Submissions are the staging point for your festival. They represent the data your creators entered into a submission platform like FilmFreeway and enable you to transition that data for the programming of your festival. Most directors export submissions from FilmFreeway as a CSV file and then import them here. However, you can create submissions one-by-one or import your own spreadsheet. No matter what, you need to create submissions before you can start programming your festival.
Once your submissions are in the system, you "promote" them to selections that can be maniuplated by creators and programmed by festival staff. Only "selected" submissions may be promoted.
Submission categories help you transition from the way you accept submissions on platforms like FilmFreeway to the way you structure your selections for programming. Each category determines what kind of assets we need from a creator as well as what other requirements you have of creators. You can map any number of FilmFreeway categories to a single submission category.
Import mappings enable you to define custom mappings between the fields in the spreadsheets you use to manage your submissions and the fields in SparqFest. YOU DO NOT NEED TO DO ANYTHING HERE IF YOU ARE SIMPLY USING FILMFREEWAY "AS-IS". We automatically support the ability to take the standard CSV export from FilmFreeway without the need for you to create your own mapping. If, however, you are using another submissions platform or you have your submission data in a spreadsheet outside of FilmFreeway, you can create a mapping here that maps the fields in your spreadsheet to the fields in SparqFest.
Audience choice awards represent categories in which your audience--both online and in-person--vote for the winners. A festival may have a single audience choice category covering all selections, or many categories covering all kinds of options. Your audience will have an online form where they can vote for their favorites based on eligibility requirements that you define.
- This category has completed voting and the winner has been approved.
- A winner for this category cannot be determined at this time. You may need to manually select a winner if the deadline has passed.
- This category has not completed configuration and is not currently ready for voting.
- The category has completed voting and is awaiting approval.
Jury awards are awards voted on by a select panel of experts whom we refer to as "judges". Each award has its own set of judges, but an individual judge can also judge multiple awards. The rules you define for a category govern how winners are determined.
- This category has completed voting and the winner has been approved.
- A winner for this category cannot be determined at this time. You may need to manually select a winner if the deadline has passed.
- This category has not completed configuration and is not currently ready for voting.
- The category has completed voting and is awaiting approval.
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Selections are the works you include in your festival. Each selection is minimally showcased with a web page that provides information about the work. You may additionally include the work in a screening block for online viewing or in an in-person event for viewing in a theater.
- The selection is ready for inclusion in the festival.
- The selection is ready to appear on the web site, but some items necessary for viewing the selection (either online or in-person) may be missing.
- The selection cannot appear online because one or more critical items for showcasing the selection online are missing.
- The selection is ready for inclusion in the festival, but it may be lacking some of the required information you requested OR the selection may not be available to all viewers due to geo-blocking or the permissions granted by the filmmaker.
The video assets you upload here may be downloaded by festival staff, but not by regular viewers. They serve the needs for both online screening blocks as well as in-person screening blocks.
Geographic Restrictions
The SparqFest Platform enables you to define rules for blocking content access at both the screening block and individual film levels. How this plays out for the viewer depends on whether you actually let the creator define film-level geo-fencing rules, whether you allow on-demand access, and where the viewer is located. If a viewer comes from a location blocked by a screening block rule but not by a film rule, then they cannot watch the film in a screening block but they may be able to still watch it on-demand. Similarly, if it is blocked at the film level, but not at the screening block level, the player will skip the film when the viewer is watching a screening block.
Virtual screenings are the primary tool for organizing the online viewing of your official selections. Each virtual screening you create contains one or more selections that may be viewed online. You may require viewers to watch the entire screening in order, or to allow them to watch individual selections "on-demand".
To arrange in-person screenings, go to the "In-Person" section of the SparqFest "Programming" module.
Note: In order to reduce confusion, we are currently migrating away from the term "screening block" to use the terms "virtual screening" and "in-person screening". Where we used to use the term "screening block", we generally mean "virtual screening".
- This virtual screening is ready for the festival.
- This virtual screening is ready for the web site, but there are one or more issues to address before the festival starts.
- The virtual screening cannot yet appear on the web site due to one or more issues with either the virtual or one or more of its selections.
- All requirements have been met for the festival, but some issues may prevent an ideal audience experience.
Geographic Restrictions
The SparqFest Platform enables you to define rules for blocking content access at both the screening block and individual film levels. How this plays out for the viewer depends on whether you actually let the creator define film-level geo-fencing rules, whether you allow on-demand access, and where the viewer is located. If a viewer comes from a location blocked by a screening block rule but not by a film rule, then they cannot watch the film in a screening block but they may be able to still watch it on-demand. Similarly, if it is blocked at the film level, but not at the screening block level, the player will skip the film when the viewer is watching a screening block.
Live streams are a tool for creating an interactive online experience during your film festival. SparqFest integrates with most live stream tools, both on the production side as well as on the broadcast side. Whatever tools you are using, SparqFest creates a single page your viewers can visit to learn about the live stream and then join it once it is live.
- This live stream is ready to go live.
- The live stream is ready to be promoted on the web site, but the infrastructure has not been provisioned or other issues will prevent you from going live.
- The live stream cannot yet be promoted on the web site due two one or more missing items.
- All requirements have been met to go live, but some issues may prevent an ideal audience experience dueing the live stream.
Geographic Restrictions
The SparqFest Platform enables you to define rules for blocking content access at both the screening block and individual film levels. How this plays out for the viewer depends on whether you actually let the creator define film-level geo-fencing rules, whether you allow on-demand access, and where the viewer is located. If a viewer comes from a location blocked by a screening block rule but not by a film rule, then they cannot watch the film in a screening block but they may be able to still watch it on-demand. Similarly, if it is blocked at the film level, but not at the screening block level, the player will skip the film when the viewer is watching a screening block.
In-person events encompass any event that takes place at a physical venue. Before you create any in-person events, you will first need to set up the venue for that event. SparqFest includes a Google Map and directions to the venue on the event page. For screenings, you can configure the selections in that event in the same way you build online screening blocks. Viewers will be able to see the program and visit individual selection pages, but they will not be able to view those selections online unless the selection also happens to be in a screening block.
- This event is ready for the festival.
- This event is ready to be promoted on the web site, but there are one or more issues that should be addressed before the festival starts.
- This event cannot yet be promoted on the web site due to one or more missing items.
- All requirements have been met for the festival, but some issues may prevent an ideal audience experience.
Summary
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You must upgrade to access the ticketing module.
Create and configure tickets that grant access to the events in your festival.
- This ticket is ready for the festival and is properly configured for all events it supports.
- This ticket does not provide access to any events. There is a risk people may purchase it without receiving any benefits.
- This ticket does not go on sale in time for one or more events, or it has no pricing and cannot go on sale.
- This ticket is ready for the festival, but some information may be missing or misconfigured.
Genres are the most common way to classify films and episodic content. In this section, you can customize the list of genres supported by the site.
Themes are a free-form way of categorizing content in a way that reflects your site.
A perspective represents the creative lens through which the work was developed—the life experience of the writers or series creators. Customize the list of perspectives to fit your site's diversity objectives.
Discounts are codes you create that customers can use to pay reduced prices on tickets and other items (or event get them for free!).
- This discount is ready to be used by customers.
- This discount would be ready to use by customers, but it has been exhausted.
- This discount can no longer be used because it has expired.
- This discount code is ready to use subject to restrictions on who can use it.
We organize a festival into "editions". Many festivals have one edition per year, while others may have many editions within a calendar year. Each edition represents a common set of selections showcased over a specified period of time.
The videos in this section are used during the online portion of your program.
The "Welcome Video", if you set one, will hide your welcome banner and play in a loop on the home page without any sound. It should be exactly 1940x692. We do not validate these dimensions, so your site will look wrong if you upload something with different dimensions.
The global pre-roll is a video that will run before each screening block or on-demand viewing. The ideal pre-roll is 3-5 seconds long and serves as a bit of a brand intro. If you want to present your sponsors before each screening block, you might also add them into the pre-roll. In the "Programming" section of this portal, you can also define prerolls for each screening block. You thus may end up with two pre-rolls before videos in any screening blocks that have a pre-roll specified.
This section is where you upload videos in support of online programming. Because this festival is not running online, there are no videos to upload.
You may configure your various venues here for re-use across multiple editions of the festival. A venue may be a standalone location like "Wayzata Beach" or a complex location divided into individual rooms such as "The Minneapolis Convention Center". The venue information enables us to present the venue information for an event, including maps and directions to the venue.
Below is a list of templates for emails that SparqFest may send on behalf of your festival. Select the email you wish to customize to edit it.
This list of users shows all staff, creators, and judges across all editions of the festival. You can add new members of your staff and adjust their access.
SparqFest can integrate automatically with a number of third-party solutions.
Below are all the areas in which we can integrate with third-parties along with a quick look at how you have them configured. To configure a specific solution, select that panel and follow the instructions. Any integration with a padlock is one that requires an upgrade to your current subscription.
Email Marketing

We can synchronize your creators, jurors, and audience members with mailing list solutions so that all of your users can be reached through your email marketing tools.
Not Configured

Cloud Storage

Cloud storage synchronization is an optional integration package that will upload screeners, posters, captions, and other media assets to your cloud storage account.
Not Configured

Collaboration

Our integration with your collaboration tool enables SparqFest to send updates about festival progress and critical notifications to your entire team.
Not Configured

Mastodon

Mastodon integration enables SparqFest to manage limited aspects of your Mastodon account for things like auto-following your Official Selections.
Not Configured
