topbanner_forum
  *

avatar image

Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.
Did you miss your activation email?

Login with username, password and session length
  • Thursday March 28, 2024, 7:09 am
  • Proudly celebrating 15+ years online.
  • Donate now to become a lifetime supporting member of the site and get a non-expiring license key for all of our programs.
  • donate

Last post Author Topic: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program  (Read 54967 times)

KenR

  • Super
  • Blogger
  • Joined in 2006
  • ***
  • Posts: 826
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« on: April 25, 2007, 07:45 AM »
I would like to know what movie organizer program (i.e., Movie Collector, All My Movies, DVD Profiler, Movie Organizer, etc.) people think is the best.


Here, for example, is a screenshot of Movie Collector

Screenshot - 4_25_2007 , 7_41_30 AM_thumb.png


Programs like the ones listed above download information about movies from the internet and perform a variety of tasks with the information. I have found a few programs and looked at them, but I'd love to know about other's experiences regarding these programs.

Thanks, Ken
Kenneth P. Reeder, Ph.D.
Clinical Psychologist
Jacksonville, North Carolina  28546
« Last Edit: April 25, 2007, 02:43 PM by KenR »

TucknDar

  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • Posts: 1,133
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: Movie Organizer Software
« Reply #1 on: April 25, 2007, 08:01 AM »
I use Movie Collector. It does have it's limitations (the major one for me, is no multi-disc support. I think this is because it's focused on Movies, not DVDs, but this is a much wanted feature, and I'm hopeful that it gets added eventually).

I used a free app (actually donation-ware) called DVD Collector, which had some fantastic features coming in the 2.0 betas, but development suddenly stopped :'( The latest full version is 1.0.2 and can be found here: http://crunchymedia.com/

If development was started again, I'd ditch Movie Collector in a second, even though I've paid for it. (Got Website Watcher covering crunchymedia.com, but I'm not holding my breath for updates...).

KenR

  • Super
  • Blogger
  • Joined in 2006
  • ***
  • Posts: 826
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #2 on: April 25, 2007, 07:19 PM »
Thanks for your input TucknDar!

Ken
Kenneth P. Reeder, Ph.D.
Clinical Psychologist
Jacksonville, North Carolina  28546

concept1961

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2007
  • **
  • Posts: 12
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #3 on: April 25, 2007, 07:34 PM »
I'm a big fan of Movie Organizer from http://www.movieorganizer.com/

There's plenty of features, thumbnail of the cover from their site, a huge database of data and a link with Imdb one of the best site related to movie.

Movie Organizer is free, allow you to print report of your movies the way YOU want them.

It's been my favorite for the last four or five year.

François
Carpe Diem

Cosiness

  • Participant
  • Joined in 2009
  • *
  • Posts: 5
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #4 on: March 18, 2009, 04:14 AM »
I'm very much satisfied with Movienizer. It supports many movie related sites and not only IMDB, therefore I was able to extract info about each film I have in my quite big collection. I like the navigation system, it's not overloaded and easy to maintain, I like how the categories are arranged and variety of search options.

CWuestefeld

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2006
  • **
  • Posts: 1,009
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #5 on: March 18, 2009, 08:39 AM »
I suppose it's a good time to revive the question, as Collectorz does its best to kill Movie Collector.

What are your requirements for a good program? I need:
  • find movies from authoritative sites like IMDB, Amazon, etc.
  • find foreign movies (esp. Chinese), which probably implies a decent breadth to the sites it can scrape.
  • Store all the stuff that might affect my choice to watch a movie:
    • Actors
    • Director
    • Producer
    • Length
    • Year
    • Genre
    • MPAA rating
    • "star" rating, like from IMDB
    • etc.
  • Print out catalogs of my collection.
    • Multiple movies per page, each entry including cover thumbnail, category, actors, short description, year.
    • Complete collection, or just those I haven't yet watched.
    • Sort by various criteria, e.g., Year, Genre
  • Print "keep case" cover inserts for a movie

Cosiness

  • Participant
  • Joined in 2009
  • *
  • Posts: 5
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #6 on: May 28, 2009, 03:36 AM »
Movienizer released the new version 2.0
« Last Edit: May 28, 2009, 03:40 AM by Cosiness »

yksyks

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2006
  • **
  • Posts: 476
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #7 on: May 29, 2009, 05:17 AM »
Thanks, Cosiness, this one was new to me and it looks quite nice. I tried it and it imported my current Ant Movie Catalog easily. I like some of its features.

However, it lacks the "Translated title" field, which is quite important if you have for example a lot of French or Italian movies and don't speak these languages. (Or did I miss something?)

Also, it sorts the movie titles wrongly -- all accented characters are listed at the bottom.

So for the moment I'm back at AMC.

maxic

  • Participant
  • Joined in 2008
  • *
  • default avatar
  • Posts: 14
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #8 on: June 25, 2009, 08:05 AM »
As far as I remember, All My Movies is able to import collection created with Ant Movie Catalog as well.

sajman99

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2006
  • **
  • Posts: 664
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #9 on: June 25, 2009, 02:21 PM »
Another vote for Movienizer here. I've used it for the last couple of years, and it suits my limited needs. With the new version 2.0, it now inserts a newly added movie in the correct chronological order. It used to place an added movie at the top of the list (ie. out of order) for no apparent reason, and that really annoyed me. Presently, it puts TV appearances at the top of the list in the wrong chronological order, but I suppose I can live with it. For example, the fact that Adam Sandler played a drug dealer in an ABC Afterschool Special in 1990 is a fascinating tidbit, but Movienizer places that role at #3 in the list above Bedtime Stories (2008) and other recent Sandler films. That's not logical to me, but as I say, I can live with it.

I suppose if I were a huge movie buff I would switch to the free version of DVD Profiler at http://www.invelos.com/ because it is all about details, details, details. Admittedly, it's a bit much for my needs.

Another movie organizer worthy of consideration is Griffith at http://www.griffith.cc/ . As I recall, it is easy to use and has a very clean interface, but for reasons which escape me at the moment, I decided to stick with Movienizer.

« Last Edit: July 23, 2009, 02:41 PM by sajman99 »

40hz

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2007
  • **
  • Posts: 11,857
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #10 on: June 26, 2009, 02:22 PM »
I'm almost embarrassed to admit what I use.

My favorite movie collection 'program' is a file box with some 3x5 index cards arranged alphabetically by title.

I can seldom see the point of locally caching data that's readily available on the web. If I want to look up info on an individual film, I'll just go to IMDB or Amazon and read what I'm looking for.

I'm more concerned with keeping track of what I own, and who I've loaned it to than anything else, so a title card is pretty much all I need. The only other information on the card is the purchase date and price I paid for it. The main reason I keep track of the price is to 'remind' certain borrowers how much it would cost to get a title replaced if they lost it.

Borrowed title cards get put behind a divider in the back of the box. I also attach a Post-It note to the card showing the name of the borrower and the date it was loaned out.

Recently, I've begun marking certain expensive, collectible, or hard to replace titles with a pink highlighter. I now have a blanket rule that anything that's been "pinked" does not leave the premises. I instituted that rule after two nigh impossible to replace foreign titles went permanently missing after the nephew I loaned them to brought them to a college film party. (Nice to note that the "five-finger student discount program" has not been forgotten at some universities.)

--------

My GF came up with a technique that has worked wonders for getting things back.

Whenever somebody returns a movie to us, we make it a point to hand them back the Post-It with their name on it. It doesn't seem like much, but since we've started making a little ritual out of returning the borrower's chit, we haven't had anything not come back.

Ah psychology...sometimes it's a beautiful thing! :-*


« Last Edit: June 26, 2009, 02:31 PM by 40hz »

sajman99

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2006
  • **
  • Posts: 664
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #11 on: June 26, 2009, 03:11 PM »
@40hz: Some kids today act like they don't recognize pen and paper. That's old school, man!  8)

40hz

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2007
  • **
  • Posts: 11,857
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #12 on: June 27, 2009, 06:54 AM »
@40hz: Some kids today act like they don't recognize pen and paper. That's old school, man!  8)

So I've been told.  ;D

(Still, I shudder to think what might happen to the iPhone crowd if a real war ever broke out. ;))

On a more positive note, my program is green, uses non-volatile storage, and will run anywhere.

And it's resilient! It will even work if the power goes out.

Maybe you couldn't watch a DVD if that happened...but let's not get too bogged down in the details! ;D


« Last Edit: June 27, 2009, 07:02 AM by 40hz »

awraynor

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2008
  • **
  • default avatar
  • Posts: 16
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #13 on: July 05, 2009, 10:04 AM »
Lifehacker.com has done a couple of Hive Five (polls) of favorite Movie Organization programs.  Check out the member posts for lots of recommendations.

Innuendo

  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • default avatar
  • Posts: 2,266
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #14 on: July 06, 2009, 12:18 PM »
I don't use any...but way back when I had noble intentions of keeping track of all my movies I bought eXtreme Movie Manager. The reasons I picked his over any of the others are many. First, he's one of the hardest working software authors I have ever seen bending over backwards to make his users happy. That much is evident from reading his forums.

Next, for what it does and the amount of work he has put into it he asks a mere pittance. Not only that, but he's insane enough to offer that price as a one-time fee with lifetime updates. Another plus for this program is that the author has built in this very powerful scripting engine that will allow users to get movie information from a wealth of sites. Did something on your favorite movie site change and now the program won't get information anymore? No need to wait for an update to the program. Grab a new version of your desired script from the forum or from the update function in the program.

The last reason I chose this program is it's not hard-coded for physical media. Most movie collection organizers have no provision for movies that are not physical media like DVDs and Blu-Ray discs. If you have rips stored on an HTPC or media server this program keeps track of them. You can even keep track of the accompanying movie trailers as well on your media if you're a movie trailer kind of person.

MerleOne

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2006
  • **
  • Posts: 957
  • 4D thinking
    • View Profile
    • Read more about this member.
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #15 on: July 06, 2009, 03:48 PM »
I am using Mediaman, because of its efficient webcam scanner, and because it handles video, music, books, games in one single software.
.merle1.

superboyac

  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • Posts: 6,347
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #16 on: January 03, 2010, 04:24 PM »
I don't use any...but way back when I had noble intentions of keeping track of all my movies I bought eXtreme Movie Manager. The reasons I picked his over any of the others are many. First, he's one of the hardest working software authors I have ever seen bending over backwards to make his users happy. That much is evident from reading his forums.

Next, for what it does and the amount of work he has put into it he asks a mere pittance. Not only that, but he's insane enough to offer that price as a one-time fee with lifetime updates. Another plus for this program is that the author has built in this very powerful scripting engine that will allow users to get movie information from a wealth of sites. Did something on your favorite movie site change and now the program won't get information anymore? No need to wait for an update to the program. Grab a new version of your desired script from the forum or from the update function in the program.

The last reason I chose this program is it's not hard-coded for physical media. Most movie collection organizers have no provision for movies that are not physical media like DVDs and Blu-Ray discs. If you have rips stored on an HTPC or media server this program keeps track of them. You can even keep track of the accompanying movie trailers as well on your media if you're a movie trailer kind of person.
Nice.  Innuendo, I really appreciate how you go out of your way to explain some things around here.  In this case, it waas very helpful.

JavaJones

  • Review 2.0 Designer
  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • Posts: 2,739
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #17 on: January 04, 2010, 05:35 PM »
I'm still researching this particular topic, and finding that nothing seems to quite meet my needs. But the other thread on this has a lot of useful info, particularly about the media PC people having some good ideas and software...
https://www.donation...x.php?topic=10370.25

- Oshyan

J-Mac

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2007
  • **
  • Posts: 2,918
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #18 on: January 05, 2010, 12:07 AM »
I am using Movie Collector and DVD Profiler. I won't upgrade Movie Collector to the latest version because too much has been stripped from the program and the developer - a real pisser - is basically trying to force his customer base to build his own database - he doesn't allow searches to other well-established sources like Amazon, IMDB, DVD Empire, etc. - and he's also pushing toward an all-online service. I am still using v. 5.6 but I'm sure that will stop working for me at some point.

DVD Profiler is OK but nothing special. I doubt I will stick with that but for the time being I am using both. That would be a pain when building my collection from scratch but since my collection is pretty well established it is just a matter of adding a DVD here and there.

Thanks!

Jim

sajman99

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2006
  • **
  • Posts: 664
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #19 on: March 09, 2010, 06:40 PM »
Darn, I just found out Movienizer is no longer free so I guess I'll be reviewing this thread and others to find a suitable replacement.

Innuendo

  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • default avatar
  • Posts: 2,266
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #20 on: March 10, 2010, 09:18 AM »
DVD Profiler is OK but nothing special.

I know this is an old remark, J-Mac, but mind elaborating on that statement for the curious? I don't use DVD Profiler, but I know at one time it was the premier solution for movie collectors because of its features & exclusive database of movie art. Is this no longer the case?

J-Mac

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2007
  • **
  • Posts: 2,918
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #21 on: March 10, 2010, 10:50 PM »
DVD Profiler is OK but nothing special.

I know this is an old remark, J-Mac, but mind elaborating on that statement for the curious? I don't use DVD Profiler, but I know at one time it was the premier solution for movie collectors because of its features & exclusive database of movie art. Is this no longer the case?

A lot of little gripes, mostly personal things I guess. In the end, DVD Profiler is for the "elite", and I guess I ain't!! Some examples:

  • You enter a barcode in the "Add movie" dialog and a result is returned from their own database; a database of "profiles" that have been submitted by users and thoroughly scrubbed and edited by "elite" users. Well, actually it appears that any user can comment on submitted profiles but the longer-term members are given most of the weight. You don’t get results from any other source even if they don’t happen to have the DVD in their database yet.
  • By DVD Profiler's counting scheme I have about 800 DVDs in my collection. Wow! I had no idea! In reality I have about 200 DVD titles; however DVD Profiler counts each separate disc as a DVD. So since my boxed set of "Homicide: Life on the Streets" (Entire series) contains 35 discs DVD Profiler counts these as 35 separate DVDs. Or actually 35 separate "profiles". Their statistics only count profiles, not DVD titles so I have to count up my DVD titles manually to keep track of how many I own/have purchased. Apparently this is how the purists prefer to view their collections. Personally that seems kinda stupid to me. But hey - what do I know?!
  • Many of the DVDs in their database only have the main profile and no "child" profiles, so there is no way to show episodes in TV series. I have tried to find out how to add my own child profiles but the help file just tells me to get it from their database. It discourages users from entering their own. We are not smart enough to do it correctly!
  • In a few instances I entered a new DVD in my database that was not yet in their database. Immediately after entering it the program asks you to be a good member and submit it to their database, which I did. And boy oh boy did that get the "elite" upset! You see, I normally enter what I want to appear in my collection. If the DVD case only shows four cast members I may go ahead and enter 10 or 12; depends on what I wish to have there. They didn't like that. Also I often enter more plot information than is contains on the case. Again, I was blasted for it in the "Submission" forum. You should never enter anything more than what the DVD has on the case or in its credits. That way their database remains "pure". I had to laugh at all that but these folks are very, very serious. Basically suggested I never submit anymore DVDs to the database. Which is OK by me. I only did so out of courtesy and because the program asked me to do so.
  • Take a look at their forums and you will see threads 20 to 30 pages long and longer with arguments over whether a producer's name should show his/her middle initial or not. I kid you not! People viewing every movie the producer was ever credited on and keeping a running score of the number of times the middle initial was used vs. not used. Some of the people are as vicious as I have ever seen online! Kinda creepy, really.
Anyway those are some of the reasons I posted my comment. There's more but why go any further with it. The program itself looks nice though it is extremely slow to open and respond. I don’t know what it is programmed in but it appears to be something like Java or similar. (Not a coder myself). It takes a lot of CPU and memory also.

I recently purchased CATVids from FN Programs - the SoftCAT folks. Very simple Access database setup. Not nearly as flashy as DVD Profiler but much easier to manipulate my data. And no one gives me a lot of crap for adding too much in the way of plots, etc.!!

Thanks!

Jim

Innuendo

  • Charter Member
  • Joined in 2005
  • ***
  • default avatar
  • Posts: 2,266
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #22 on: March 12, 2010, 09:26 PM »
There's more but why go any further with it.

Indeed. No need to go further. When this program was first released there wasn't a decent source for box art & movie descriptions, & etc. so the author made his own walled garden to use as a database. Unfortunately, as their database has grown it looks like the walls have, too, so now it looks like they are walled off from everything else, most notably reality.

Looks like I'll pass on this one. Thanks, J-Mac!

J-Mac

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2007
  • **
  • Posts: 2,918
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #23 on: March 12, 2010, 10:07 PM »
No problem. Understand that DVD Profiler is a pretty decent software otherwise. The issues I posted just happen to be points that nag at me - might be personal preference in my case, IDK. But I like a little more freedom to add notes, etc., to my liking while most of their users seem to want to adhere to some rigid, self-made rules that tend to make me become a little resistant. OK, maybe a lot resistant!

Jim

J-Mac

  • Supporting Member
  • Joined in 2007
  • **
  • Posts: 2,918
    • View Profile
    • Donate to Member
Re: What is the Best Movie Collection Organizer Program
« Reply #24 on: March 12, 2010, 10:17 PM »
OK, OK.... one more example that really bit my rear-end. I have the boxed sets for all seven seasons of The Shield TV series. In Movie Collector I had added all episodes and extensive plot summaries for each episode. It was one of the first TV series I entered in MC and I went a little overboard. In DVD Profiler I add the seven seasons but no child profiles are in their database, so therefore no episodes are listed.   :huh:  So after much ado I managed to add a child profile for each season along with copying over my plot summaries. Of course when these were submitted to their DB they were all rejected because my summaries were more than the DVD boxes had on them.   :-\

Later the program asked me about checking for updates and I mistakenly thought it would check for program updates. Instead it checked my database against their online database and.....  they...... "corrected" my database!! Yes, deleting all of my seven seasons of episodes!

Now it turns out that you can "lock" your data on a disc by disc basis so that it can't do that, but that is how I found out about that setting. Too late IMO. I think they should pop up a confirmation dialog that explains that you will lose all personally added data, but they didn't feel it was necessary because, after all, they are "correcting" my data with their vastly superior data. OK, they didn't exactly put it that way but that is basically what they said with other words.

Needless to say I was not amused...

Jim