Yet Another Local Media Assets Not Working Thread (Movies, 2020)

[Thearniec]

Server Version#: 4.30.2
Player Version#: 1.12.1.1253-c29aa096

I’ve been working on this problem for 2 weeks trying every Reddit thread, Google hit, and knowledge base and I’m still stumped.

I have Plex running on a Windows 10 Professional PC. I watch movies on it on the Windows 10 client app as well as Apple TV, LG TV App, iPhone app, iPad app and Kindle Fire

I have my movies organized in a folder

/Movies/

In the root of Movies I have a handful of movies with no extras.

But there are at least 100 movies that I have in properly named folders. And none of them are showing me my local Special Features/Trailers, etc.

For example, I just ripped Escape from LA (Personally owned copy, no piracy here). So I have it in

/Movies/Escape from LA (1996)/

In there I have two copies of the movie at different qualities. But I took the bonus features and, following the instructions at:

Local Files for Trailers and Extras | Plex Support

I created a subfolder

/Movies/Escape from LA (1996)/Featurettes

And in Featurettes I have a number of individual files with making-of videos, etc.

And in some cases I have

…/Trailers/ …/Behind the Scenes/ …/Deleted/

I have followed the Plex Knowledgebase instructions that under settings, agents, Local Media Assets is checked and moved to the top of the list.

And NONE of the features are showing up.

This used to work just fine for me. For several years this has worked. But now, even on movies where the features used to appear, they no longer do.

In the case of Escape from LA, when I first added them to the library each Featurette showed up as its own movie in my library. Then I did a rescan and they just disappeared, they’re not in the root of my Plex library nor are they available as bonus content under the movie itself.

And I validated, Under Settings, My server, Agents, Movies the option “Local Media Assets (Movies)” is checked and the first item in the list.

I’ve read so many threads about this dating back to 2015…anyone have recent fixes for this?

[alexandre]

Are you sure you enabled “Local Media Assets" on the agent you use in your library because it works on my server.

[Thearniec]

I am 100% sure.

[alexandre]

U should enable Local Media asset onthe agent u use to scan your movies folder, are you sure you don’t use Plex Movie or The Movie Database?

[Thearniec]

Yeah, that’s what mine has. But I have Collections on…

[nydave69]

Your using Plex Movie as the agent…

How do you have that one set up?

[BigWheel]

if you are using Plex Movie as your libraries agent then you need to makes sure it is enabled under Plex Movie not Personal Media.

[Thearniec]

Ok, maybe this will help with diagnosing?

I did check. Under Plex Movie I do have Local Media Assets enabled:

But I found that features are working on SOME of my movies but not others (I thought this to be the case but couldn’t find a sample until last night).

If we look at the movie “Color of Night” I have two versions in my library, the Theatrical cut and the Director’s Cut. Both have different special features as the Theatrical cut had the Writer’s commentary and the Director’s Cut had director’s commentary and some other items.

The Theatrical Cut shows extras (pasted as two images since I can’t get it all to fit on my screen at once)

Also of note, this looks identical on my server and on my Windows 10 client (on a separate machine, of course)

Then the Theatrical cut is not showing my features on the client:

On the server it’s showing some weird category that looks like both different movies and maybe some bonus features from OTHER movies??:

Yet my directory structure is identical for these two films:

Maybe this helps indicate a way to drill down and diagnose what’s going on?

[JuiceWSA]

Remove ALL Versions and anything associated with any of these movies from the library - to a ‘Hiding Place’.
Scan Library
Empty Trash
Clean Bundles

You’re not going to like this, but I’m afraid you have no choice. <— As far as I know.

Prepare the first Movie Version with ALL the extras and the movie in the folder (extra folders - I used inline - let’s assume it won’t matter - for now) and put that movie structure in first.

Put ALL the extras in the initial - ‘first version’ folder.
You can’t have two, or more versions with different extras.

When it’s all indexed and the gears stop turning… check to see you have the extras, of course, before continuing.

Add the other Version(s) - in their own unique folders - one at a time.
(NOT in the same folder with the extras)
Check after every version addition if you still have extras - this very well could fall apart on #3. That is uncharted territory - as far as I am concerned.

Split or Merge after that and it should stay healthy.
(do keep an eye on it)

I have left these ‘Merged’ - as they became when the second one showed up:

Split or Merged - they both (or all, we hope) will now show the extras - providing you follow the steps above.

If you don’t - the next time Plex does maintenance, it’s over and your extras have flown the coop. Yes, it took me a while to figure it out.

… and do yourself a BIG favor.
Move Local Media Assets to the bottom of the stack of active agents under every tab you’ve got in Shows and Movies.

You don’t want LMA in the top slot - ever - and you sure as hell don’t want it in the top slot with those MP4 files you have. Plex will prefer the embedded titles, not your file names (which are awful, BTW) - and this thing is over before it started.

The Big Sleep (1946) [Pre-Release]/
.......The Big Sleep (1946) [Pre-Release].mp4

The Big Sleep (1946) [Theatrical 1080p x265]/
....The Big Sleep (1946) [Theatrical 1080p x265].mkv

Note:
Plex ignores everything in [Brackets].

Note 2:
I have this working fine with 2 Versions.
(and I can’t tell you that’s not a work-around in itself)
Not sure what’s gonna happen with 10.
I guess we’ll find out…lol

In the event you can’t live with all the extras in the same pile…

You can make a fake TV Show for Each Version and have the Movie as S01E01 make the ‘Extras’ S01E02, and so on - until you run out.

That’s your ‘Second Option’ - and it’s way out there, Man, but you never know…

A Possible Third Option is to rename your extras, so they indicate which version they fit. PITA? Yes, I know.

Extras aren’t that tough in the current Plexiverse, but unless something has changed very recently, there is but one way through this verision minefield… one wrong step and… you need one less shoe.

[Thearniec]

Juice,

Thanks for the ideas. And I see your point about extras in multiple versions of the movie, but that’s really not indicative of my overall situation. It was an example I had of something I just uploaded to Plex that day.

My primary subject is Escape from LA. I only have one version of this movie (although in 3 different qualities). I have bonus features in the Featurettes folder as shown:

But when I go to see the movie even on the server itself, no features are listed.

And this is happening with a LOT of my movies. I am using Escape from LA as an example. But, as Color of Night showed, it’s not happening to ALL my movies, which is where I’m really confused.

[OttoKerner]

@Thearniec

I only have one version of this movie (although in 3 different qualities).

“Qualities” or “versions” are really the same here.
@JuiceWSA is right with his recommendation.

[Thearniec]

When I mean qualities, I thought the Plex docs say if I append - to a filename then Plex knows it’s the same movie. Whereas before because it was a director’s cut it had to be treated as a totally different movie.

I thought I was following the procedures as described in:
https://support.plex.tv/articles/200381043-multi-version-movies/#:~:text=You%20can%20gather%20multiple%20versions,single%20item%20in%20the%20library.

where if you have two versions of the same movie they say

To merge the files, name them:

• MovieName (Release Year) - ArbitraryText.ext

Where ext is the file extension. (Some operating systems such as Windows may hide your file extensions by default.) ArbitraryText can be any text useful to you to identify the media from outside Plex. Plex will show you the actual resolution of the media if the app you’re using shows you a list or use the best file for a mobile app. The text you have there is not displayed.

/Movies
   /Pulp Fiction (1994)
      Pulp Fiction (1994) - 1080p.mkv
      Pulp Fiction (1994) - SD.m4v

But for different cuts of the movie they say

Note : This feature is not intended for situations where you might have, for instance, both a “theatrical” and “director’s cut” version of a movie. Likewise, it is not appropriate for 2D vs 3D versions. Those situations are best handled by Splitting the movie into separate library items.

(also I was told my filenames are awful…how can I improve them? I thought I was following the format shown in that Plex article I linked to above)

In the case of Escape from LA it’s 2 qualities of the same movie.

But I tried what Juice said. I removed Escape from LA from the library. Scanned. Emptied Trash. Cleaned Bundles. Put Escape from LA back in with ONLY 1 version. So here’s the files:

It shows up in plex as the most recently added movie, but still no bonus features.

[JuiceWSA]

You have to build the multiple version bundle one movie at a time.

This seems different.
Escape from L.A. (1996) [Passthrough].mp4
is a better file name.

Do this:

Video File Naming

With LMA in priority, Embedded Titles within MP4/M4V files are preferred - even over a perfect file name. Local Media Assets should - AT ALL TIMES - remain enabled (unless specifically instructed to turn it off). Local Media Assets should be ‘Demoted’, to the bottom of the stack of active agents under ALL tabs in Shows and Movies, but should NOT be disabled. Local Media Assets is needed for many things - it doesn’t need to be given Tip-Top-Priority (as Plex has so hatefully placed it as it’s …

(in case some embedded metadata is screwing us)

and change to ‘inline’ extras - if it doesn’t work after the next Plex Dance… 'cause that’s what I use.

You have to remove this Escape from L.A. and any others.
Scan library
Empty Trash
Clean Bundles

You have to build the bundle from the ground up for multiple versions (qualities - same thing), but first you need to get some extras working.

Seems like you have more going on than we thought.

Show me some Escape from L.A. extras and then you can try a multiple version (quality - same thing) extravaganza.

[Thearniec]

Firstly Thank You for continuing to help me troubleshoot this! Your detailed replies are appreciated. I wanted you to know that I don’t take your time helping me for granted.

Now, I did as you said. Changed the agent order across the board. Removed Escape from LA, update libraries, empty trash, clean bundles, brought it back (renamed as you suggested) and I got what I got the very first time I moved this into plex…it treated every extra in the featurettes folder as its own movie, and tried to even match some of them based on title to movies in their database (as shown with that far left image)

That’s the result when the file folder looked like

As that’s what happened when I first put this in, I went and ran a library update. That removed all those erroneous files leaving me with

And Escape from L.A. STILL had no bonus features in it.

So I went and tried the inline extras. (Now I don’t like inline extras because, as described in the docs, it means I can only have one version of the movie. Plus, to me, it’s an ugly way to store media. You said my file names were ugly, I’m an old horse from the 8.3 naming convention days, so I like the thought of having Trailers in their folder, Features in their folder. It’s madness, in my mind, to do it all in one folder)

So here is my new folder/file names:

And I have THREE features now. Not all of them, but three.

Having only some of them is even more confusing to me than having none of them. (And I ran a library update just in case it needed to “see” the other files, but this is what it gave me)

[JuiceWSA]

Now that, is odd.

Trailer(s) is under the Film Reel - and I really don’t know if they’ll all be there, or what. That’s very confusing - by design - so we don’t know what’s going on there ATM.

You should have as many ‘Extras’ showing as you have things that aren’t trailers. Your naming looks good, but the folder and the movie should be the exact same name, including the [Bracket] - for complete OCD satisfaction.

Show me the file path all the way back to the root. Indicate your Movie Library Folder in that path.

Server/Settings/General:
Enable Debug Logging
Disable Verbose logging.

Plex Dance L.A. again (never gets old, does it?) - wait 5 minutes and gather a set of logs (Server/Settings/Troubleshooting - Download Logs - in your System Downloads folder) - drop the zip on a message - unless it starts working for some reason - and in that case… make sure it keeps working.

Note:
The Plex Dance ONLY works if you do all the steps - in order:

The Plex Dance ™

The purpose of this is to remove all cached metadata and xml data for an item that Plex usually keeps. This helps when you want to “start from scratch” for particular item move all files for the media item out of the directory your Library is looking at, so Plex will not “see” it anymore scan the library library (to detect changes) empty trash clean bundles (in menu next to server name, when accessed under ‘More’) double check naming schema and move files back scan the library Support articl…

Can’t skip any.
It just won’t work otherwise.

[Thearniec]

@JuiceWSA

Show me the file path all the way back to the root. Indicate your Movie Library Folder in that path.

My files are on my D drive attached via USB to the computer.

So the movies are in

D:\Holocron\Videos\Movies

Under Videos is one folder for each library I have in Plex. So Movies is the folder for the entire library.

In \Movies I have hundreds of folders and files. I have some movies as files in the root (I’m working on cleaning this up). Those are movies that have no bonus features, etc. I just want them to play.

But I have a large number of folders in there too that are all (Year)

Plex is in the Windows 10 Default installation folder - c:\Program Files (x86)\Plex

(let me know if that doesn’t answer your question).

And I did the Plex Dance with every step so far as I know, I’d never heard of it until this conversation but I always did all the steps there.

So after doing the latest Plex dance with the debugging logging enabled I still have the same 3 features that I had before.

I’m not seeing a way to attach files to a post here, so I put the ZIP on my web server. You can download it at http://cilff.com/Plex%20Media%20Server%20Logs_2020-06-16_18-57-36.zip

[JuiceWSA]

You drop the zip file on a message - done.

Typically, to see the file path back to the root - you ‘Get Info’ (under the dots) on the preplay screen and copy the file path:

Typically you aren’t looking at a merged item when you do, but I would like to see Get Info on yours.

@OttoKerner ?
See anything out of the ordinary?

[anon18523487]

Do you have “Run a partial scan when changes are detected” enabled? That will interfere with including extras located in folders.

Turn that off and do the Dance again.

[JuiceWSA]

Didn’t know that one…

You know, it was you - 100 years ago - that told me the 1st Movie has to have the extras. You also told me it might not work, then you disappeared…lol

Yea, it works - if you do it ‘just right’…

[anon18523487]

I can’t remember 100 years back. Hence, I can’t remember 100 hours back sometimes.

The automatic update feature only looks at changes. So if you have extras in a folder and you Plex Dance the movie, it doesn’t pick up the extras since those didn’t change. If you dance the extras, it doesn’t see the original movie so it doesn’t know these are extras. Even adding them all at once doesn’t work since it will treat each folder separately.