Filmmaker Provided DCP
Submission Guidelines

(OpenDCP and Quvis Wraptor for Adobe DCPs, and Zipped/Compressed files will be summarily rejected)

Return to the Filmmaker DCP Submission Here

That’s great news!

Now, help us deliver your DCP to our partner festival with the best chance for it to play flawlessly!

The festival, the audience, and the theater count on a professionally made DCP.

Yes, we have strict, professional guidelines. We are often managing more than 400 movies for a festival and to ensure a smooth event, we need participating filmmakers to approach this with professional, industry-standard expectations. 

Follow the guidelines below and have an incredible screening!

A Professional Service Created the DCP

This makes it easy for us to curate, QC, and deliver your DCP to help you have a fantastic festival screening experience.

If a professional DCP company such as Simple DCP, The Archetype Company, or DCP For All, made your DCP, you can send us the DCP one of the following ways:

  1. Send us a direct link from the company (we only accept Filemail, Dropbox, Aspera/Signiant/Media Shuttle links).
  2. Mail us your Linux EXT2 or EXT3 formatted hard drive (We only accept these formats).

We curate professional DCPs as a no-charge service to partner festivals and their participants as long as your DCP follows these guidelines.

SENDING US A LINK:

  • If your DCP provider uses Filemail, Dropbox, or Aspera/Signiant/Media Shuttle, we will accept direct links after you complete the submission form.

UPLOADING TO OUR SERVER:

  • We may allow you to freely upload to our server as long as we can verify where your DCP was professionally made.

SENDING US A HARD DRIVE:

  • We will accept hard drives formatted as Linux EXT2 or EXT3 only.
  • These are the required formats to ingest directly into our system (and a digital cinema server).
  • Hard drives are only returned if you include a properly labeled, with postage, self-addressed stamped envelope.
  • If the hard drive is to be returned, be sure the MOVIE TITLE is on both the hard drive as well as the self-addressed stamped envelope.

IMPORTANT:

  • HARD DRIVES WILL BE IMMEDIATELY RECYCLED If your postage is incorrect, your labeling is incorrect, or a self-addressed stamped envelope is not included.
  • Hard drives not formatted as Linux EXT2 or EXT3 will be rejected.

You’re ready to submit a Self-Made DCP

You, or your colorist, or editor, or someone with access to software made it.

If you have tested and used your DCP theatrically previously, and you are 100% certain it will work, you can mail us your Linux EXT2/3 formatted hard drive free of charge, or you can use our digital transfer service for a minimal fee.

If a DCP is amateurishly made and does not follow guidelines laid out by the Digital Cinema Initiative, you risk incompatibility with the theatre, a stressful experience for yourself, a dissatisfied audience, and you might cost the festival thousands of dollars of theater time.

UPLOAD/TRANSFER YOUR DCP (Fee-Based Service):

  • If you choose this option, you can upload directly to our server or transfer a Dropbox link with us.
  • Basic Service: $40 – we will run a validation report to check the integrity of your DCP and allow for three total uploads/transfers if required.
  • Digital Storage Service: $60 – we will run the validation report and store your DCP in Dropbox for 180 days for you to access/share with other festivals.
  • Digital Storage Service Deluxe: $80 – we will run the validation and store your DCP in Dropbox for a full year for you to access/share with other festivals.

SENDING US A HARD DRIVE (No fee):

  • We will accept hard drives formatted as Linux EXT2 or EXT3 only.
  • These are the required formats to ingest directly into our system (and a digital cinema server).
  • Improperly formatted hard drives will be rejected.
  • Hard drives are only returned if you include a properly labeled, with postage, self-addressed stamped envelope.
  • If the hard drive is to be returned, be sure the MOVIE TITLE is on both the hard drive as well as the self-addressed stamped envelope.

IMPORTANT:

  • HARD DRIVES WILL BE IMMEDIATELY RECYCLED If your postage is incorrect, your labeling is incorrect, or a self-addressed stamped envelope is not included.
  • Hard drives not formatted as Linux EXT2 or EXT3 will be rejected.

You made a DCP through Adobe Wraptor or with OpenDCP?

Unfortunately, both OpenDCP and the Wraptor plugin have a flawed performance history.

Many festivals and theaters do not accept Wraptor DCPs at all.

If you choose to use OpenDCP or Wraptor, you will be responsible for delivering your DCP directly to the festival on a Linux Ext2 formatted hard drive.

DCPs found to be created using this software will be summarily rejected.

Avoid Common Problems!

Any of these issues below will require you to deliver a DCP on your own to the theater or will require a Service Fee to re-deliver to us.

AVOID INSTANT REJECTION:

ZIPPED/COMPRESSED DCPs
Large video files are notorious for becoming corrupted when compressed. Downloading and extraction takes time. If your submission is compressed, we will automatically reject it.

QUVIS WRAPTOR FOR ADOBE DCP
The exhibition systems in use at this festival are known to be incompatible with DCPs made using the Quvis Wraptor Plugin for Adobe products. DCPs found to be created using this software will be summarily rejected.

Open DCP
This is free software that does not appear to have been supported since 2014. In our experience, we have not seen many DCPs with this software actually work in theaters. We will no longer accept or deliver DCPs made with this software.

MISSING, CHANGED, RENAMED FILES
Your DCP package must be complete. A DCP is a series of files in a folder that all work together. You cannot make changes to your DCP after it has been created. You cannot replace or change files without creating a new DCP.

Maybe your DCP is the exception to the rule; however, we will not be able to deliver it on your behalf in either of the above instances.

NAME YOUR DCP CORRECTLY:

NAMING CONVENTIONS
Your project should follow Digital Cinema Initiative naming conventions. DO NOT USE acronyms, different names, or version numbers. Use the NAME OF YOUR MOVIE! While we will not reject yoru movie for improper naming, not only does it make it difficult for a projectionist to find/play your movie, many theaters will reject movies that are not named properly. Correct naming will follow this format: MovieTitle_FTR_F_EN_XX_INT_51_2k_NULL_20211230_E_SMPTE_OV

SOFTWARE CONSIDERATIONS:

easyDCP
This software is costly, but it is the gold standard. If you are using this, make sure you do your due diligence to deliver the best possible DCP you can. If you use a free or trial version, it will likely leave a watermark over your movie, which many filmmakers only discover too late.

Blackmagic Davinci Resolve Plugin
We don’t use this here, but we receive many DCPs that are created this way. Many work without issue, and others are problematic. Again, do your due diligence in the process. Those that fail typically do so for not following DCI standards.

DCP-O-Matic
Similar to Resolve, many DCPs made with this software work without issue. Again, do your due diligence in the process. Those that fail typically do so for not following DCI standards.  If you are using DCP-O-Matic or other similar software DO NOT INCLUDE every file. Only include the folder with a name similar to MovieName_FTR_F_EN-XX_INT_51_2K_NULL_20220727_E_SMPTE_OV (it will typically have six files).

DCPs that do not adhere to the following guidelines WILL NOT be accepted.

DCPs that do not follow DCI naming conventions may be rejected. Your DCP must be DCI compliant. You can find out more about DCI standards here. Professional DCP houses will do this for you.

Video

  • Acceptable Frame Rates:
    • InterOp DCPs – 24 FPS only
    • SMPTE DCPs – 24, 25, 30 FPS
  • All presentations must fit inside an acceptable container size
    • For 2K FLAT content (1998×1080) – 1920×1080 3996×2160, 1998×1080, 2048×1080 (will have bars)
    • For 2K SCOPE content – 2048×858
    • For 4K FLAT content (3996×2160) – 3840×2160 (will have bars)3996×2160, 3996×2160, 4096×2160 (will have bars)
    • For 4K SCOPE content – 4096×1716
  • DCPs must be formatted to DCI XYZ’ color space
  • Maximum bit-rate: 250Mbps
  • No 3D, HFR, or High Bit Rate content please

Audio

  • 2.0 Stereo and 5.1 mixes only
  • 24 bits – 48kHz Linear PCM audio
  • Multichannel mixes must use standard SMPTE channel assignments (L/R/C/LFE/Ls/Rs)
  • Matrixed stereo mixes (LtRt, Dolby E, etc.) will NOT be decoded to multichannel

Subtitles

  • In most cases for festival, subtitles should be burned in to the video.
  • 2.0 Stereo and 5.1 mixes only
  • 24 bits – 48kHz Linear PCM audio
  • Multichannel mixes must use standard SMPTE channel assignments (L/R/C/LFE/Ls/Rs)
  • Matrixed stereo mixes (LtRt, Dolby E, etc.) will NOT be decoded to multichannel

Drive Formatting

  • All Drives should be formatted with and MBR Partition to Linux EXT2/3 with INODE SIZE: 128 bits
  • Please test your DCP drive in a digital cinema server prior to submission!

Naming Convention

You must complete the appropriate form first.

SEND A Theater-Ready Hard Drive 

If you choose this option, you can mail us your theater-ready drive.

Drives must be formatted as Linux EXT2 or EXT3.

All other formats will be rejected.

A professional DCP service provider will be able to create these for you.

What to send:

1) USB 3.0 HARD DRIVE
Send the Drive, With the USB Cable
Must be formatted as Linux EXT2/3
Do not send anything with a Thunderbolt connection.

Or Send:

2) CRU Theater-Ready Drive
Must be formatted as Linux EXT2/3
Must be a CRU DX115DC-compatible caddy

If you want your drive returned, you must:
 Include a self-addressed stamped envelope.
Envelope must have proper postage.
Envelope must have your movie title written on it.
Drives will be immediately recycled otherwise.

Ready to Submit?

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