‘The boring shit’ #2 - filing system

I have never had a good filing system. Working with audio and video, I am constantly saving source files and multiple versions of the same project. 

Sounds are so hard to file! How do you categorise them? Names like ‘crunchy 2’ are everywhere.

Then how do you deal with versions? Every single time I end up with ‘[filename] final final FINAL THIS ONE’. 

Then there are the random project files the software creates which I have no idea what they are and always have some extension I can’t understand, but I assume are necessary for something? And I always forget to set it up properly so the files are just saving to some completely inconvenient location and they all get split away from the project files and then when I come to put it all back together its just a mess.

Hoping to solve this, I worked with my Access Support Worker to research how other artists - like video and sound editors - deal with filing.

One major consideration was that I work in projects which span different media types - so the existing system of Documents, Pictures, Music, Movies on a Mac wasn’t really helping me. It would be better to somehow group those things together by project first.

This tutorial was really helpful (and quite short).

These were the main things I learnt:

Project name

• Use the project name in every filename

• Create a short code eg. the first 3 letters of the project name

• The aim is to make the files searchable - so if you search that code all those files show up

• (Often I don’t have a project name at the start, so I decided this): Choose a code at the start & replace it systematically later if the project name changes

Key words

• Choose key words for filenames & always use the same - this is to tell you without doubt what is in the file

I looked at the types of files I usually have for each project and chose one way to name them (to avoid having multiple words for one file type eg. audio, sound, samples, recordings).

v.1, 2, 3 etc and ‘Submitted’ are there to avoid the curse of ‘final final 2 FINAL’ :)

With the sound & video I decided to use the venue name to show it was a final version, and which performance it was for.

Filename format

• Naming every folder & file the same format eg.

So ‘ExP’ is the project code for ‘Example Project’, then it is followed by ‘proposal’ to show what is in the file, and v.1 to show the version.

Hopefully when I go to the folder, I can scroll to the latest file version just by selecting the highest v. number.

Then, when I send something off for instance a grant application, I should save that version as ‘submitted’.

This is how I named the folders.

The numbers are just there so the Mac displays them in the right order - this helps my brain somehow.

Each project should have quite similar folders, but they can also be modified to fit the types of files needed for that project.