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[glynor]

So, someone posted this question earlier tonight (I chopped off the poster's name to protect the guilty).  I got all into it and answered it pretty nicely, I think, but before I could post my answer, the OP had deleted his post.  So I'm going to post it anyway.

Here was the question:


click to embiggen

There are a few ways to do this.  I know there have been some epic "view design" discussions around this precise point in the not-too-distant past.

You can use any of the same fields in your Movies views that you use in TV Shows views.  One strategy for those multi-part movies would be to add an [Episode] tag (1, 2, 3, 4) and a [Series] tag and then insert these into your Movies view in Theater View.  The problem with this is that if you do it the "simple way" you have a silly view for movies that aren't episodic (where you have to drill down through "All" for [Series] and [Episode]).

For the record, I don't do this.  If I have a movie that is really "one movie" segmented into pieces, I join the actual files (simple as pie with mkvmerge, takes seconds) and I never make those anymore (because who cares about CD/DVD-R size limits anymore).  And for multiple movies in a series (such as Harry Potter), I just name them:

Harry Potter 1 - The Sorcerer's Stone
Harry Potter 2 - The Chamber of Secrets
Harry Potter 3 - The Prisoner of Azkaban
Harry Potter 4 - The Goblet of Fire
Harry Potter 5 - The Order of the Phoenix
Harry Potter 6 - The Half-Blood Prince
Harry Potter 7 - The Deathly Hallows: Part 1
Harry Potter 7 - The Deathly Hallows: Part 2

And view them in a flat list.  Since my Movies (by Name) view has [Name] field added as a Category (with Grouping turned on)...


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That way, my list is already broken down by "alphabet letters"...


click to embiggen

So it isn't too much to handle.  I also have ByGenre and other handy views in there.

However... If you want to do it that way, you can absolutely pull it off.  Here's a demo of one way...


click to play

I should note, however, there is this issue:

The remaining issue is that the movies don't display with the correct List Style.  Because I have to group by Name in order to get one entry per two part movie, the list style used is the grouped one, that just shows thumbnails and name, not the extended movie info tags.  I only get that info if I select a movie name to drill down to the individual files, and therefore I only see the movie info for one movie at a time.

Which is too bad.  The problem is that MC doesn't know what kind of metadata to pull about the "item" in question, because it doesn't know if it is showing a [Series] or a [Name] or something else entirely (I think it is an opaque "search" to the view engine).  There might be a solution, but I don't know about it.  Like I said, I don't use that method...  But it is possible, quite easily.

[InflatableMouse]

Thanks for posting it anyway.

There is another way which I used to use and thanks to this post I just discovered its no longer working.

It involves creating an extra Librart field, I called it 'Sequel'. For each movie in a collection I fill in the collection name in 'Sequel'. Under Tools/Options/Theater View you can then use an expression I think under Rules for Display. Then when you browse movies, it shows the collection as a folder with a cover from one of the movies in it. Within it, you can sort by name or year or whatever.

I always struggle with the search on this board (yes even advanced) and unfortunately I can't find it anymore.

[stevemac]

I use a method I found in the forum - however I can't remember who to attribute its success to (sorry)

Populate the Series Field with a meaningful identifier (eg Dirty Harry for DH, Magnum Force etc, Harry Potter for those 8 movies, Batman for the three Nolan films etc)
Create a new Library Field & use the following formula in the Calculated Data Expression if(!isempty([Series]), [Series][Year][Name], [Name])
Sort the view by the newly created field

cheers,

Steve

[gappie]

i use the album field for this. its easy. when you want some movies grouped, like james bond. i put james bond in the album field. otherwise i leave them empty. then i use this expression in Theater View:

if(isempty([album]),[name],[album])

when there is no album, choosing a movie here brings you to the info panel, when there is an album with some more then one movie, you get the list with these movies.

you could use an other field ofcourse, ive been doing this since version 11, i think, and it works for me. in the past mc wrote dates to the album field, you might wanna clean that first..

 
gab

[glynor]

Thanks for posting it anyway.

I did the stupid movie, and then discovered the deleted post, and I wasn't about to just let it go (after working on the screencast for 45 minutes or so).

PS....

I always struggle with the search on this board (yes even advanced) and unfortunately I can't find it anymore.

Use Google.

Example (to find my Tag On Import HowTo): http://lmgtfy.com/?q=howto+tag+on+import+site%3Ajriver.com

[InflatableMouse]

I guess I could make an exception and use Google for that at least .

But this was it  ...

i use the album field for this. its easy. when you want some movies grouped, like james bond. i put james bond in the album field. otherwise i leave them empty. then i use this expression in Theater View:

if(isempty([album]),[name],[album])

when there is no album, choosing a movie here brings you to the info panel, when there is an album with some more then one movie, you get the list with these movies.

you could use an other field ofcourse, ive been doing this since version 11, i think, and it works for me. in the past mc wrote dates to the album field, you might wanna clean that first..

 
gab

Except I used a new library field for it called Sequel. And its not under Rules for Display like I thought it was, but simply add a new item under Items to Show and add the expression above with the field you're using to name your collections.

Works beautifully.

Thanks gab!

[glynor]

I guess I could make an exception and use Google for that at least .

But this was it  ...
Except I used a new library field for it called Sequel. And its not under Rules for Display like I thought it was, but simply add a new item under Items to Show and add the expression above with the field you're using to name your collections.

Yep.  That's essentially identical to what I demoed above, using [Series] and [Episode] as a stand-in.  You could, of course, skip the [Episode] part, and just use the [Season] field (or [Album] or anything else you want), to "contain" the series name.

[MrHaugen]

What tool did you use to create that video, Glynor?

[glynor]

What tool did you use to create that video, Glynor?

Hmmm... Probably Camtasia Studio.  I use both Camtasia and Telestream Screenflow for those.

I like Screenflow better, but it is Mac-only.  About half-the-time I do it, though, I'm capturing a Windows application running on my Mac in Parallels, so it is always hard to remember.  I'm did this one at home, though, so probably Camtasia.

Too lazy to look.  Both are awesome screencast tools.