Add videos to a gallery
Videos sit in the gallery next to the photos. They are included on every paid plan. The Free plan is photos only.
Upload a video
Upload it like a photo: drag it onto the page or use Upload Photos. MP4, MOV, M4V, MKV, WebM and other common formats work, up to 30 GB each. Videos upload one at a time in resumable pieces, so a dropped connection costs a few seconds, not the whole file.
Processing
After the upload, the tile shows Processing… for a few minutes while the video is prepared for streaming. You get an email when it is ready. To turn that email off, go to Settings → Notifications → Video ready. The tile starts playing as soon as processing finishes. If processing fails, the tile says so and offers Retry.
The couple never sees a video until it has finished processing.
What the couple sees
A tile with a play button and the video’s length. It streams at whatever quality their connection supports, so nobody downloads 20 GB to watch a highlight reel. It plays full screen from the lightbox.
Video controls
Open the video’s ⋯ menu:
- Choose thumbnail… Scrub to any frame. That frame becomes the video’s tile image everywhere.
- Use as cover video. The gallery’s cover plays this video silently on a loop behind the couple’s names. The still cover photo stays as the fallback in emails, previews and anywhere motion does not belong.
- Delete video. Removes it and frees its storage.
Videos can also be hidden, made couple-only, moved between sections, favorited and shared in a set, the same as photos.
Downloading a video
The download button on a video offers two sizes:
- Original file. Exactly what you uploaded, full quality.
- Web version. A 1080p MP4 that is much smaller. A 389 MB original came out at 79 MB. Good for phones and for sending on.
Two switches control this: the gallery’s Allow downloads setting, and Allow video downloads in the gallery’s Settings → Downloads.
Videos are never included in the ZIP from Download all, because a 20 GB file does not belong in an archive. A video is downloaded from its own tile, in the gallery or in a shared set. Videos are never watermarked.
If a video will not process
The usual cause is bitrate, not file size. A video above roughly 200 Mbps cannot be prepared for streaming. A camera-native or lightly compressed 4K export can exceed that even when the file is small. Export a delivery version from your editor (H.264 or H.265) and upload that.
FOCL checks the bitrate before the upload starts, so you find out in seconds instead of after a multi-gigabyte transfer. The tile tells you when bitrate is the reason.
A gallery can be videos only
Nothing requires photos. If there are no photos to choose a cover from, use Change cover → Upload a cover to use any image from your computer. Counts throughout the studio say “3 videos” rather than counting them as photos.
Storage
Video is measured in hours, separately from your photo storage. Each paid plan includes some: 3 hours on Essentials, 10 on Studio, 30 on Pro. Films also use storage by their file size, but in practice the hours run out first.
A highlight film and a full ceremony edit together are usually a little over an hour, so Essentials covers about two weddings with film, Studio about eight, and Pro about twenty-five.
Settings → Plan & storage shows a video meter next to the storage one. We email you at 80% and again if you use it all. Running out stops new films only: photos carry on as normal, and every film you have already delivered stays online and downloadable.
If you need more, extra video is $5 a month per 10 hours. Contact us to add it.
Streaming costs you nothing extra, no matter how many times a film is watched. See Plans and storage.
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