LICENSING CONTRACTS + WHAT ARTWORKS CAN WE SHOW ON VUCAVU?

VUCAVU does not have direct contracts with individual artists but will coordinate licencing for any artworks in our existing content providers’ catalogues (whether already on the platform or not).

Festivals and Programming Partners are responsible for making all licencing arrangements directly with the appropriate rights holder (either a distributor or the artist) for any works they would like to exhibit on VUCAVU.com that are not already on VUCAVU or within our existing content providers' broader collections. 


Works from our distribution/content partner’s collections are not up on VUCAVU but we think they are in one of your partners’ broader collections?

Many of our 8+ distribution/content partners have not yet put all the film and video works in their collections on VUCAVU. If you are looking to program works on a certain theme, we can send the word out to all our partners.


The works we want to show are not on VUCAVU and/or distributed by any or your partners, can we do that?  - Yes we can!

We are happy to temporarily host/stream content on our platform that is not in the collections of our existing content partners and/or is not distributed. In these cases of 3rd party works, we ask that your organization makes the licensing arrangements with the relevant distributors/artists/rights holders in order to gain permission from them to show their work on VUCAVU for a specified amount of time.


Take a look past programming partnerships presented on VUCAVU here:
CURATED PROGRAM ARCHIVE

PAYING ARTISTS

Central to VUCAVU’s mandate is the payment of artists. We are a publicly funded nonprofit and we require that all Canadian artists whose works are presented by festivals or programming partners to be paid a screening fee based on at least the minimum IMAA/AAMI or CARFAC-RAAV fee scheduled rates.

For example, a FREE streaming shorts program on VUCAVU, we recommend that each work under 15 mins. receive a minimum rate of 150 $ for a 1-week FREE streaming period. 

Longer shorts and features should receive more. We are happy to discuss this with you and offer guidance. We know there is no set fee schedule established yet but we recommend that artists are paid fairly and that if the partner can pay more than our suggested amount, they definitely should.

For international works, we leave it up to the festival or presentation partners to make licencing agreements with the respective rights holders.

HOW DO AUDIENCES WATCH ON VUCAVU?

In order for anyone to watch the works, they will have to sign up for one of our user accounts (Free, Rental or Professional).
Each account has different user permissions.

All audience members will need a user ID and password to stream videos on VUCAVU. 

They can sign up for a “Free” account on VUCAVU with their name and email or for a "Rental" account with a name, email + credit information.

If your program requires a fee/ticket, they can sign up for a “Rental” account and add their credit card info using our secure third-party payment gateway.

MORE ABOUT USER ACCOUNTS HERE.

PRICES / TICKETING

Festivals set the prices for their own programs. For paid programs, we remit 95% of rental fees back to you. We keep a 5% holdback to help cover our payment processing fees. Audience members must sign up for a “Rental” account on VUCAVU to view any paid programs. 

Even if a program is free to stream, public audience members will still need to have a Free or Rental VUCAVU account to view. 

We are unable to accommodate external ticketing systems.

All-Festival/Comps Passes
If you want to sell All-Festival tickets on your own or have comp passes for industry members, VUCAVU can create temporary Curator Accounts for them that they can use for the duration of the festival. The day after the festival is finished, we will convert their accounts to FREE VUCAVU accounts.

PRIVATE PAGES - ***NEW!

VUCAVU has built a new feature where we can make a single work or a collection of works that are only privately viewable.

These pages can NOT be seen on VUCAVU as they are hidden from the public and can only be accesse with a special username + password we provide to you. Private pages are built like a curated program page, so you can add a curatorial text, images and embedded video links in the page if you wish.

Your organization will receive a single username + password that can be used by your entire audience.

The user goes to VUCAVU, logs onto the platform with the login credentials , goes to the link we provided and they can stream the works for the duration of the predetermined free viewing time.

GEOBLOCKING

We are currently able to geoblock individual works and restrict viewing to the following regions: 

  • Canada
  • USA
  • International 

We are working on being able to geo-block by province but this is not currently available. Please contact us if this is something you would like to do.

LIVE STREAMING + VIDEO EMBEDS 

We can embed FREE live streamed video feeds + videos into your program page. The livestream or pre-recorded video can be embedded in a widget anywhere on your program page.

In most cases, programming partners are responsible for producing and coordinating live video feeds or promotional trailer videos and sending the relevant URL's to us for embedding onto your page. We also need your the permission to embed it on our platform.

If the embedded video needs to be removed from the archived program, please let us know the dates.

To facilitate live streaming, we suggest learning about OBS software and can share more resources to help you (SEE BELOW).

Examples:

TECHNICAL INFO: HOW THE PLATFORM IS BUILT

 

1) Basic Page Types (Title / Program / Series)

The diagram below shows the different page types on our site and how they are connected to each other on our platform. 

2) Title Pages (aka Video Title Details Page)

These types of pages are build for any video added to VUCAVU’s catalogue either temporarily or permanently.
(***Does not apply to live streamed or embedded content)

We will give you the parameters required.
 

Short or Feature Length works: 
In our regular shared catalogue, we suggest creating individual video title details pages for each video you want to add to your program. Each film has a bilingual title page. 

We will provide you with a Google Form to fill out that lists all the relevant information we need in order to upload it to the platform.


Trailers, clips or film stills:
You can add trailers, clips or stills to each title page if you want. These are added separately from the full length video file and can be viewed publicly by anyone with or without registering for a VUCAVU account. 

We find it helps encourage viewership and gives incentive to a potential viewer to create a VUCAVU account.

This is especially true if your program is a paid one. This promotional content becomes a call to action that encourages people to watch your program.

Pre-Sequenced Shorts programs:
For some shorts programs, some partners may want to pre-sequence the films into a single video file that is then uploaded to the platform. This preserves their curatorial vision/program and encourages the viewer to watch all the works in a selection.

The user can still use the play bar on the video window to forward or rewind the video if they wish.

In these instances, VUCAVU will create a single video title details page for each pre-sequenced program of shorts.

We recommend posting a list of all the timestamps to be listed on your curated program page so the audience knows what they are watching and how to find each work in the sequenced video. Click here to see an example
 



Closed Captions:
You can add .srt files to any video which can be clicked on or off by the user when they are watching.

Here is an article about doing CC through VIMEO, the first video is very informative and concise: Captions and subtitles – Vimeo Help Center

3) Curated Program Pages

  • Each curated program has its own bilingual page. Partners are responsible for providing us with the translation of their texts. We can provide you with translator contacts if you need one.
  • A program page normally includes an introductory, curatorial and/or explanatory text that explains the selection or provides information about the works included.  
  • Each video title page is added into the program page individually. There is not limit to how many videos you can have in a single curated program page.




Curated Series Landing Page: 
If you are planning a series of multiple programs over a period of time, we can create a landing page for your programs where your audience can find all the programs in your series.

See examples of a Series Landing Page:

 

4) Homepage Ad Widgets

  • We will insert information about your programming on our home page with our Homepage Ad Widgets.
  • Image sizes are 580 x 300px (72 dpi)
  • We will link to your program in the signed-in header on scrollbar at the top of our homepage. We can add up to 5 programs or title page links in this top scroll window. 
  •  
  • You can also have an image on the left/right of the widget window with text on the opposite side.
  • You can have 2 images side by side that are hyperlinked to your program pages

5) Social Media

VUCAVU will work with your communications team to share and/or create social media posts about any programming hosted on our platform. 

General image specs (at 72 dpi) :

  • Facebook: 1200 × 628px
  • Twitter: 1024 × 1024px
  • Instagram: 1080 × 1080px
  • Instagram Stories: 1080 x 1920 px (with an aspect ratio between 1.91:1 and 4:5)
General video specs (at 72 dpi):

Facebook (highest resolution video that meets available file size)
  • Minimum width: 120 pixels
  • Supported aspect ratio: 16:9 (horizontal) to 9:16 (portrait)
  • .mp4 and .mov
  • Up to 240 min. long
  • Up to 4GB
  • Max. frame rate of 30fps
Twitter (highest resolution under the file size limit of 1GB)
  • Minimum width: 600 pixels for square video, 640 px for other
  • Supported aspect ratios: between 1:1 and 2:1
  • .mp4 or .mov
Instagram
  • Up to 4GB
  • 120 seconds
  • .mp4 or .mov 


6) OBS for Livestreaming Artist Talks + Panels

OBS is an internet feed mixing software. Whatever live feeds you have, say via Zoom meetings, live intros, their film sequence, etc., would feed into OBS, which would then be streamed by Twitch (or FB Live, VIMEO live, etc.). The URL links created by these applications are what we would embed into VUCAVU so that the live stream can be viewed within your program pages on our platform. 

For more info, check out: New Normal Webinar: Intro to Broadcasting with Aaron Zeghers of Gimli Film Festival (May 28, 2020)