have over a thousand of video clips in my 2 TB internal hard drive in a mov format. All named on the basis of date when taken.
I am looking for a MAC application like a cross-reference/relational database which would permet to link each of these clips to a categorization table so that I can determine in which category each clip may belong (for example by counrty, by theme- Autumn, winter, etc, by subject (landscape, people and so on).
The idea behind this is to be able to trace the clips I want to select to construct a video with a given theme and story.
Can someone guide me towards the most practical solution to do this ?

What do you edit with now?
Most professional editing apps will do this.

I am not looking for something to edit my clips. I have FCP to do this.
What I want is to assign to each clip stored in my macpro a set of categorisation through multiple filters and be able to FIND the clips I want on the basis of criteria/filters. Just FIND CLIPS and DISPLAY in thumbnails the results of my search and then export the results into another directory, not editing the clips.
Someone mentioned to me 2 softwares : CatDV and Frameline 47.
Any other suggestion ? or preference between these 2 ?

Can someone guide me towards the most practical solution to do this ?

The most practical solution is using FCP like I suggested.
Maybe you missed the point that FCP can store all that metadata contained in the clips when you log them, for recall & sorting later. It will do exactly what you asked. If You get a little better acquainted with the app & manual you will see that FCP suite of tools is more than just a video editing application.

Of course there are other stand alone apps that will do this like filemaker pro and such,
but you will have to spend money on the additional app, and then will have to go through each clip manually and re-enter all the data you want for each clip into the app. Why double your expenditure and time required when you can do what you want now?

What you need is something like Shotgun (http://shotgunsoftware.com/home) but slimmed down. I've actually been toying with the idea of developing a tool like this...something that offers more robust asset management and tracking than an NLE browser does. However, I don't have a solid year to take off for development and testing.

Shotgun is awesome. It is truly a spectacularly engineered tool as well as thoughtfully designed. The people there did something very, very right. I can't praise them enough. Their tool is indispensable for a large post or VFX house working with hundreds to thousands of shots and keeping their relevant assets and data (metadata, plates, clips, notes and comments, change history, etc) straight and easily accessible (and searchable).

I don't know what their cost is, but they are worth looking into. Very friendly people. Tell them I sent you.

The most practical solution is using FCP like I suggested.
Maybe you missed the point that FCP can store all that metadata contained in the clips when you log them, for recall & sorting later. It will do exactly what you asked. If You get a little better acquainted with the app & manual you will see that FCP suite of tools is more than just a video editing application.


I am not sure FCP can do what I want which is to assign keywords to each clip so that I can do an effective and quick search to select clips I have from over 9,000 clips. For example I want to display all the clips I have which are associated with the following keyword : Sunset, water, autumn, with the logical choice AND or using OR.

I found the right software to do the job. It is CATDV Pro version 8.

Francois: GREAT FIND! I'll be investing once I get my next workstation set up shortly.