It’s boring and pretty easy to overlook, but when editing any video, at all, I strongly believe in the idea of serialised labeling. Nothing is more frustrating when revisiting an old project, or stealing footage from another job than to have the NLE ask you for “Tape 1″

Even for the small jobs, the one offs, I think it’s worth using simple and unique labelling that will enable you to find a tape again if you need it.

My guidelines for tape identification would be:

• Not related to content – a tape label reel id is just about finding the tape, it doesn’t need to tell you whats on it. You have clip names for that.
• Not repeated – this is the biggest one. You should be able to find the tape by knowing nothing more than the ID of the tape.
• Not too confusing – consider things like O and 0 and anything else that could lead to confusion later.
• Digitise nothing without an ID – stick tape ID labels on tapes before you capture them.

In choosing an ID scheme I would advise using only numbers and letters. Have at least 3 zero-padded digits in conjunction with letters, or at least four digits if using only numbers.

You could create prefixes you understand, perhaps a two-letter code for each job or client. The important thing if you go that way is to avoid repeating codes.

Go to the local stationery store and get the smallest label sheets you can find. Then using Word or OpenOffice or something make up sheets for of tape ID labels. Print them out and keep them handy. Whenever a new tape arrives, whack a label on it.

When you capture, use the tape ID either alone, or at the beginning of the tape name in the NLE. So rather than “Interviews GS0021″ make it either “GS0021″ or “GS0021 Interviews” – that will ensure the relavant portion of the ID survives any EDL or Metadata exports that might truncate it.

That’s it really. Just do whatever you can to avoid the dreaded “tape 1″ syndrome.