Overview

How to setup My Films to play locally stored trailers you may have, or add, for your films.

Summary

1. Download and save trailers to your local hard disk
   • using either an external app
   • via another MediaPortal plugin like Online Videos
   • via the Trailers menu in the MyFilms Details window
2. Tell MyFilms where you store your trailers - i.e. either the movie folder, or a separate trailers folder(s) (such as the one you select in Online Videos for Downloaded files, or the external app you may use to download trailers)
3. Add (link) the trailer files to your movie catalog/database:
   1. automatically when you import a movie IF you already have trailer files
   2. by adding them within MyFilms - either globally (Global Updates) or for a single movie

Note: To use and play local trailers you may have on your hard disk drive in My Films, you must first store the file name and location of related trailers in the field (DB Item for storing Trailer Info) you choose in your database and link it to the film. Normally this is the Source Trailer field and is automatically preset when you use the Setup Wizard.

Organizing Trailers

You may store your trailers however you wish:

1. In each movie folder
2. in a

   \Trailer

   sub- folder of your movie folder named 
3. In one or more trailer folders either locally or on a network server/NAS.

Note: If you store trailers in the movie folder, ensure the file name contains trlr, trailer or clip or customize the Trailer Identification to match how you name your trailers so MyFilms can distinguish the trailer from the movie file (and not add it as a new movie to your catalog).

 Tip: You only need to worry about file names and trailer identification strings if you store your trailers in the same folder as the movie (i.e. option 1. above)

Customize Trailer 'detection'

When you import movies, MyFilms uses AMC Updater. Thus the settings for detecting trailer files to avoid adding them as movies, are in AMC Updater >  Options Tab under Accepted Trailer Identification strings:

This is only required if you store your trailers in the movie folder, not if you use a separate, Extended Trailer Search path in Trailers Setup.

As of v 6.1.0 regex expressions are also supported for trailer identification strings (e.g. '*Wclip'*)

Note: Only 'trailer' and 'trl' (either file or folder names) are recognized when Adding Trailers (see below) to your database using Search and add trailers in MyFilms.

Trailers Setup

Open MyFilms Setup and select the Trailer tab:

1. DB Item for storing Trailer Info - select the field in your database where you have entered the filename of a related trailer(s). Make sure the field is NOT used for other data already. The Setup Wizard will normally preset this based on your catalog type, e.g. Source Trailer for AMC4 catalogs.or Borrower for AMC3
2. Extended Trailer Search path - select one or more folders (separated by semi-colon) to search for related trailers. This is especially useful if you download movie trailers using other MediaPortal Plugins, like Online Videos,  or Showtimes. Just search the folders where you store these trailers and My Films will automatically link to them.

As of v 6.1.0:

1. Autoregister Trailer - when enabled trailers will be automatically added to your movie catalog/database whenever you enter Details View. This is especially useful when downloading trailers within MyFilms (e.g. via OnlineVideos plugin). Warning: if you download a lot of trailers, this option will cause regular updates to your database and may reduce performance.
2. Cache Trailers for Online Content - when viewing Online Content (e.g. *** Online Info *** views or a person's Filmography (TMDb)). If you have specified an Extended Trailer Search path, My Films will cache trailers in the background in a

   OnlineTrailerCache

   subfolder so you have the choice to play them locally at a later time. This is especially useful if you have lower bandwidth. In addition, that makes sure, you still have the trailers available, even when the online source has been taken down.
   Warning: when this option is enabled, MediaPortal will not actually close until the current download is finsihed.

Movie Folder Setup

If you store trailers in your movie folders the Setup Wizard will automatically preset the DB Item for storing Trailer Info field on the Trailers tab in Setup based on your catalog type.(e.g Borrower for AMC3, Source Trailer for AMC4 and other catalog types) No additional setup is required. 

Note: when you download trailers from within MyFilms via the integration with the Online Videos plugin you may select the option to store the trailer(s) in your movie folder instead of the download folder you select in Online Videos configuration.

Trailer Folder(s) Setup

If you typically download trailers using an external app, or another MediaPortal plugin like Online Videos (not via My Films Details Window), you must enter the path(s) where you store your trailers in the Extended Trailer Search path. 

The advantage is that you may have movie trailers even before you get the movie or create a movie folder. Then, when you get the movie and import it, My Films will search your trailer folders  and automatically add them to your database.

My Films will automatically detect the files stored in your Extended Trailer Search path(s) and match them based on the movie title, so you don't need to worry about the file names.

Adding Trailers 

Whenever you download trailers for movies that already exist in your movies database, you need to add the path to the field you use for Source Trailer. However, you do not need to do this manually. My Films can search and add new trailers based on the path(s) you selected above.

You may add trailers from within MyFilms for either a single movie or all movies:

• single movie - Details window > Trailers menu (or context menu) > search trailer (local)
• all movies - Main window menu > Global Updates > Search and add local trailers (all films)
  Note: This process can take a couple minutes if you have a huge database and many trailers, especially if they are stored centrally on a network.

Note: As of v 6.1.0 you can also select the Autoregister Trailer option in Trailers setup (see above and beware warning!)

What's Next

Now you have completed the Trailers Setup, see Using My Films >  Trailers to learn how to view and play your them, or for more details on adding new trailers from within MyFilms.

Related

• Setup Guides