How to create an Asset Management System

How to create an Asset Management System for your files

When you do not have a proper system for managing your files, you end up wasting a lot of time searching for files and often you end up losing files. A naming convention which will be described in a new post shall accompany the system as it is an integral part of it. In order to be as efficient as possible, it is best if a system is approved beforehand to be able to comply with immediately, thus saving time and money.  

Objective:

1.     To organize and classify all media assets in an archive that is simple and efficient.

2.     To develop a system that allows the quick search and recovery of files.

3.     To establish criteria for everyone to follow to archive material that will avoid unnecessary storage costs as well as lost time in the search and recovery. To assist with the establishment of these criteria a document will be created explaining the coding convention. This document will be distributed to all vendor, providers, stakeholders, etc who are involved with deliverables so that they can comply with the naming convention prior to the delivery of the assets and if creating the raw material prior to apply prior to beginning working.

Proposal:

The idea is to create a system that is based on a folder structure and an accompanying naming convention that will make it easy to locate and identify files by following a folder route and/or by using the search box. The system must be scalable so that it is possible to increase it with the addition of new projects as well as new asset types. It must also be structured in such a way that if a migration to a professional level “MAM” or “DAM” (Media/Digital Asset Management) system were to happen, the migration would be as simple as possible.

FOLDER STRUCTURE:

The archive folder structure would be designed in a maximum of 4 levels according to:

1.     Project

2.     Raw or Edited material

3.     Asset type

4.     Task or Sub-Project

According to this structure, the folder structure would look something like this:

LEVEL 1:

ROOT:

-       Project 1 (P1)

-       Project 2 (P2)

-       Project 3 (P3)

Above would be the first level of folders you see as you open the root folder. Projects are the most common group of files so we will use that. If you do not use projects you can always skip this level of folders and start at the next one. Any ventures that are holistic in itself (unrelated to any other project) and that will generate assets that need to be archived should be considered a project. If you were working on a video game for example, the name of the videogame would be a new project and would therefore get a new folder in the system.

The initials next to the project name are the first prefix that will be used in the naming convention. This will help associate the asset to the project it belongs to. In the case the initials were to coincide between projects, the year would be added to the newest project. In the case there was another project with the same initials the same year then the name would have a letter added starting with the letter A and continuing on as many times as this were to happen. 

LEVEL 2:

The second level would determine whether the material is raw / source or edited material.

Raw or source material is all material that has not been doctored and that arrives as is, whether it is material from a camera, cell phone, microphone, SD card or wherever. This is the first point of archive in the life of the material. All source material must be archived. The material must stay as is for future use and/or reference and must never mix with any other type of material. All material that is generated will be archived here as soon as it comes into our system. The material needs to be labeled according to the naming convention before anything is done with it.

The folder structure with this second level would look something like this:

-       Project 1(P1)

-       P1 Raw

-       P1 Edited

-        Project 2 (P2)

-       P2 Raw

-       P2 Edited

-       Project 3 (P3)

-       P3 Raw

-       P3 Edited

In this level the material would be sorted out in such a way where your raw material is the material that you archive, this is your source material. Your edited material is material that has been produced from that source material.

In this folder structure you can then include a new folder if you wish that contains all documents and also if you wanted any other file that does not fit within any of those categories but that must be archived. So your folder could for example look something like this:

ROOT

-       Project 1 (P1)

-       P1 Raw

-       P1 Edited

-       P1 Documents

-       P1 Sessions

-       P1 Others

This is scalable so it could expand as needed with the addition of any new categories.

We define Document as any file that has text and in which the information conveyed in it is the key element.

LEVEL 3:

This level would classify the material according to the type of asset. For the Raw material:

1.     Video

2.     Photographs

3.     Graphics

4.     Audio

It could be scaled also to any new types of assets.

For the edited material it would be classified in a similar approach but also including the purpose of the material in order to account for those assets that are not specifically one type of asset but a combination of them. With this in mind this level for the Edited material could be:

1.     Video

2.     Photographs

3.     Graphics & Marketing & Artwork

4.     Audio

5.     Subtitles

6.     Tie-ins

7.     Products

8.     Web

If there is a Documents folder the level within the document folder could be divided into categories according to “department” and type of document. So you would have for example:

1.     Scripts

2.     Legal

3.     Finance

4.     Marketing

5.     Presentations

6.     Press

If there was a Sessions folder you would categorize by the software, so something like this:

1.     Photoshop (PS)

2.     Final Cut Pro (FCP)

3.     ProTools (PT)

4.     etc

This is also scalable, so that it can have folders added as long as the items are related to that particular project.

Documents pertaining to the overall organization should be filed separately but with a similar approach. So maybe the organization could be added as a project to the root folder and follow the system described herein or somewhere else.

So according to this folder structure this would be the folder tree thus far:

 -       Project 1 (P1)

-       P1 Raw

-       P1 R Video

-       P1 R Photographs

-       P1 R Graphics

-       P1 R Audio

-       P1 Edited

-       P1 E Video

-       P1 E Photographs

-       P1 E Graphics

-       P1 E Audio

-       P1 E Marketing

-       P1 E Artwork

-       Project 2 (P2)

-       P2 Raw

-       P2 R Video

-       P2 R Photographs

-       P2 R Graphics

-       P2 R Audio

-       P2 Edited

-       P2 E Video

-       P2 E Photographs

-       P2 E Graphics

-       P2 E Audio

-       P2 E Marketing

-       P2 E Artwork

-       Project 2 (P3)

-       P3 Raw

-       P3 R Video

-       P3 R Photographs

-       P3 R Graphics

-       P3 R Audio

-       P3 Edited

-       P3 E Video

-       P3 E Photographs

-       P3 E Graphics

-       P3 E Audio

-       P3 E Marketing

-       P3 E Artwork

LEVEL 4:

The fourth level would be used whenever applicable to classify assets within a specific task or subproject. For example, source video that has been shot for one specific video would be classified with the name of that task or subproject. At this level however there will already be files and folders within a folder.