Frequently-asked-questions

HOW DO COMPETITIONS WORK ON GENERO.TV?

Each competition varies slightly in terms of prizes, judging, dates etc. but the basics for our competitions are:
- competitions are based around individual songs, multiple songs or whole albums.
- anyone can enter from professional directors, production companies through to creative and talented fans who have the camera and skills to make an official music video.
- all entries are uploaded to the site throughout the competition and before the close date.
- depending on the number of entries, Genero.tv may need to prepare a short list of entries for the artist/label, which may vary in size.
- finalists are then chosen by the artist/label and sometimes in conjunction with Genero.tv.
- the artist/label will then choose their favourite video which will usually become the official music video.

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HOW ARE FINALISTS CHOSEN FOR EACH ARTIST/SONG COMPETITION?

The approach to choosing finalists for each competition varies so check the individual artist page for details. For song competitions there are normally 6 finalists chosen between the artist and their representatives and Genero.tv. In the past user voting was used to determine some of the finalists but we've found it's too open to fraudulent voting and hasn't been a reflection of the community preference so we've removed this as a factor in finalist selection.

The judging panels for each competition will feature representatives from the respective artist and/or label - the judging panel details for each competition can be found on the individual artist/song pages. Note though that there is usually some short listing done by Genero.tv on behalf of the artist/label prior to finalists being chosen, so for competitions receiving a large number of entries they're unlikely to watch every entry into the competition.

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WHO IS ON THE JUDGING PANEL?

Each Artist/Song competition has different judges but they’re usually made up of Genero.tv staff and the Artist or their representatives. To see who is on the judging panel just go to the individual Artist/Song page that you’re interested in.

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HOW MANY TIMES CAN I ENTER?

As many times as you want so go nuts.

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HOW MANY TIMES CAN I VOTE ON EACH VIDEO?

Currently votes are driven by Facebook Likes. This means you can vote once per video, but of course you can vote on as many videos as you like.

If a competition uses votes for results we'll specifically let you know on the competition page.

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I AM HAVING TROUBLE REGISTERING OR RECEIVING THE ACTIVATION EMAIL

If you are having trouble registering, or haven't received the activation email, please follow these steps;

1. First, check your spam or junk folder for an activation email.  Unfortunately legitimate emails are sometimes classified as spam.

2. If that doesn't help, please send us the following;
- operating system, browser & version you are using (eg. Windows 7, Google Chrome, 4.0.249.89 (38071), the version can be found in the About menu of your browser
- your IP address by going to myIPaddress.com, it will show you a series of numbers separated by dots, just copy and paste those back to us

3. It is always best to make sure you have the latest browser version installed, please use one of the following;
Apple Safari for Mac or PC
Mozilla Firefox for Mac or PC
Google Chrome for Mac or PC
Internet Explorer for PC

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WHAT KIND OF MUSIC VIDEOS ARE YOU LOOKING FOR?

We’re all about creativity and pushing the boundaries in terms of what music video is and what it can be. There are no real guidelines on what we’re looking for, but make it creative, innovative, high quality and entertaining. The winning video becomes the official music video for the song so keep that in mind when making your video.

We can only accept high quality videos that have the potential to become official videos. We don't want lip syncing videos or travel/family/stock footage set to music, in fact we probably won't publish them. Make sure your video is also shot in 16:9 or wider so it can be used across all of today's media platforms.

We moderate every video to check not only for appropriateness, but also for quality of concept, creativity and film making. We apologise in advance if your video isn't published because it isn't deemed of sufficient quality to potentially be used as an official music video, but we have a responsibility to each of the artists and labels we work with to make sure the videos being made for their music and published on our site are of a high quality.

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WHY ARE SOME VIDEOS NOT PUBLISHED?

Before you get started, make sure your video content is suitable. Here are the main reasons for videos not getting approved;

- creatively or conceptually, there is not much of an idea (eg. family/travel/stock footage set to music)
- the overall production or editing quality level is too low
- your video has racist, violent or defamatory content

Creativity is very subjective, for that reason we often can't give specific reasons why your video hasn't been published. Remember we're looking for videos that could potentially be used as the official music video for the artists and songs we feature.

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ARE ALL VIDEO ENTRIES PUBLISHED ON GENERO.TV?

No not all videos entered are published on the site. We moderate every video to not only check for anything inappropriate, but also to check the videos are of a standard that could potentially be used as an official music video.

You can think of this moderation as the first round of the competition, like having your video accepted into a film festival, and we do this on behalf of the artists and labels we represent who don't have the time to go through every video entered.

We apologise in advance if your video isn't published on the site.

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GMT AND CLOSING TIMES EXPLAINED

All closing times we quote are in GMT, which stands for Greenwich Mean Time. This is a world-wide time reference point, and we use it so that everyone knows exactly what time a competition closes. To be absolutely certain, we reccomend doing a Google search for "GMT time" which will return the time at that point. Sorry, but we cannot accept late entries if there is any mis-understanding or confusion about closing times.

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DO YOU PUBLISH SECOND LIFE VIDEOS?

It's our view that Second Life videos aren't generally suitable or up to the standard to become an official music video. We don't rule them out completely and do publish some given they represent a different medium, but in most cases, we won't be publishing them.

We feel that they aren't in line with what artists and labels are looking for, unless they are very creatively done and in consideration of the song.

The way competitions run on Genero.tv is that being published is basically the first round of the competition - like being accepted into a film festival. We moderate the videos on behalf of the artists and labels we represent and many other videos have also not been published for the same reason. You can read more about that here.

We apologise if your Second Life video hasn't been published, and we appreciate the time and effort you would have spent making your video.

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WE DON’T HAVE ANY FOOTAGE OF THE ARTISTS; HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO MAKE A VIDEO FOR THE SONG?

Some of the best videos don’t use any footage of the artists. So use the fact that no footage has been provided as an opportunity to have complete creative freedom for your music video.

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I’VE GOT A GREAT VIDEO OF ME LIP-SYNCING TO ONE OF THE FEATURED SONGS. WHAT ARE MY CHANCES OF WINNING?

Even though your friends would probably find it funny to watch you, basic lip-syncing videos aren’t what we’re looking for. So apart from not winning it probably wouldn’t make it past our moderators because we’re really focused on quality videos, not quantity.

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HOW DO I UPLOAD A VIDEO?

Go to the page for the Artist/Song you've made your video for and click on the ENTER button on the right hand side. You'll then be taken to an Upload form - browse to find your video and upload it, fill out the forms and click SUBMIT. If there is no ENTER button on the Artist page it means that either it's not open for entries yet or it's closed so make sure you check the dates.

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HOW DO I CHANGE THE PREVIEW THUMBNAIL FOR MY VIDEO?

Log in to Genero, then go to your profile. Click on the thumbnail of the video you want to edit.

Watch your video and find the image you want to use as the thumbnail. Enter the time it appears into the box to the right of the thumbnail (in the form MM:SS) and click the UPDATE button. Wait a moment while your new thumbnail is generated.

The thumbnail of your video is the image people see when they first visit your video page, as well as the image used for social sharing sites like Facebook, Pinterest and Google+. Try and use an evocative image that gives the best impression of the feel of your video.

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HOW CAN I UPLOAD AN HD VERSION OF MY VIDEO?

We no longer allow SD video entries, this is because they cannot be used as an official music video in today's media. Please upload an HD version that has a minimum resolution of 1280x720, or even better if it has a resolution of 1920x1080.

Read more about required tech specs here.

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CAN I UPLOAD A NEW VERSION OF MY VIDEO?

You can upload an updated edit of your entry and you'll keep all of the votes, views and comments your previous version had.

Just follow these simple steps;

- Login to your account
- Click your PROFILE link at the top right corner of the site
- Choose your video from the thumbnails on the right hand panel
- Click the REPLACE/EDIT button
- Follow the steps from there

If you want to upload an entirely separate and different entry, then don't use the process above - you should upload a new entry from the competition page.

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HOW LONG SHOULD MY VIDEO BE?

Your video should be at least as long as the song you're creating it for if you want to be able to win. Obviously a video can't be used as the official video for the song if it doesn't use the whole track, but it's not against the Competition Terms to create a video which is shorter (especially for some of the longer tracks we feature). You can also include footage before and after the track starts or ends if you think it adds to the overall music video.

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WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH FILMING IN PUBLIC? DO I NEED A PERMIT?

The laws for filming in public differ between countries and even cities so we can't give you a complete answer on this. You'll need to check with your local film commission or similar body. Here are a few resources though that might help as a starting point.

• UK Film Council: http://www.ukfilmcouncil.org.uk/publicspaces
• Paris Film Office (in English): http://www.parisfilm.fr/uk/guidelines.html
• Australian Copyright Council: Filmmakers and Copyright infosheet
• New York: http://www.nyc.gov/html/film/html/permits/shooting_home.shtml
• California: http://www.film.ca.gov/Permits/index.html
• Seattle: http://www.seattle.gov/filmoffice/film_permits.htm

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SHOULD I ADD TITLES OR CREDITS TO MY VIDEO?

No, please don't add any credits or titles in your video. You can use the Description and Other Credits areas to provide any further details about your video and other contributors. If there are titles or credits appearing in your video you'll be asked to remove them and resubmit it.

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MY VIDEO HAS NOT BEEN APPROVED BECAUSE IT HAS BLACK BARS, OR IS THE WRONG ASPECT RATIO

If your video has not been approved, it is possibly due to one of the following reasons;

Aspect Ratio
We need your video in HD, and 16:9 or wider so that we can use it in all media types if selected as the official video. If you want to check your aspect ratio, you can divide the width by the height, eg. the minimum resolution we accept is 1280x720. Dividing the width by the height gives you 1.7778, which is 16:9 (16 divided by 9). Remember, don't include black bars in the resolution width or height though. Read more about aspect ratios here.

Black Bars
Horizontal or vertical black bars are not acceptable. Sometimes, exporting a 4:3 movie to 16:9 simply adds black vertical bars left and right of your footage, this is still a 4:3 video, and therefore won't be approved. If your video is wider than 16:9 (eg. 1.85:1 or 2.39:1) then our transcoding process will add top and bottom black bars so that it plays within our 16:9 player. Never add any black bars, regardless of what resolution you are uploading.

Titles/Credits
We don't allow any titles or credits to appear on the video. There is space on your video's page (when uploading) where you can put credits and extra information. Titles are added by the media outlet that ends up playing the winning video (eg. MTV).

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WHAT BROADCAST SPECS WILL I NEED TO SUPPLY IF I AM A WINNER OR FINALIST?

ALL winners, and some finalists are required to upload a broadcast quality version of their file, usually via FTP. If you are unable to supply a broadcast quality file to the client's specifications (see below as a guide), you will be disqualified from winning or being a finalist. The current specs which most of our clients require are as follows;

Codecs: Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) [preferred], Avid DNxHD or DVCPro HD
Scaling: Content may NOT be upscaled from SD
Frame size & rate: 1920x1080 (Progressive) [23.98, 29.97 or 25], or 1920x1080 (Interlaced) [29.97 or 25]
Color space: ITU-R BT.709
Audio: Stereo LPCM in either Big Endian or Little Endian, 16-bit or 24-bit, at 48kHz (Audio levels should remain constant at -6db as much as possible. Please prevent audio levels going below -12db.)

Top 10 reasons (of many!) for immediate rejection of a broadcast file;

1. All text must be TITLESAFE regardless if it is for online use only or not. (See below for details)
2. “Apple ProRes 422 (HQ)” is NOT “Apple ProRes 422”, if ProRes, must supply (HQ)
3. H.264, MPEG2 and MPEG4 are NOT supported file codecs.
4. Audio must be in STEREO. If both the L and R audio are identical, it is TWO CHANNEL MONO and will fail. (See below for details)
5. Audio as 44.1k is NOT supported; it must be 48k. AAC is NOT supported, it must be LPCM,
6. When delivering 5.1 AUDIO, the channels must be clearly named and labeled (either on the tape or the filenames).
7. 4:1 CADENCE is a failure point for Long Form content. (See below for details)
8. Content cannot be PILLARBOXED.
9. Audio and video must be properly SYNCED on all video content.
10. FIELD DOMINANCE issues resulting from reversing the wrong field (upper/lower) first.

Title Safe
Title Safe is a term that refers to the zone of a video frame where all of the titles and graphics applied are completely visible without being cut off. Videos need to be Title Safe in order for all text and graphics to be displayed completely within the viewing frame of a video. All content must be in title safe to be considered archive-worthy, REGARDLESS of the current intentions for its use. It may be meant for online use presently, but that can easily change in the future.

Two Channel Mono
This occurs when both the Left and Right channels are identical to each other. The audio coming from the Left and Right channels must NOT be identical. This should be checked on a stereo-meter as Final Cut will falsely define anything with two audio channels as stereo.

Mixed Frame Rates
Mixed Frame Rate issues occur when different types of source footage recorded using different frame rates are edited together before they are converted to a single, unified frame rate.

4:1 Cadence ( Long Form Content: Immediate Failure)
4:1 Cadence means you have 4 progressive frames of video, and every 5th frame is a repeat of the 4th frame. There should be no repeated frames at all. This issue is often the result of a 23.98 frame video being converted to 29.97 incorrectly. When done correctly, you will see 3 unique progressive frames followed by 2 interlaced frames. Content should be kept native to the frame rate at which it was shot. This also can occur when interlaced content is tagged as progressive.

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WHY ARE SOME ENTRIES PUBLISHED AFTER THE DEADLINE?

You may see several videos published in the hours after the competition closes, or even the next day. This can be due to several reasons:

• A large number of videos entered as the competition closes will take some time to approve
• Delays or problems with transcoding a video
• Genero may need the filmmaker to make a small change or confirm some information about the video before we publish
• Other reasons

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