Ad Specifications: Video Ad

Product
Video Cloud
Applies to Roles
Ad Operations
Version
Brightcove 5
Edition
Pro, Enterprise
Created by Grant Goodman.

The Video Ad is a component of the Video Pod, together with the Expandable Banner and the Leave Behind Banner. Click here for a description of the Video Pod.

Formats Supported: .FLV, .MP4, .SWF, .JPG, .PNG, or Static .GIF

Video Ad

The Video Ad is supported by ANY Video Cloud player template. It can be served as pre-roll, mid-roll or post-roll. Video ads of any length are supported, however video ads of less than 15 seconds are recommended.

FLV, MP4, and SWF video ad creatives will scale for custom players if the creatives are built to specification. The Ability to skip a Video Ad is not supported out-of-the-box.

Video Ads can be clickable. When a Video Ad is clicked, the click-through will open a new browser and the Video Ad will pause in the Video Cloud player.

During Video Ad playback, Fast-Forward and Rewind controls are disabled. Mute, Un-mute, Pause, and Play controls are enabled. A "Sponsor Message" text label appears in the bottom left hand corner of the player. The sponsor message text label can be changed when building a custom player template using the Brightcove experience markup language (BEML) and the VideoPlayer component; however, the message is hardcoded for all out-of-the-box player templates. Get more details. If you are building a custom player template using Video Cloud MediaControls component, the sponsor message will not appear. Read more.

A time counter (which counts down) appears in the bottom right hand corner of the player. The time counter is set by the trafficker within the “duration” attribute in the XML template.

Download a Flash 9 or Flash 8/ActionScript 2 Creative Ad Template for a Video Ad (use the videoAd_template.fla from the .zip file).

FLV or MP4 Format

  • Dimensions – 480x360 (4:3 Full Screen) or 480x270 (16:9 Wide Screen) [Publisher discretion]
  • File size max – [Publisher discretion]
  • Flash version – Flash 7/Flash 8 [Publisher discretion]
  • MP4 specifications – H.264 encoding with any profiles or levels and AAC or HE-AAC audio codecs.
  • Video length (in seconds) – no limit [Publisher discretion]. Note: If the media duration in included in the file metadata, then that value will be used as the duration for the ad. For more information, click here.
  • Frame rate – 30 fps.
  • Key frame – every 30-60 frames (2 seconds).
  • Video data rate – 600 kbps [Publisher discretion]
  • Audio data rate – 48 kbps [Publisher discretion]
  • Total data rate – 648 kbps [Publisher discretion]
  • Format – It is recommended that you crop to TV-Safe Area and de-interlace. Video should not include a leader.
  • Clickable – Supply a click-through URL.
  • 3rd Party Serving – Third party redirect ad tags for SWF, JPG, GIFs, and FLVs are permitted to run inside a Video Cloud player, provided that the agency or third party supplies a single redirect URL (http:// or https:// path) to the asset file and has met all the required advertising specifications.
    Note:     IFRAME, ILAYER, JavaScript, HTML, etc. tags are not supported because Flash does not support these ad tags and Video Cloud is a Flash environment. If you are synchronizing companion banner assets outside the Video Cloud player with a video ad instead the Video Cloud player, then third party IFRAME, JavaScript, HTML, etc. tags can be used for the companion banners being served on the HTML page.

    1x1 impression third party tracking pixel and click tag URLs are also supported. Place 1x1 tracking pixels in either trackStartURL, trackMidURL, trackEndURL, trackPointURLs, trackMuteURL, trackUnmuteURL, trackPauseURL, or trackResumeURL, depending on what you want to track. For more information on each tracking point, see Ad Format XML Elements and Attributes.

SWF Format

  • Dimensions – 480x360 (4:3 Full Screen) or 480x270 (16:9 Wide Screen).
  • File size max – [Publisher discretion]
  • Flash version – Flash 7/Flash 8 [Publisher discretion]
  • Video length (in seconds) – no limit. [Publisher discretion]. Note: If the media duration in included in the file metadata, then that value will be used as the duration for the ad. For more information, click here.
  • The length of the main timeline dictates the duration of the ad. A 300 frame movie will last 10 seconds (300 frames at 30 fps).
  • Frame rate – same as source or 1/2 (50%) of source (15 – 30 fps).
  • Key frame – every 30 – 60 frames (2 seconds).
  • Max animation length – [Publisher discretion]
  • Looping restriction – [Publisher discretion]
  • Requires a 480x360 (or 480x270) rectangle with a top left registration point at (0, 0) drawn on stage for the whole movie. This bounding box can have an opacity of 0%, but must be present so the Video Cloud player can size the ad properly.
  • Ad content should begin on or after frame 5. At this point, content can be inset from the stage borders or extend outside them without it affecting sizing.
  • A stop(); action should be placed in the final frame on the main timeline.
  • Must not reference level0 in ActionScript. References should not be made to _root unless _lockroot=true. It is recommended that relative paths be used instead.
  • Any reference to any methods or properties of the Stage class must be removed.
  • ActionScript should not change the player quality.
  • Preloaders are built into the players, so they should not be present in the movie.
  • To get the play/pause buttons to appear when using a SWF in the video ad window, use the ad creative templates available or see Getting the Play/Pause Button to Appear for a SWF. [Publisher discretion]
  • If you are not using the creative templates supplied by the Video Cloud publisher, add these lines of code to the first frame of the file: 
    System.security.allowDomain("*");
System.security.allowDomain("http://admin.brightcove.com");
  • Clickable – Supply a click-through URL and implement a clickTag function as described in Adding a click-through URL to an ad creative.
  • 3rd Party Serving – Third party redirect ad tags for SWF, JPG, GIFs, and FLVs are permitted to run inside a Video Cloud player, provided that the agency or third party supplies a single redirect URL (http:// or https:// path) to the asset file and has met all the required advertising specifications.
    Note:     IFRAME, ILAYER, JavaScript and HTML tags are not supported for Flash players. Flash does not support these ad tags. If you are synchronizing companion banner assets outside the Video Cloud player in Flash mode, then you can use a third party solution that includes IFRAME, JavaScript, and HTML tags  for the companion banners being served on the HTML page.

    1x1 impression third party tracking pixel and click tag URLs are also supported. Place 1x1 tracking pixels in either trackStartURL, trackFirstQuartileURL, trackMidURL, trackThirdQuartileURL, trackEndURL, trackPointURLs, trackMuteURL, trackUnmuteURL, trackFullscreenURL, trackExitFullscreenURL, trackPauseURL, or trackResumeURL, depending on what you want to track. For more information on each tracking point, see Ad Format XML Elements and Attributes.

IMPORTANT: Writing methods and properties to any Flash object's prototype property will cause it to be added to all instances of that object. As such, it is strongly recommended that you avoid modifying the prototypes of Flash's built-in objects like MovieClip, TextField or Button in the creatives. Doing so will modify all instances of these objects in the Video Cloud player, bloating the player and possibly causing erratic behavior. The recommended method for developing in Flash using ActionScript 2.0 is that prototypes are not modified and that instead classes are created that extend the built-in objects.

JPG, PNG, or Static GIF Format

  • Dimensions – 480x360 (or 480x270).
  • File size max – [Publisher discretion]
  • GIF must be static. Flash 8 will only display the first frame of most animated .gifs.
  • JPG must be non-progressive.
  • Clickable – Supply a click-through URL.

More Ad Specifications