By the time you finish reading this you will probably think I am completely nuts. This will seem like WAY too much trouble. But I assure you, if you DON’T manage your materials as if you will suddenly and unexpectedly squirt out of the universe, your name will be cursed in absentia. In other words, you need to assume that, at some point, you might not be available to administer the materials or editing tasks for some reason, and how well you organize everything will determine how well other people can pickup where you left off.
When the box of stuff finally arrives in your edit room, the first thing you should do is take everything out and look at it. Duh! But incredibly enough, sometimes people THINK they’ve sent you what you want, but they sent something else, or they didn’t send it at all. Open all of the tape and disc cases and confirm that there’s actually a tape or disc in it. If there are concerns about what you have in your hands, call the production company immediately. There are some facilities that require that you or an assistant to put barcode stickers on everything and begin making an inventory list.
When you are ready to deal with your tapes, remember, the first thing you always do is to pop the record tab so that you cannot accidentally erase it. If your tapes haven’t already been labeled, name them making sure to mark both the tape and the case. Try to keep them in chronological order too. Rewind them in a VTR, not a camera. Do not store them anyplace where there is direct sunlight, high humidity, temperature extremes, or magnetic fields such as speakers, telephones, or magnetized tools. Clearly label the container box so it doesn’t get stacked away in the wrong place.
Discs of other things like ALE files, logos, sound, etc. should be labeled too. I like to copy off each disc that comes in onto the harddrive you will be using for the project, each disc in its own folder, named according to the disc label name. This provides you with easy, centralized access to the material, but also permits the original discs to serve as a backup. You want to handle the original discs as little as possible for risk of scratching or losing them.