MovieGallery - Quickly Organize and Share Your Video Files

very good
key review info
application features
  • Add movies by dragging them from the Finder into any MovieGallery window. Drop a single film, a whole bunch, or a folder.
  • (9 more, see all...)

Usually, when it comes to organizing large databases, all you need is a very good method. And, since the latest technology gives you the possibility to record a movie file for almost every event, I don’t know about you, but my movie collection is huge.

Although MovieGallery does not actually make any change on your hard drive and only stores information about the files, the fact that you can organize them in playlists that you can further preview, burn on a CD, or directly share over the Internet makes it a good solution to a very common problem.

The Looks

Like most of the applications targeted for this kind of operations, MovieGallery has only one window, where you can find almost everything you need. On the left side, you can see the Library panel and the information area where you can store general data about the category or the respective file, including a copyright tag and a short description.

The Works

The right side of the window displays the movie thumbnails, but you can also choose to see the contained files in list or movie mode. The latter will actually allow you to directly preview the videos. The Settings menu available at the bottom of this area gives you the possibility to set a certain image as a preview, but also allows you to add your own rating.

This part of the application acts as an usual browser or player. You can choose to view an entire playlist in windowed or full-screen mode, using the arrows on the top of the area to navigate, or by employing the shuffle and loop features. Since MovieGallery is a software that aims at efficiency, you can not only adjust the thumbnail size to gain space, or change the sound level within the application, but you may also create smart playlists using simple criteria to optimize your workflow.

As any basic video player, MovieGallery will display in the full-screen mode a little panel at the bottom of the screen that will help you browse through the playlist, although you may also use the keyboard shortcuts. The Controller panel actions can be customized from the Preferences window, where you will be able to set for how long the panel is visible.

The MovieGallery innovation element resides in the Sharing feature. All you have to do is save your gallery, make the necessary adjustments in the Sharing panel and save the result in any web folder. MovieGallery allows you to employ one of the included templates that you can preview, but also gives you the possibility to choose the compression type. Some of the files could present errors at the initial compression, but the problem is usually resolved by a recompression. The Action menu also gives you the possibility to flatten the file or fix the extension.

MovieGallery offers support for CD burning, although the feature is very basic represented, not allowing you to see how much space is left on the disk, but you can adjust the writing speed and the after burning action.

You have the possibility to customize the application’s performance from the Preferences window, where you can change the On Launch actions, the previews location within the file, the default movie action, and choose to autosave documents on quit.

The same area allows you to customize the interface appearance by changing the text size, the background color  and the thumb border. The Sharing panel allows you to choose to be warned when encountering errors while sharing a gallery.


The Good

Simple but innovative, with a very clean interface due to the efficient organizing, MovieGallery provides a wide range of features that will make your life a whole lot easier. Now you can easily and quickly present your videos without spending a great amount of time searching and trying to guess if the content you have been looking for is in a particular file or not.

The Bad

Considering that the application is supposed to deal with a great amount of information, the search feature could be made obsolete by the database size. For now, you can search by name, copyright info, media type, or by all of them, but a more evolved tagging system should be implemented for larger galleries. Until then, you may also use the Arranging feature that adds some criteria like the creation date, addition date, duration, rating, size or media type.

The Truth

Initially, MovieGallery could be tested using a demo version, but Bitfield AB has recently decided to remove the limitations. Although the application’s webpage does not mention the change and the software still displays information about the limitations, MovieGallery is now available in the online store and you will have no problem testing it.

Therefore, you can convince yourself about the MovieGallery efficiency without any constraints. I am sure that once you have tried MovieGallery, it will become a constant help.

Here are some snapshots of the application in action:

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user interface 4
features 4
ease of use 5
pricing / value 5


final rating 4
Editor's review
very good
 
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