Video in a gallery

Galleries take video as well as photographs. The film plays on the gallery page above the photographs, with a still from it as the poster frame.

Add a film

1. Open the gallery from Galleries → Galleries.
2. In the Films panel, press Add video and choose the file.
3. Wait while it uploads. The panel shows how far it has got, then Queued,

Processing and finally Ready. You can leave the page while it is being prepared.

Films can be MP4, MOV, M4V or WebM, usually up to 2 GB each — the Films panel shows the limit. A gallery with only a film in it can still be delivered.

If the gallery has sections, a menu beside each film lets you put it in one. That matters for [sections only the couple see](/gallery-private-sections): a film in such a section is hidden from guests too.

To remove a film, press Delete beside it.

Most films are not converted at all

A file a browser can already play is left exactly as it is and played as you uploaded it. No quality loss, and it is ready far sooner.

A file plays as it is when all of this is true:

That covers almost every export from Premiere, Resolve and Final Cut.

When it is converted

ProRes straight off a camera, HEVC (H.265), a sound track a browser will not take, or a bit rate high enough to stall a phone on hotel wifi. Those are converted to a 1080p copy for playing, and the copy counts towards your storage as well.

25 Mbit/s is a deliberately generous ceiling. A wedding film at 20 Mbit/s is perfectly fine on a laptop, and converting it would be a real quality loss for a problem most clients do not have.

If something goes wrong, the Films panel says Failed with the reason in plain words, and a Retry button.

Watching it

Clients can skip to any point in the film, even a long one, without waiting for the whole file to load.

Downloads and storage

Clients can download the film when downloads are allowed on the gallery, like any other file. Each film counts as one download towards a download limit.

Video is the largest thing you will store, so it counts most towards your storage allowance. Worth knowing on the free plan, where one long wedding film can fill it on its own.

When the camera originals are removed, 30 days after delivery, a film that was converted keeps its playable copy, so an old gallery still plays even once the master has gone. A film that was already in a format every browser plays has no separate copy, so it is kept whole. Keep your own copy of any master you want to keep.