turned up nothing. Editing video tags is clunky, since it can only edit 1 video at a time, and it also has a limited number of tags, such as "artist", "album", "genre" (and only 1 genre tag), so I can't append any generic tag I want and organize the library by those generic tags.

So, is there any solution to this problem? Either through VLC, downloading an entirely different software, or just utilizing Window's to better organize the videos.
I'll pretty much accept any solution, but if I were to say my "ideal" solution to this would basically just be a file managing app, not an entire media player; it's only goal is to manage files since I would prefer to actually preview the video files in VLC. But I'm not too fussed if I have to go with a media player alternative.

[Video Beagle]

I do this kind of thing on my Mac, but suggestions I have:

 

Adobe Bridge ... I don't know if you have it..or if they even make it anymore, but it's a brilliant file organizer via tags etc....they never hype/hyped it, but it was better than their commerical options

 

iTunes ... yes, for PC.  I wouldn't use it as a player.. and it might not work if your files are like mkv's... but it works very well for organizing a library via how you want.

 

for tagging, MP3Tag is a windows program and it's very nice....can work on video files, but can be slow.

 

EDIT: Reading thru again, looks like you're more wanting a better library option than just windows explorer, which is what I was more aiming at with my selections as easy ways to set that up.

 

Perhaps setting up a Plex server on your machine would be the choice, then use VLC to access that?

 

EDIT 2: did a quick google to see for software options, found an article that basicly agreed with me

https://www.makeuseof.com/best-media-libraries-windows-10/

 

IT talks about VLC has a basic function and how to use it, iTunes being good, but limited, and Plex

[TheAM-Dol]

16 hours ago, Video Beagle said:

Adobe Bridge ... I don't know if you have it..or if they even make it anymore, but it's a brilliant file organizer via tags etc....they never hype/hyped it, but it was better than their commerical options

 

 

So I gave Plex and Bridge a try yesterday.
I was glad to finally learn about Plex, since I have heard so much about it. I got an old i5 Haswell computer just collecting dust in a closet that I wanted to turn into a media server, so learning plex was great for the day whenever I finally get around to doing that. However, it was a little bit clunky for sorting. Maybe I'm just picky, but I have a lot of files to manage. Also, the way that it hooked into VLC was a bit slow and not very elegant for what I was trying to do. So, I moved on to Bridge.

I actually use to use Bridge back during my days at college with CS4...we were forced to use it in our Photography class...but back then I hated the damn thing (from what I recall, the teacher never showed the students how to integrate it with our workflow, they just demanded that we used it.) So, go figure, over the years I forgot all about it.
Well, I installed the latest version of Bridge and at first felt impatient and annoyed with how insanely bloated the app is. But with about 30 minutes of tinkering, I finally got a nice light set up on it that is absolutely perfect for what I need! I can sort by keywords on the left (and it's so snappy too!), on the right I can assign keywords to any selected media, and then 90% of my screen real estate is devoted to the center panel which is just the entire video library. Best part is that by default it just launches videos in VLC, so it's exactly what I was looking for: a file manager and nothing else. VLC still handles playback, which is exactly what I want.

Really man, thank you so much. You're a life saver! It's going to take a while to get all these videos sorted, but compared to all the other methods, definitely seems like Bridge is going to make that a quick process.

[Video Beagle]

On 12/30/2021 at 6:48 PM, TheAM-Dol said:

definitely seems like Bridge is going to make that a quick process.

It's weird how good it is and how adobe just ignores it.

Glad it's working for you!