Your media library from Google Drive

Link a Google Drive folder with your own clips, photos of you, logos and graphics. Garren keeps it in sync, tags every file by what it shows, and uses the files in your videos where they fit what you say.

Two kinds of library

For all your videos: one folder for your whole account. Link it on the Library page.
Per style: a folder that belongs to one style. Editing for several clients? Give each client's style its own folder in the Style Lab under B-roll, in This style's Google Drive folder.

A video uses the account's folder and the folder of its style. Each library can hold up to 5 folders. Clips you add to one video on the New video page still work as before.

Link a folder

In Google Drive, share the folder with Anyone with the link (Viewer is enough).
Copy the folder's link and paste it into Paste a Google Drive folder link.
Click Link folder.

Garren brings the files in and looks at each one. Subfolders count too, up to four levels deep, so you can keep b-roll, me and logos apart.

Garren uses videos (MP4, MOV, M4V, MKV, WebM) and pictures (JPG, PNG, WebP). Other files in the folder are left out, and so are files over 4 GB. A library uses the first 500 files of a folder. From a long clip, Garren uses the first 2 minutes. Files it can't use are listed with the reason ("This file is over 4 GB", or a download that failed and is tried again at the next check).

The folder has to be shared by link: if Garren can't open it, it says so, and you can change the sharing in Drive and link it again.

Keeping it in sync

Garren checks your folder:

before every video that uses it,
every 6 hours,
when you click Check now.

New files are added (up to 40 during the check before a video; the rest come in with the next check), changed files are brought in again, and files you deleted or moved out of the folder stop being used. Files that didn't change aren't downloaded again. The library shows when it was last checked and how many files it has.

How videos use it

Your Drive library counts as your own b-roll. It's used when b-roll comes from Your own or Both, set in the style or for one video on the New video page under This video › B-roll. When you link a folder while your style's b-roll is set to None, its videos use your own clips; set to Garren library, they use both. To leave your library out of one video, choose Garren library or None for it on the New video page.

Garren picks files by their tags and what you say at that moment, and looks at every pick before it goes in:

It has to show what you're saying and look good on screen. When a file doesn't, Garren tries another file from your library, and otherwise you stay on screen.
Clips play for at least 2.5 seconds, trimmed to a stretch without a cut.
Photos stay up to 5 seconds with a slow zoom or pan. A photo of you fits where you talk about yourself or your work.
Logos, graphics and screenshots show whole on a card, never cropped.
A photo, logo or graphic is used once per video, a clip at most twice.

In the review room you can also ask for b-roll in the chat, for example "show my laptop clip when I talk about writing hooks". Garren looks in your library too.

Privacy and storage

Your library is only ever used in your own videos and never shown to anyone else. Linking a folder and keeping it in sync uses no credits.

Garren keeps a copy of each file while the folder is linked, like your other originals. Unlinking a folder deletes those copies and their tags; videos already made keep what they used. Your Drive folder is never changed. See How long files are kept.

Still stuck?

Write to us and we'll help you sort it out.