Film

Videos which are hosted by BAFTA have incorporated a process called ‘Adaptive Streaming’ which adjusts the quality of the playback according to the strength of a user’s internet connection, to allow unbroken viewing and prevent buffering. This is denoted by the default ‘Auto’ setting in the quality selector. At all times, this Auto setting will play the video at the best available quality to ensure unbroken viewing.

Videos hosted by external platforms do not have this functionality but should still offer you the option to switch manually between quality levels if you prefer to do so in order to maintain uninterrupted viewing.

Likewise, you can also manually override the ‘Auto’ setting in BAFTA hosted videos to higher or lower at any time if you prefer.                                                

The videos play via pop-up window. If you have a pop-up blocker on your browser, you will need to disable it in order to watch them.

For more information on how to disable pop-up blockers for your particular browser, please see this article:

Some external distributors may request this as an extra layer of anti-piracy security. Provided you trust the source and have read the Terms and Conditions before downloading the app, this will be necessary to gain access to such a title.

Check you are connected to the internet – and if you are casting from one device to your TV, check that both devices are currently connected. If your internet connection is fine, please ensure you are running the latest version of the operating software on the device/s you are watching and download and install an update if not. Also, ensure you have disabled any pop-up blockers. All titles will play in a pop-up player, so any blocker you have will prevent you from viewing.

If casting from one device to your TV and your internet is connected with a strong signal and your software is updated, are you using one of the casting combinations recommended in bold above? If not, please do so if available.

If BAFTA View appears slow, or fails to load, this might because you need to clear the cookies or cache on your browser. The reason clearing cookies/cache can help, is due to browsers often storing versions of websites in the cache to avoid having to download everything (like images, backgrounds, logos, etc.) every time a website is visited. Problems can happen if the website has been updated recently and it conflicts with the cached version. Browser caches are temporary but some may store things for longer than others.

If you don’t clear your cache from time to time, you might not see changes on a website with your computer loading older, cached data. Old, unused extensions can also clutter up your browser, using your RAM and memory.

Clearing cookies/cache can also be called clearing site data or history data.  

To clear cookies/cache on Chrome: https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/32050?hl=en&co=GENIE.Platform%3DDesktop

To clear cookies/cache on Safari for Mac: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/safari/sfri11471/mac

To clear cookies/cache on Safari for iPad/iPhone: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT201265

To clear cookies/cache on Mozilla Firefox: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/clear-cookies-and-site-data-firefox

To clear cookies/cache on Microsoft Edge: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/delete-cookies-in-microsoft-edge-63947406-40ac-c3b8-57b9-2a946a29ae09

To clear cookies/cache on Opera: https://www.opera.com/use-cases/clean-browser-and-remove-trackers

If you are still having problems or find that one title in particular won’t play while all the others do, contact voting@bafta.org

BitMovin is the name of the player that delivers all of the titles stored in Electron.

Electron is BAFTA’s in-house media storage solution, which houses all of the titles submitted by distributors who don’t have their own in-house or externally contracted platform. The API is the code by which BAFTA View pulls all the titles from Electron and also those external platforms.

BAFTA View pulls titles into the one location from multiple sources via an API. A large number of these are hosted by our own in-house Electron media storage solution, and these videos are all played via our regular Bitmovin player. However, some distributors are contracted to house their content in external platforms, which in turn have their own security measures and players. These will look slightly different, but essentially perform the same task.

If the video has started playing, but buffers at any stage please check the strength of your internet connection and if your signal is intermittent it may be best to re-start your internet hub. If you have identified that you have a continually weak signal and slow speeds, you can adjust the quality switcher in the controls to a level that works better with your connection at this time.

As a general rule, here are FIVE standard checks you should make to eliminate any unnecessary drains on your bandwidth before casting any videos:

1. Close any open but unused tabs and windows on your device.
2. Check nobody else in your household who is using the same wifi connection is streaming, casting or using other data-hungry activities such as downloading/uploading large files or online gaming.
3. Ensure your casting from and casting to devices are connected to the same network.
4. Check your current wifi signal strength.
5. Make sure your devices is not currently engaged in a background activity like installing a software update.

BAFTA hosted videos use a process called ‘Adaptive Streaming’ where our player detects poor internet connection and slow speeds. If a video plays in low resolution in patches, or even throughout, it indicates such issues. You can manually override this, by changing the quality selector from ‘Auto’ to one of the highest options but if your connection issue persists this will likely cause buffering at some point.