Right now my collection of DVDs is kind of haphazardly thrown on my shelves. I’m debating how I want to organize them, so many methods which seem valid…
Before the collection got out of control, I was sorting by Director… but now I’m thinking the most visually appealing method would be by release. Usually the companies use similar packaging- Koch, XRated, NEW, Blue Underground, MGM, etc… so it looks nice when they’re all lined up…
But then it seems to make more sense to have all of a director’s films together.
And then there’s sorting by common themes- like with the Django titles, I always want to put all them together even though they aren’t related.
Just curious if anyone else gives this any thought, or maybe I’m just spaghetti OCD
I have limited storage. All discs are stored in a large case which holds up to 1500 discs and I store the covers in plastic sleaves which then go in ring binders. Stored by title from A to Z.
Sort by label … Anything else is a hassle and bound to give you grey hairs before your time. Sorting by director is a fine idea but then there are those joint ventures with more than one director and don’t forget the box sets, are you going to split them up? Impossible with the Koch Media box sets for example.
Sorting alphabetically is impossible, unless you sort by original title… Too many damn different titles given to the same movie.
What you need to do is sort them so you are able to find a given movie again. Sorting by label is the easiest thing to do and there is a decent chance that the releases from the same company is going to match somehow… Pleasing to the eye. That’s what I’ve done anyways… The spaghetti westerns are separated from the rest of my Italian collection but are thinking of joining them as the split-up makes not much sense anyways as the rest aren’t grouped by genres.
If all else fails there should be someone on this site who could sell you a cheap strait-jacket … Custom fit.
Mine are strictly chronological except for a bunch of DVD-Rs without cases which live in a portable zip up thingy. As long as I know what year a film was made I can put my hand on it in no time flat. Any other system would seem far too confusing for me.
Right now I have them loosely arranged in order of my personal preference. I have 4 full rows now so I’m going to have to start arranging them differently soon. I like Phil’s method, I’ll probably try that.
I know it is not recomendable to those of you with 100+ collections but I sort mine alphabetically. I started doing that when my collection was much smaller and I had to have my three Deadwood seasons hold up my other westerns. But now, Deadwood is off the shelf and lying on top. I put my SPO Japanese titles first because it’s Japanese. Then go ABC. But my dollars trilgoy is by Fistfull, For a Few, The Good. For some strange reason, I have There Will be Blood on my western shelf. Maybe because it is set in the desert. But I don’t call it western at all. I have my DVD-Rs that are in sleeves piled up in front.
Well then. I guees it is easier than I imagined. But I actually have fun alphabetizing my collections. I just love to look at all those nice covers lined up after I add a new one.
God i’m always re-arranging all of mine! At the moment around 280 ish are crammed onto a book shelf (and there’s now no room left whatsoever) and some multiple versions are in a slipcase. The sell thru dvd’s are currently sorted by label, (Koch, Wild East, etc…even the Franco Cleefs are all together). Then it goes to dvdr’s which i tend to have boxed with sleeves, and they are sorted by actor to some extent…gradually going down to stuff i’m not in a hurry to watch and then on the bottom, stuff i have watched but won’t be viewing again in a hurry. Maybe A-Z is the way to go…
That must be a pain when you get a new title though, and have to shift everything over by 1
I really like that idea though, saving a lot of space that way. If I had thought of it a while back, then there’s a good chance I’d do it that way… but I’ve put too much work into making custom cases at this point for my DVDRs and such… i dunno, maybe I’ll still switch to that method at some point. As it is, I’m going to have to buy a new bookshelf just for my spaghettis
good points there
Makes sense if you’ve got plenty of spaghettis… I cant imagine shuffling my 300+ spaghettis in with the rest of my dvds, but then I also tend to sort everything into genres anyway
lols
That’s an interesting system there, I’d probably have troubles with it but it would be a good way to learn what years the films fall into
A-Z is the way to go. I imagine sorting by releasing company, actor, director, etc. is very confusing. Forgetting which actor is in which movie, who directed what, who released what and which version you have. But I haven’t ever done that and maybe you guys are sharp about this stuff.
@autephex
Where do you search for custom DVD-r covers? I should try it.
but i tend to design my own covers… I’ve made quite a few of them. I can share them if you’d like. The ones I download, I tend to redesign for better printing, as the ones on the site above are nice but the text doesn’t print very well and a lot of the images are pixelly from stretching- so i go in with photoshop and paint over the pixels and such to clean them up
[quote=“korano, post:14, topic:1660”]A-Z is the way to go. I imagine sorting by releasing company, actor, director, etc. is very confusing. Forgetting which actor is in which movie, who directed what, who released what and which version you have. But I haven’t ever done that and maybe you guys are sharp about this stuff.
@autephex
Where do you search for custom DVD-r covers? I should try it.[/quote]
Well…i don’t forget stuff like that…i tend to remember them often by who is in them and i know how many versions i have of each one. As for Director…that never even registers for me…
I’m the same but I usually remember the director also… if its a lesser known director I have troubles with it sometimes, but after I watch the film I can usually remember without any problems
The actors do seem to always register, as long as we’re talking regulars
Haha…well, guess i’m a bit of a heathen when it comes to that kind of thing. I do quite often recall who did the soundtracks though. And yes, mostly it’s the regular actors. Mostly…
I’m still at a loss on how to sort my collection. Currently its roughly according to actor, but than what happens when a movie has two actors and you have to pick one?
I’m going to switch to alphabetical sorting but its kinda tricky with spaghetti western titles. Do I go with english titles? Italian? What about titles that start with “a”, or a number, or “the”. What if spaghetti westerns have two titles that have two titles that are used equally often? For those of you who sort A to Z i’D appreciate some tips.
I dont sort my collection that way, but my list of titles is sorted alphabetically, and I just use the English title that I associate most with the film
I plan on making another list in Italian titles, cus it gets tricky when doing comparisons… but as for your discs, I’d go by whatever you know the film as most- what you’re likely to reach for when you’re looking for it
