The Miller, which makes big videos and photos small

What the Miller does#

Tenants ground their grain at the lord's mill, and the miller took a toll. The Miller grinds big videos and photos into small ones.

• The hopper. Drop screen recordings, phone clips and photos into Mill\Hopper, in your user folder. The Miller looks every minute, and grinds what's there, one file at a time.
• The flour. Smaller copies go to Mill\Flour, under the original's name. A name already taken gets " (2)".
• Your originals are never touched on its own. Each kept copy has Move original to the Recycle Bin, which asks first.
• The toll. Its page adds up what every kept copy saved.

It holds its office on an everyday PC. On a gamer's PC, the Chronicler holds it, keeping your game clips, and the Miller works behind it.

The Miller comes with the Household license.

What it makes#

• Videos become MP4, in the most efficient format this PC can make (HEVC where it can). A copy keeps the original's dates and tags (when it was taken, the camera, the place), every sound track, and its timing.
• Photos become JPEG: HEIC photos from a phone, and JPEG and PNG photos bigger than 4K (3840 pixels on the long edge) or 8 MB and over. A copy is turned upright, at good quality, and keeps the date it was taken.

A copy is kept only when it's really better#

Every check must pass, or the copy is thrown away and the file is listed as refused, with why:

What it leaves as it is#

Listed under Left as they are, with why:

• Videos under 10 MB.
• HDR videos: a copy would lose the HDR look.
• Photos already within 4K and under 8 MB.
• PNGs with see-through parts: a JPEG can't keep them.
• Photos holding several pictures.
• HEIC photos, when Windows can't read them: it needs two extensions from the Microsoft Store, which the page names.
• Files still being copied in: a file is ready once its size has stayed the same for 30 seconds. Partial downloads are never taken.

Names for your videos#

For each kept video, the local AI looks at one frame from the middle, and the Miller suggests a name, such as 2026-10-01 screen recording - code editor with terminal.mp4. The date and the kind (screen recording, phone video) come from the file; the words from the AI.

The suggestion says where it was written ("note from the NPU, unverified", say). Use this name renames the copy, never the original, and only when you press it. Without the local AI, copies are still made and kept, with no names suggested. See Set up the local AI.

Its page#

The Miller's page is at http://miller.localhost:19292/, and Open on its card in Castellan goes there. It shows the toll, the file being ground and how far along it is, the hopper's queue, the copies made, and what was refused or left alone. See Grind a video or photo.

Its settings#

What it can't do#

• Only the hopper's top level is looked at, not folders inside it.
• One file at a time: a long video holds up the next.
• Subtitles and chapters aren't carried into the copy.
• A photo's camera and GPS details aren't carried into the JPEG; its date is.
• A HEIC photo is already small, so its JPEG is often bigger, and is refused. That's the rule working: the Miller only keeps copies that save space.