dear universe,

there's something i want, but i'm not sure how to get it.

you see, universe, i'm working on a couple of projects right now that involve videos:

• artist interviews for the Youth International Art Competition
• preservation videos

there's something wrong with both of those pages. what is it? thumbnails.

granted, the problem with the YAC is bigger than the problem with preservation because there is no way to display a thumbnail in the gallery for YAC, whereas I can upload 8 little images to the preservation gallery. but my desire is the same for both: i don't want to have to add any images. i only want to add the videos.

why do i feel that this is fair? well, in the Media API Objects Reference i am informed that each video comes with two very promising pieces of information:

videoStillURL

The URL to the video still image associated with this Video. Video stills are 480x360 pixels. Note: URLs are subject to change without notice. Do not hard-code them into your applications, but rather use the Media API to pull them dynamically.

thumbnailURL

The URL to the thumbnail image associated with this Video. Thumbnails are 120x90 pixels. Note: URLs are subject to change without notice. Do not hard-code them into your applications, but rather use the Media API to pull them dynamically.

now, universe, i recognize that there are certainly more complexities to the Brightcove + LDSEdit equation than i can imagine, but surely something must be possible to take greater advantage of the features in Brightcove.

the way it currently works is like this:

1. you click to add a video collection
2. you click to add a new video
3. you enter the Brightcove IDs
4. you find an image to use for a thumbnail
5. you crop and resize that image to the exact right dimensions for your use case
6. you find/create a directory to store your video thumbnail image files
7. you upload your image
8. you save your video
9. you repeat steps 2-8 until you've added all the videos to your collection
10. you save your video collection

the way i imagine it working is this:

1. you click to add a video collection
2. you click to add a new video
3. you enter the Brightcove IDs
4. you save your video
5. you repeat steps 2-4 until you've added all the videos to your collection
6. you save your video collection

yes, universe, i'm lazy. it's true. but think of all the time i save by eliminating steps 4-7. think of all the image files we no longer have to host on our servers. i reduce redundancy by not repeating work that was already done in Brightcove. and, by using the information in Brightcove, i ensure consistency across all uses of my video. i could always choose to upload a different thumbnail and override the default if that seemed appropriate for a particular context.

i'd bother the developers for chweb, but most of them are out sick. and i don't just want this to work for chweb. i want it to work for everywhere.

so how do i find out if this is possible?

UPDATE!!

katy carpenter is the universe

Joanna,

You are correct in that this can be done, but it’s currently not being done anywhere on lds.org because it requires some front end dev work. If the request do to this came from CHD or FHD, the ICS front end developers assigned to the project would just need to meet with JD Russell (the technical product manager on my team) to discuss how this is done.

Warm Regards,

Katy Carpenter