Restructuring iTunes media folders for Home Movies

I'm working with Final Cut Pro X and it should have the ability to "share" edited videos into Apple Devices (like iTunes and Apple TV), and as I understand it, the video files should be stored in Home>Music>iTunes>iTunes Media>Home Movies.
But that's not what happens on my system.
I've tried to add the folder myself, but it doesn't seem to be taking. So I'm wondering if this is more of an automatic structure that gets built on the fly.
I'm currently using iTunes 11.1.0.50. However, all my music and podcast is actually stored on an external drive. (I don't know if that has anything to do with my problem)
Does anybody have insight into how iTunes file structure is built, and how/if I can make this work for me?

I figured it out (with the help of Apple Support)...
In the iTunes preferences, under the Advanced tab, I needed to check the box to "Copy files to iTunes Media Folder when adding to library."
Sure enough, doing so creates the folder that the video file can be stored in.
I had unchecked it so that I wouldn't bog down my laptop's hard drive with all my music. So each time I share my videos, I'll have to first go in to iTunes and check that box.

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Itunes media folders for musical groups that Start with "The"

I am using Itunes 10.7 and have selected the option of copying files to Itunes media folder when adding to library. When I add a musician group that sometimes starts with "The" and other times don't start with "the" (eg Bee Gees or The Bee Gees) these two names are correctly sorted on the Itunes list - "The Bee Gees" sorts next to "Bee Gees".
When I look at the folders in Itunes/Itunes Media/Music I get one folder for "Bee Gees" and a second folder for "The Bee Gees. I have just started loading music into Itunes and already have 47 sets of folders where the groups are in two different folders - musical group name starting with "the" and another that does not start with the word "the".
Suggestions?
Thanks

As Ed says, that's the way it works. For any similar group decide which of the two forms you think is correct and then use it consistently in Artist, Album Artist, and Composer when relevant. While not the ultimate arbiter of fact Wikipedia suggests that Bee Gees is the correct form in this example.
See my article on Grouping tracks into albums for more.
tt2

How do I consolidate two separate iTunes Media folders?

Apparently I have to separate iTunes Media folders. There is the one in the default location ( folder named "iTunes Media" in ~/Music/iTunes/ where the tilde "~" represents your home directory.) and one on my external harddrive. They BOTH have updates in varying folders.
At one point I moved my folder to the external drive, and thought I kept everything consolidated. When looking at the Advanced Preferences window (iTunes/Preferences/Advanced) it has my Media Folder location in the correct place, the external drive.
BUT I apparently have still be downloading SOME podcasts, mobile apps, and a couple of other things into an iTunes media folder in it's original / default location.
I have no idea why the original folder is there or how long I've been adding files to this dual media nightmare.
I'm just trying to figure out the easiest way to combine the two files.
Can I drag and drop the contents of folders from the default media into the external media? Or do I have to worry abut iTunes knowing where to look for these files? Why do I still have some podcasts and apps downloading into the default folder and some downloading into the external one?
I REALLY dont want to start over and deal with rebuilding my iTunes Media, because I know I'll loose lots of data or end up with tons of duplicates (it happened once before when switching between harddrives).
Thanks for any insight.

Hello Q-too_cool
I would start with checking out the article that talked about dealing with multiple devices on one computer. That is going to be the best way to have two accounts on one computer.
How to use multiple iPhone, iPad, or iPod devices with one computer
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1495
Thanks for using Apple Support Communities.
Regards,
-Norm G.

Keeping two iTunes Media Folders (and libraries) in sync

Hi all,
Here's my situation... I can't be the only person looking for an answer to this. (Can I?)
At home I have a Mac Mini with my music collection on it managed by iTunes. I have the same at work. I also have Chronosync set up to nightly syncronize my iTunes Media folders. Obviously, this is just step one.
What I'd ultimately like is to be able to change files or add media at either location (through iTunes) and not only have the files moved by Chronosync but also have the iTunes libraries updated. Is there a way to do this via AppleScript or some other solution? I looking to keep two iTunes Media folders mirrored and have iTunes' library be updated at the same time (or on a regular basis).
Thanks in advance!
A

It sounds like a question for whoever wrote Chronosync. I have never heard of it and have no idea what it is or what it does. Generally you ask questions related to third party software on the software's own support forum. What you need it to do is synchronize the whole iTunes folder, not just media files. The library.itl file contains most of the actual playlist and content data but things also get updated in the artwork folder, and some other files (mostly also in the iTunes folder).
What are the iTunes library files? - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1660
More on iTunes library files and what they do - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITunes#Media_management
What are all those iTunes files? - http://www.macworld.com/article/139974/2009/04/itunes_files.html
Where are my iTunes files located? - http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1391
Apple's solution is to have you buy all your music from Apple and use the automatically download new purchases set on both computers. Of course it isn't a complete solution. For example, if you change the rating on one computer it won't change it on the other since all you're doing is downloading a file from a third place (the store) to both other places (computers).

Consolidating iTunes Media folders - Making sure I have all my music

I have over years of use, ended up with multiple iTunes Media folders on different hard drives, each with much of the same music but also each with some different music. I want to consolidate all of this into one (and only one) Master iTunes Media Folder. I know I could manually go through each sub folder and compare the songs in each and eventually (perhaps once I reach age 100) get this all together. BUT there has to be an easier way. Please instruct me - I love to learn. Thanks

At a guess you followed the process in HT1364 - iTunes for Windows: Moving your iTunes Media folder which would have moved the media folder to a new path of your choice. This process leaves the library database files back in the original location of <User's Music>\iTunes. Often people assume that all they need is now on the external drive and wipe the internal drive, or discard their old computer, before backing up the all important iTunes folder. If you have a backup of your user's profile folder from before the upgrade the iTunes library folder should be in there somewhere. Restore it to <User's Music> and your original library should pop back into existence. The external drive would need to have the same drive letter that it had previously.
A more effective way to relocate the library is to move the entire iTunes folder to the external drive, then hold down shift when starting iTunes and keep holding until asked to choose or create a library. You would then choose the file iTunes Library.itl in the iTunes folder on the external drive. If this is the way you moved the library before then that is how you should now reconnect to it. Changing the media folder in preferences doesn't change which .itl database file is opened, nor does double-clicking on an .itl file directly.
If you no longer have the original .itl file then you will have to build a new library and import the media to it. If you need to do this I would recommend you create a new library at F:\iTunes, then move your existing media folders inside F:\iTunes\iTunes Media before importing. This will avoid the creation of duplicates and make sure the library is in the correct shape going forwards.
If you have an iPod or iOS device my scripts ImportDevicePlaylists and SyncStats may well let you recover ratings, play counts & playlists from the device.
When you've fixed up your libray you should consider getting a second external drive to backup to.
tt2

Changing (Not Re-Locating) ITunes Media Folders

I have two iTunes media folders on my computer system. The first is an outdated Media Folder on my C: drive. The second is an updated Media Folder on an external hard drive. For reasons that are not worth explaining, iTunes was inadvertently re-directed to the Media Folder on my C: drive. I have redirected iTunes to the correct location on my external hard drive using the Advanced Preferences menu. However, iTunes is asking me "Would you like iTunes to move and rename the files in your new folder to match the keep iTunes media folder organized preferences?"
If I click "Yes" will this cause the Media Folder on the external hard drive to match the outdated playlist data on the C: drive?
If I click "No" will this maintain any playlist data in the updated Media Folder on the external hard drive?
Is there an entirely different procedure I need to follow if I want to change ITune Media Folders from the C: drive to the external hard drive while maintaining any playlist data on the external hard drive?

As Ed says, that's the way it works. For any similar group decide which of the two forms you think is correct and then use it consistently in Artist, Album Artist, and Composer when relevant. While not the ultimate arbiter of fact Wikipedia suggests that Bee Gees is the correct form in this example.
See my article on Grouping tracks into albums for more.
tt2

HT2470 Why won't Itunes store my music library in my User/Music Folder, if I select my user name as a storage location in Itunes, Itunes creates folders for artist name right in my user folder, instead of in my user/music folder

Why won't Itunes store my music library in my User/Music Folder?
If I select my user name as a storage location in Itunes, Itunes creates folders for artist name right in my user folder, instead of in my user/music folder. This gets especially annoying because if I tell Itunes to store my "media" in my user/music folder, Itunes will then create a folder named "music" in my "music" folder and will also create additional folders in my user/music folder location to store other non-music media in as well. It is very annoying to see this lack of affinity for folders between two Apple created programs.

Help iTunes locate your media folder:
No content shows up in iTunes after updating
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1967

Is quick time pro suitable for home movies?

is quicktime pro suitable for home movies?

is quicktime pro suitable for home movies?
That depends on how you define "suitable" (the editing capabilities you want/need to use) and what you mean by "home movies" (the editing compatibility of the files you need/want to edit).
QT 7 Pro does not add any additional codec components. It merely unl, ocks editing/conversion features not available to to base QT 7 player app. If you to convert, trim, merge, edit, mask, layer, and/or composite various forms of "compatible" data (up to 99 tracks), then it is a cheap alternative to full video editing apps/suites costing hundreds or even thousands of dollars. While it has many advanced capabilities and features, the utility often requires the user to perform many of the actions manually at a low or basic graphic user interaction level. If you are expecting QT 7 Pro to open files the base QT 7 player won't already open, then you will be diasappointed.

HT1725 I had an itunes redemption code for a movies and got the following message: "code redemption temporarily unavailable. Try again later." several times. How do I get my movie?

I had an itunes redemption code for a movie and got the following message, "code redemption temporarily unavailable. try again later." How do I get my movie?

Hi r.viel,
I'm sorry to hear you are having issues with your redemption code.
The following article should help you with this:
iTunes Store: Invalid, inactive, or illegible codes
If you're still unable to redeem your code after verifying the characters in the code, you'll need to contact iTunes Store Support for help. You'll need to provide a digital image of the front and back of the gift card as well as the sales receipt for the purchase of the gift card.
Contacting iTunes Store Support
Go to the iTunes support page and select your iTunes country.
From the iTunes support page, choose Contact Support on the lower-left side of the page.
Follow the instructions to get iTunes Store support assistance.
I hope this information helps ....
Have a great day!
- Judy

ITunes Charged me for two movies I only bought one

iTunes Charged me for two movies I only bought one

Contact iTunes STORE-- they will look into it and correct problems.

I am missing the iTunes Store Tabs for Music, Movies, and TV Shows. How do I add them?

I am missing the iTunes Store Tabs for Music, Movies, and TV shows. How do I add them?
It is very strange especially not having the Music Tab. I desperately want to download music...
Please help, anyone please, thank you.

To begin with, I would like to try to explain Apple's confusing nomenclature in regard to iCloud.
Apple have called the whole cloud thing iCloud, there are a number of features under the iCloud umbrella, some of which require their own login. iTunes is one of these, another is what Apple have unfortunately also called iCloud too.
You can use the same Apple ID (account) to login to both iCloud and iTunes, but you don't need to and often users will login to each service using a different ID.
The part that you need to remember is that the services available when you log into iCloud are completely different and unrelated to those when you log in to iTunes. Your iCloud login enables mail, contacts, calendars, find my phone, Back to My Mac, Documents & Data sharing and photostream, it does not affect any of your iTunes services.
To avoid confusion when discussing your problem, when I mention iCloud, I am referring to the services under the iCloud login, Whereas I will refer to the whole cloud thing as The Cloud.
To go back to your question; you cannot merge accounts, but perhaps using one account for iCloud and the other for iTunes will resolve the majority of the reasons you needed to merge to begin with.

Problems displaying SOME album art for Home Movies in iTunes 11.1.4

I have a number of home videos in my iTunes 11.1.4 library on my Mac. I have manually added album art to each video, but only about half the movies actually show the album art when viewing the movies from the Home Videos tab in iTunes. The other half of the movies just show a frame of the movie. I double checked Get Info for the movies that aren't displayed the album art and confirmed that the album art is listed. All the album art I uploaded is of the same size and file type. Not sure why half the art displays and half doesn't. Anyone else see this before? I'm puzzled.
Thanks

I don't know if you got your answer this this post is from about 3 months ago. I've also been having the same issue.
On my end, I've been keeping all of my movie files on an external drive and just as your situation, only some of them appear and some of them are missing. I don't know if it's as a result of having them on an external drive and anytime I launch iTunes, it's not always plugged in. I'd have to do a bit more testing on that.
I did notice that as soon as I select the "Get Info" on a movie file with missing artwork and confirm that it's there in the metadata by just clicking "ok", it appears automatically in the iTunes window. Seems like a quick and easy solution for now, but not so if you have 300+ movies and you have to do the step for every other one.
If you figured out a solution for this or what worked for you, I'd be glad to hear it.

Descriptions for home movies in iTunes

I have some home movies that I classified as TV Shows, so I could see them separately from my movies on my video iPod. However, when I try to access them on my iPod, they don't show up because there is no way to alter the category "Show" so I can find it on my iPod. Does anyone know how to do this?
Imac G5 1.6 Ghz Mac OS X (10.4.3)

I don't know if you got your answer this this post is from about 3 months ago. I've also been having the same issue.
On my end, I've been keeping all of my movie files on an external drive and just as your situation, only some of them appear and some of them are missing. I don't know if it's as a result of having them on an external drive and anytime I launch iTunes, it's not always plugged in. I'd have to do a bit more testing on that.
I did notice that as soon as I select the "Get Info" on a movie file with missing artwork and confirm that it's there in the metadata by just clicking "ok", it appears automatically in the iTunes window. Seems like a quick and easy solution for now, but not so if you have 300+ movies and you have to do the step for every other one.
If you figured out a solution for this or what worked for you, I'd be glad to hear it.

How can I combine two iTunes media folders without losing media?

I have two media folders. One on an external drive that I used on an old PC before migrating to a new one, and my internal HDD on the new PC. My internal drive became nearly full so I had to start using my external drive and iTunes media folder again. So, right now iTunes looks to my internal drive for most of the media and my external drive for some of it. Now, I need to move all the media files back to the external drive and, hopefully, in one place. The primary challenge is that I don't know how to move the media files (and metadata) efficiently. I just don't know which folders have been affected and so a standard copy -> paste won't work because the PC will try to overwrite the folders and I have no idea which ones can be overwritten and which can't. Ugh...does this make sense? Thank you!!!

Hi there theskyisblue,
You can indeed switch between two different iTunes libraries, and this article outlines how:
iTunes: How to open an alternate iTunes Library file or create a new one
If iTunes is running, quit iTunes.
If you're using Windows, hold down the Shift key and from the Start menu, choose All Programs > iTunes > iTunes.
If you're using a Mac, open iTunes and immediately hold down the Option key.
You should see one of these screens:
Thank you for using Apple Support Communities.
All the best,
Sterling

AVCHD + iMovie, best tactics for home movies

Hey all. Thanks ahead of time for your help. Even after a decent amount of research, I'm having a hard time figuring out some of this.
I have a late-2008 13" MBP (2.4GHz ic2d), iMovie 08, a Canon Vixia HF20. My previous camera (mini-DV tape Panasonic) imported into iMovie a consistent 6.86 MB / second at 29.97 FPS and 853x480. I guess we're spoiled by the small amount of hard drive space this uses up, since we have several years of footage (unedited) on my MBP.
My daughters like to look through the unedited footage in iMovie (as a player), so it has become kind of like iTunes for our video files. Plus, who knows when we'll have the time to do editing - i.e., no time soon, if ever.
So, we're just looking for a way to continue the trend with our new Canon HF 20 camera, a gift from the grandparents. (Yes I hear you laughing knowing what is coming...)
The HD clips are super small on the actual camera, but bloat up once iMovie imports them into AIC. I've read up on this already, so I understand why now. But obviously we don't have the internal HD space to store unedited HD video with huge AIC file sizes.
I tried downloading the VLC program that was suppose to play the MTS files, but it didn't work (probably because I didn't copy over the whole folder tree/stream files from the camera, I'm guessing). Is that my best bet to keeping the file sizes down?
I've been reading up on programs that convert the AVCHD format to MP4 and DV so that iMovie can read them (the conversion process takes forever). I guess I don't understand the benefit of this. If my iMovie already can import them into AIC, why would I need a 3rd party conversion program?
Or more specifically, does using a converter program to take AVCHD to MP4 retain full HD quality but reduce file size? How about to DV format?
I'm not wild about the idea of taking 12x the clip length to convert the AVCHD files into MP4, but if that will be a one-time "suck it up" process, and we'll ultimately have small file sizes (yet full HD quality), I can see the value there.
We're not tied to using iMovie (we don't even edit really, we're just using it as a player/organizer right now). *So I guess our goal is to keep file sizes down so we can (ideally) have all our unedited video on my MBP for view-any-time fun... all the while retaining HD quality if we ever (way in the future) want to edit it.*
Sheessh, it's just home movies. Got so complicated so fast.
I do have an ASUS G73JH (i7-720QM, Win7), and I read AVCHD is native to Win7, but I'd really like to avoid using the PC for the videos.

Thank you so much for responding. But my questions aren't really about archiving the raw AVCHD/MTS format (which I believe I can already do right now using Disk Utility or my PC).
The issue is that we still want to play/view the unedited HD files on the Mac, but need to keep the file sizes down (so AIC format is out of the question). I guess my questions can be summarized as follows:
*1) How can we simply view/play the raw AVCHD files on the Mac, while (a) keeping the file sizes down, and (b) maintaining the HD quality to do some editing in the (very) distant future?*
I tried the VLC Media Player program, but it didn't work (even with the entire folder tree from the camera).
*2) Does converting the AVCHD format into MP4 (or DV) result in a loss of video quality?*
My couple tests doing this (with AVCHD Converter program) took forever to do the conversion to MP4, but ended up with very small file sizes as well as file types that Mac could play. It was hard to tell, but it looked like the video quality went down. I have not tried converting to DV yet.
*3) If you are trying to retain the most video quality while keeping the file size as small as possible, is it better to convert AVCHD format to MP4 or DV?*
*4) Is the conversion from AVCHD to DV/MP4 quicker based on CPU?*
VoltaicHD, for example, says it takes 12 times as long as the original footage to convert the clip, but it didn't mention the CPU. If I did the conversion on my i7 quadcore PC, would it all go faster?

Restructuring iTunes media folders for Home Movies

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