Companion files and exports: what stays with your recordings

A camera rarely writes just one file. Next to your video or photo it often saves a few small helpers: a low-resolution preview, a thumbnail, a GPS or flight log, a settings file, or the JPEG it took alongside a RAW photo. Media Organizer calls these companion files, and it keeps them with the recording they belong to.

Why it matters

• Nothing gets left behind. When you add a recording to an edit pack, copy it or back it up, its companions come along.
• Your editor works better. Proxies and logs are where editing apps expect them.
• Copies are counted honestly. A copy of a clip counts only when its companions are on that drive too, so you never format a card thinking everything is safe when the flight log or preview isn't.

How Media Organizer recognises them

It looks at file names inside one folder, the way the camera saved them. It never opens or changes your files to do this.

• Files with the same name. Any file named like a video or photo in the same folder belongs to it, whatever its type: CLIP.MP4 keeps CLIP.THM, CLIP.SRT and CLIP.XMP. Editing notes named after the whole file, such as DSC_0001.NEF.xmp, count too.
• RAW with JPEG. DSC_0001.NEF keeps the DSC_0001.JPG taken with it. The RAW is the main file.
• iPhone Live Photos. IMG_1234.HEIC keeps its short IMG_1234.MOV video and any .AAE edits file.
• Camera naming rules. Some cameras give companions different names, and Media Organizer knows them:

Camera	Main file	Kept with it
GoPro HERO5 and later	GX010042.MP4	GL010042.LRV (preview), GX010042.THM (thumbnail)
GoPro HERO4 and earlier	GOPR0891.MP4	GOPR0891.LRV, GOPR0891.THM
GoPro MAX	GS010236.360	.LRV preview and .THM thumbnail
DJI drones, Osmo Action and Pocket	DJI_0001.MP4	DJI_0001.LRF (preview), DJI_0001.SRT (flight log)
Insta360 X series and ONE X2	VID_…_00_001.insv	the second lens file VID_…_10_001.insv on cameras that record one, and the LRV_… preview
Sony	C0001.MP4	C0001M01.XML (clip information)
Nikon Z 8 and Z 9 RAW video	DSC_0001.NEV or ProRes RAW .MOV	the DSC_0001.MP4 preview, when it sits next to its main file

Scans pick up these companions even when they are an unusual file type, as long as they sit next to the file they belong to. A preview or log the camera rules recognise by its name, such as a lone DJI_0001.LRF, is kept even when its video is gone, and shown as main file missing. A preview that is itself a video named exactly like its main file, such as a Nikon DSC_0001.MP4, is only a preview while the .NEV is next to it; on its own it is simply a video.

In the library

Companions are not listed as rows of their own: each recording has one row, with small icons for its preview, thumbnail and logs. See Browse your recordings.

What it will not do

• It never looks across folders. A preview in another folder is not linked to the video.
• It never joins two separate recordings. CLIP.MP4 and CLIP.MOV are two videos, not a video and its companion. RAW with JPEG and Live Photos are the only exceptions, because the camera made them together.
• It relies on names. If you rename a video but not its companions, they no longer match. Rename all of them the same way, or not at all.

Tip: if you have gathered sidecars from old folders, move them next to their original, with the original's name. The next scan links them.

Choosing which companions to keep

Open Settings, choose Camera settings and, under Files copied with each recording, click Change…. Each camera maker has a list of the kinds of file its cameras write, and Any camera covers the rules that apply to every camera. Every kind is kept until you switch it off.

Switch off a kind you never use, such as thumbnails. Media Organizer asks first, then takes those files out of your library. They stay on your drives, but they are no longer copied off camera cards and no longer needed for a copy to count, so they are lost when you format a card that holds them. Switch the kind back on and the next scan finds them again.

Exports are something else

An export is a new file made from your recording, for example an MP4 that Insta360 Studio renders from an .insv, or a conversion Media Organizer made for you. It usually sits in another folder or on another drive, so it is never a companion.

Many people keep an export as their copy of a clip they will never edit again. Media Organizer supports that, with your say-so:

1. It suggests pairs: its own conversions, exports whose names the camera's rules recognise, and exports you renamed that start within two seconds of a recording and are no longer than it (with Insta360, the clip number at the end of both names must agree). An export that fits more than one recording is not suggested.
2. When an export has its recording's name and starts and lasts the same, Media Organizer confirms the pair itself: you do not have to look at it.
3. The other pairs wait for you: the library report (Library > Library report…) says how many, and its Exports to confirm button opens them, each shown side by side with the recording: both thumbnails, the part of the names that differs marked, and the start times, lengths and clip numbers with how far apart they are. Play either file from there if you want to be sure, then confirm or reject. Tick Show confirmed and rejected to see the pairs confirmed automatically, too; reject any of them and it is never suggested again.
4. You choose whether exports count as a copy for that camera family. This is off until you turn it on.

A confirmed export then counts as a copy of the original on the drive that holds it. It needs none of the original's companions: an export has no preview or thumbnail of its own to carry.

Confirming a pair changes nothing about either file. An export you never confirm is simply a video of its own.