FOLDER STRUCTURE Best PRACTICES Examples | Organize your Files and Folder 101
Let me show you how you can organize your files and folder. I show you my folder structure and best practices example how I use it. Hope this video helps you to stay organized as a creator or social media manager.
I will explain how to organize your personal, your business and your content fired. So a lot of people are asking me the same question. How do you organize all your fights when you're traveling? Like I have a tons of hard drives the have show you say and this will are not only show you my whole folder structure, I will show you also some apps you can use for batch renaming for creating this automation tree structure and to pack up your flight.
Stay Organised
I show you quickly which hard drives I'm using. So for videos and photos, quick editing, always using SSD, you need a lot of data transfer so this is a two terabyte as a steal from senders. I have also the Samsung team, so they are pretty fast for backups.
I'm using these guys here, which is each of them have five terabytes less than digital are the best. I have G drives now as well. Don't bystanders. I had a lot of centers that just kept protein and I lost all the fights, but I had to back up. So it's fine. So this is actually for stretching. My 16 terabytes I have all my files on it from over the years, ten years, which are important. And I have also another backup in Germany. But this one is just for traveling where I have all my files because of my online course. I'm creating right now, so I need to scrap through to old footage. I'm traveling with all these hard drives and, and I need more space actually.
OK, let's go back into the screen recording OK, before I show you all my folder tree structure, I will show you this three apps I'm using. The first one is finding out which renames all your files. I'm using this always, so I show you here. So this is the program. It's also free. So when you have your card from the camera on it so you can copy the fights on your hard drive.
And then what you do is like, I'm copying all the files into this program. Then I type in the date and what camera it was and also what is the name of the location or some key points. These files get renamed to what I was writing here and you get to see what zero, one, two, three, whatever. And then you get the file name the reason why I'm doing this is I had previous remember on the 16 tab, I had a lot of fired style like duplicate and I lost some of them because I was deleting some stuff and I was thinking it was from my older project, this file number.
But no, it's actually was from a new project because that's the same file number since then. I'm doing this all the time because I'm not one of those files again, but actually just don't delete files because maybe you need it later. I just put it on the hard drive. Hard drives also cheap these days. So yeah, once I have this done as you can see here, these are all the name from the camera and now I want to rename.
So I click rename and now all the files are actually renamed, which is pretty good. So first organization. So I know exactly which day I shot, I know exactly which Cameradas and I know where ID was. And you can put some keywords and if you want, but I do this mostly in the folder before, so it is this file menu links also down below.
Post Haste
The second app is posthaste, which is amazing app. Once you figure out your file structure, you can create a template and what you have to do is then type in which status, but actually it does automatically. Then here the project name, which is for my case, this video, what I'm creating right now and then I just click on create project, put it on my SSD in my YouTube, and then boom, it creates this photo structure.
And you can see I show you my tree structure a sec. You can see all the tree structure I created is in second there and I can keep copying all the flights. Let's say he had this camera straight away into the folder structure. So super awesome. The third app is Free Firesign, which is just for backup or looking if you have all the files copied.
Right? So what you do is this is the folder which I want to copy to another hard drive in this case to desktop. So I compare them and it it's like there's three gigabytes and nine are not and 19 fired. So I click on Synchronize and boom but if the program crashed your computer crash or whatever like you can sometimes lose files.
That's why I'm using mostly disk because you can always compare again and you see like, oh OK you have already copied some files and it's also checking if on the other side is something more new. So it copies on the other side. Just depends what you, how you want to do about like I could do a whole tutorial about this pretty code to pick up all your files.
I'm using this all the time and it's also for free. You can also use carbon copy cloner, which is a not a cool backup, but for free fire free financing. All right, let's go into the folder structure. What I first do if I have a new computer or I copy all my files from a lot of computer, I create a folder with my name.
In this file, I have all my files and so I show you this folders. My planner, first of all, I have Google Drive in Google Drive, I storage all my business personal education stuff, literally everything at backups. So what you can see here, inbox chaos. I only store a folder called Inbox. This is when I'm in the rush and I need to copy flights very quickly.
So I have this in there and I have business where you can see this is like my brand identity, like all my business stuff website design, price calculation towards I usually do everything now and notion, but I still have some old stuff there. This is all my client works which I share with my client. I have this also here, my stock footage where I have my model released out, my tax then contracts and so on and personal stuff I have also what makes me happy, like when Zone Cold was texting me.
Super funny. Yeah, there's a lot of stuff I have in here then cause of this. Any stuff, any courses that I buy, I always put the files and one folder, which is then here in the Google Drive app and here I store. It's all the settings from any applications that's a love injury. So resource, you have all the keyboard shortcuts in here or like Adobe stuff.
So this is my Google Drive. I have a DIY plan right now. Sometimes I switch to Taiwan and if I have plane flights that are quite huge, otherwise I'm using Mega with a company to get on May we have a plan which is three terabytes. And what I have in here is all the visual effects music, all my sound effects, my music library from Atlas, like all the stuff I'm downloaded and I want to have on my hard drive because when I'm on the go, I know enough wi fi or anything.
So I have straight away access to my music library visual effects, as I say, like also my assets, my logos, my lot gallery overlays, which are smoke foam grain. I don't want to go too much in details I think you know what you have on your hard drive. You need to have a keyword on it. Like what is about you see here 0.6 firm green.
So you know, when you go in this is firm green, what you can put on your videos. So keep it simple and so that you can find all the fights back. So this is all I can give you. This is what I have in me. Blast out of stuff you can't see right now. But before I go in my folder structure, I will give you some other tips and tricks how to start with the file structure.
So first of all, have always a keyword in the folder name or in the file name so that you know what it is about. And also you can find it very quickly. Over to search. I'm using always at first the date, which is then always 2020 0406, which is April six. So then when I have this, I type mostly the camera, name a one.
And then what is about like it's a Bucky Beach, right? So I know exactly what data this, which camera and also what I did. Then you have two options now actually there is a way you can put year where you have photos and video and one folder. So let's say you have client work here and you shoot a commercial tonight, then you have the final Photoshop or videos project fired, which is the injuries or prempro or whatever program you're using.
Then I have a folder called Footage and Footage. You can put your photos or your videos in one folder. So this is option one. You can put your videos and your full of for this client and one folder as you see here and video. I have day one day two days three and a half hour tool you have which camera is drone, Sony and so on.
Then in photo it's the same. So for every day I create always like a folder for photos and videos separate. Then you have audio, then you have graphic effects and you can create a folder for proxy files or templates if you're editing a video. What I'm doing most of the time is separating all the files. I have one harddrive drive for videos, I have one harddrive for my time lapses, I have one hard drive for my photography.
So full destruction option two is you can create a year 2000 when you do any, then what you do is you put the year in doubt name about it. So travel client or YouTube. So if I open them all, you see OK, I have a travel folder then the Dominican Republic where I am right now, I have the buggy drive and in here it's the same stuff you are.
It's always the same. You can also make a roll for two Sony, a one face, two camera. This is more forward Toria and the same here for audio you can device over from your record or music Sound Effect, whatever you do, just keep it organized. Once you figure out your system, just stick to it. You can change it from time from year to year, but stick to it.
I give you options. Yeah. I also shared a folder structure with you so you can test it out. What works the best to you? You can rename it if you're not like a video at other crazy, then you can use my photography folder structure. So no worries, no problem at all. So if you go to client work, it's the same thing.
You have real estate, then you go into folder, which is the date, and then Villa Flow State Infinity Pool for malaria. Then yeah, projects again. The footage you organize day one is daylight. Walk around, breakfast, dinner, you straight away know what stuff is in here. Without looking at a footage, this is what you want. And I could do a whole tutorial just from videography.
How you can organize your footage into, let's say dove into your soul or Primer Pro. Maybe I do it in future that we know and it comes from below. Analyze YouTube same thing you have the YouTube video name the same thing what I was creating before. So this is just roughly showing you how it looks like now we're going to my photo structure in my Photoshop drive.
I have photography a folder and I have the Lightroom catalogs always in here or my in our new catalog. Then sort out this stuff, which I just throw it in and I want to check it later and then I have the years. And then what I'm creating here is like portrays products, real estate travel and also the year behind.
Right? So let's say where did I where in 20, 20 Indonesia, then in Bali, then Gili Air and you see here this was my older folder structure added like this minus. But now I'm not doing this anymore. So as you can see here, you see the year, you see which camera it was and where it was. So what I have here on this hard drive, I always storage my photos. There's no other stuff in there. It's only photos. So what I'm doing actually is I'm opening Lightroom and in Lightroom I organize all my files and all my photos, convert them to DNG or I using or obviously, which is a compress and files. I have a video on my YouTube channel if you are interested. So I really can find very quickly, OK, what portraits I did in 20, 20, what portraits I did in 21.
So all the stuff is on my photo harddrive now. We're going to my video production as the SDA. This is mainly just for my traveling. I'm using and you see here the same. You have the year at the beginning and then you see the location or the country. So in this case here you see our end. I'm going to kind of republic and this is all the footage I shot here and I have two key words.
Where'd was I from? My studio here. And then the file in oh here for example, Galapagos was very huge. Then I have these project flights in here, the final content, I export it. And here's all the footage you see again, I put the date on it, then which camera and where it was. So I can quickly see. Oh, yeah, OK.
Also, he had this fired. I see. When it was shot what it is. And then you can check out this footage. What I found on Galapagos. I actually create this video right now on this hard drive that's always folder, which is called DaVinci Folder. This one I don't touch at all. I don't delayed anything down, anything. It's the cash folder, the proxy folder and also now all my projects.
And here, if I'd like this file, for example, all my projects are gone, but I always do it back up, so it's fine. I learned my lesson from a previous deleting actually. But yeah, so this is actually what I have on every hot drive which has videos as I have energy folder. Then my client as a steal which you can see here, I have an inbox edit folder which is I'm dumping all the stuff which I just have on my card and then I reorganize.
And later this is what I'm working on right now. Client stuff, YouTube videos I create for clients, and these are all my own YouTube videos. As you can see, it's again the date then the numbers of the YouTube video. I know which one I'm in right now and title actually. So this is the one we created before. And in these photos I create a render folder which is actually the final video and projects is when I finish a project, I copy the project down.
Then for this is actually where all the footage is from camera A is, it's a tutorial, then it's a face to camera B-roll, it's screen recording. And this is what I was copying before then we have audio music and graphic effects or visual effects. Depends what you want. So this is my client. Then we're going to time. I have a inbox full load as well as I order time as I created recently or like two months ago.
I haven't done them. So here are all my raw files and these are all the raw flights from the Sony A one. And then I usually create time lapse of a lot of time lapse after effects ones I have done this, I copied them here into the raw folder. Then I have another folder called Final Time Lapse and Hyper Lapse where you can easily find, OK, I want to have a hyper lapse from Sydney and I want to have the Holy Grail hyper lapse and you see this amazing Holy Grail hyper loops.
I created in Sydney and Australia. So yeah, that's pretty cool. That's actually all things to see. I have a folder which is for the Lightroom catalogs because I have separate from the photo folder, so I have a Lightroom catalog just for the time lapse. Then I have a folder for all the Ros, then I have a folder for all the final clips and inbox folder.
OK, now I have also a hard drive, one terabyte for my stock footage. What I did here is I have on top always what I'm doing. Asked if I want to have a folder like up, I do space or I create this unlock not and then I get this on the first position. So let's say here photo and videos.
I want to have them under first position because these are the exported videos. They are good and I want to upload them in black box or wire stock, whatever stock sites I want to use. Then I have an archive folder here which is folder one. This is all the stock footage I already created. Upload it and this is just like for storage thing.
Once I need space, I copy this folder on my bigger hard drive so I get like this as I see free. Then I have a folder which is like video raw stock footage and photo folder for my stock footage. So I separate them as well and 60 stuff. So that's actually all you see. Oh my hard drives once these projects is like for one client, I have everything in one folder.
Don't get me wrong that I always put every separate. If I have one client, one special project, then down to time ups and there are the photos and there are the videos and, and the final project and I you storage done this on a bigger harddrive so everything is organized so not a good tip is once you have folders you want to access all the time.
I would recommend you on Apple just move this folder out and put it on the site card so you have access very quickly and you see all you'll find straight away. That's what I did here with Google. I have all my business stuff and personal stuff in Google Drive then I have my old folder here on me on my video as notes, which I also have here my music library from art list or whatever I'm having.
So this is here as well. Motion templates I downloaded from motion around most of the time. Really awesome platform, high quality stuff. So I have actually everything here and yeah, this is actually all the staff, what I have here. I hope this video can help you. Another thing what I'm seeing right now is I use notion also to keep track on my footage.
So for example, if I go to my footage library, I do screenshots, for example, this is stuff what I phone for stock. So I put some tax on. I also make maybe a template which you can get. I don't know if it's for free or not. We'll see how complex it is. So it does this this number one way you see it.
This is stock footage slow motion and for 20 frames a second that's the video and it's ready to upload. So you see here how the footage looks like and you can type in some information or the link. And I know straightaway what it is. So this is what I'm doing. Once I'm in a new country, I create this pay child, Dominican Republic, and this is all the footage I sent in Dominican Republic.
And you can see here, like in Indonesia or here in Ecuador, this is how I keep organized. And then I have just video footage. I can see straight away just photo footage. My 60 don't worry. Well, organized thanks to German efficiency. So yeah, this is literally how I organize all my files. OK, one more time I will show you my photo structure all right.
So we're on the island called, so we're not here in Dominican Republic. So this is the year and the island name. Once I go in, I have two final projects which is stuff I already exposed on the projects. I from Da Vinci to keep it organized and the footage. So I have found a block which is on the first position, which is for iPhone.
I have here, for example, all the photo fights, the video fights and my 360 stuff. So that photo folder is categorized in every day. So day one you see here I was filming only with the drone data. I was photographing with the Sony A-1 and the drone video same day to day one, all the drone stuff and my Suzuki footage and also the X products was 60 stuff, which was nothing.
And I would say so you see here, yeah, this is actually all like hope you this have you for how to figure out like how to organize the footage, how I'm doing it and you also can download all these templates and photo structure I just created for you and just check it out if you use it or not, it's up to you create your own think about like what are you shooting at most?
Create these photos and then just keep copying all the fights. I mean, I had five years unorganized footage and it took me like one or two years to literally sort out everything and copy all the files in my folder structure. But now I know exactly where all my stuff is from ten years ago. So yeah, hope this appeals to you and yeah, let me know when they come and it out how you like it.
If hope this was not overwhelming to you, and I hope you can stay organized. So see you in the next video, please. Like them, subscribe to our YouTube channels and onto them. See your next video got. Dan, this is so hot here. How the attack on how you sound at the microphone.
Links I mentioned in the Blog or Video:
Post Haste ► https://www.digitalrebellion.com/posthaste/
Name Mangler ► https://manytricks.com/namemangler
FreeFileSync ► https://freefilesync.org
RAWSIE - Compress RAW photo ► https://youtu.be/8T4efVLzOIg
#BestFolderStructure #OrganizeFilesandFolder #FolderStructure
Post Haste
Create your Folder Structure with the customizable templates in just a second.
https://www.digitalrebellion.com/posthaste
DOWNLOAD my FREE Post Haste Tree structure and Settings
🎨 | DeHancer - 10% OFF code "MAIK" ► https://geni.us/DeHancer
BEST Film emulation, Filmlook, Film Grain, Halation, Bloom
1. Click the Link ► https://geni.us/DeHancer
2. Press BUY then enter the Promo Code "MAIK" You get then 10% DISCOUNT of Dehancer
🎨 | Cinema Grade “MAIK“ *GET 20% DISCOUNT* ► https://geni.us/FREE-PDF-CinemaGrade
The easiest way to color grade in Davinci Resolve, Premiere Pro, and Final Cut without any experience.
🖥 | MotionVFX for Davinci Resolve, Premiere… ► https://geni.us/MotionVFX_Davinci
The BEST motion graphics plugins for speeding up your workflow.
🎶 | ARTLIST Music & SFX licencing ► https://geni.us/ARTLIST-MK
*GET 2 FREE EXTRA MONTHS!
**There are affiliate links to support my work and get a discount on your purchase. Thanks ❤️
You don't enjoy reading books like I do? Blinkist can give you a book summary in under 15 minutes, so you can become a better individual. Try it out!
After reading this blog article, you can also watch my video tutorial.
Check out my Video on Youtube
👍🏻Like, Share and Subscribe 🙏❤️😀
Timestamp:
00:00 - Intro
00:30 - My harddrives
01:28 - Name Mangler
03:02 - Post Haste
03:40 - FreeFileSync
04:40 - Folder Structure - GoogleDrive
07:05 - Folder Naming
07:45 - Option 1 - Photo & Video
08:45 - Option 2 - Separate Folder Structure
10:44 - Photography Structure
11:55 - Video editing Structure
13:22 - Client & Youtube Folder Structure
14:20 - Timelapse & Hyperlapse Structure
15:26 - Stockfootage Structure
16:45 - Quick tip for apple user
17:34 - Notion Footage Library template
18:40 - Photo & Video Structure for Project
These are affiliate links. You can check out these products through my links, which helps support this website, channel, and where we creators get our income from when purchasing these products. Thanks
🎬 | The Equipment I use:
🛒 GEAR LIST: ► https://kit.co/MaikKleinert
💻 | FREE DIGITAL PRODUCTS: Discounts, LR Presets, LUT’s ► https://www.maikkleinert.com/shop
⏰ | LR Timelapse - Timelapse & Hyperlapse Software ► https://geni.us/LRTimelapse
💰 | Selling Stockfootage ► https://geni.us/Wirestock
🎨 | FCPX COLOR FINALE plugin ► https://geni.us/ColorGradingPlugin
🔴 | Tubebuddy: BEST Title & Keyword research tool for YouTube. ► https://geni.us/TubeBuddy-MK
📚 | BEST ONLINE COURSES I CAN RECOMMEND TO YOU 🎬
📹 | KOLDER CREATIVE - Sam Kolder advanced editing ► https://geni.us/KolderCreative
⏰ | Timelapse & Hyperlapse - Matjoez ► https://geni.us/TimelapseCourse
🎥 | FULLTIME FILMMAKER ► https://geni.us/FullTimeFilmaker-MK
Get your ONE-CLICK Teal & Orange + Urban Style preset for Lightroom desktop & mobile.
Get your 20% discount for Cinema Grade the time-saving color grading tool for Davinci Resolve, Adobe Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro X.
Join The Creator Weekly
Get your 20% discount for Cinema Grade the time-saving color grading tool for Davinci Resolve, Adobe Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro X.
Get your ONE-CLICK Teal & Orange + Urban Style preset for Lightroom desktop & mobile.
Unlimited Royalty-Free Music & SFX
ARTLIST Get 2 FREE extra months
⭐ | Check out my other popular videos
📺 | HOW TO Speed Up Your Color Grading WORKFLOW | CINEMA GRADE (Step by Step)
► https://youtu.be/LV-xMfu4ad8
📺 | How to use CINEMA GRADE in Davinci Resolve | Step-By-Step Tutorial
► https://youtu.be/vdq3AS_aEzU
📺 | How To Find MUSIC and SOUND EFFECTS for Your VIDEO! ARTLIST Overview
► https://youtu.be/G481h_a4T8k
📺 | RAWSIE Best RAW photo compression APP to reduce file size
► https://youtu.be/8T4efVLzOIg
