Using GA Video at an Event

Sample Video

Sunday Morning Worship: In This Delicate Turning, General Assembly 2019

Planning to include General Assembly (GA) video at an event at your congregation or elsewhere? Technical problems (either at GA or at your event) may interfere with even the best-laid plans. Test as much as possible before your event, and be prepared with a backup plan (show previous events instead of live-streaming video, or plan a discussion or other activity in case the technology just doesn’t work).

Live-streaming public GA video is available each year at UUA.org/ga/YYYY as well as on YouTube. Choose one or more of the events occurring before your service to test the following at the location of your service (online or in person).

Publicly streamed events include General Sessions and the three Major Worships (Service of the Living Tradition, Synergy Bridging Service, and the Sunday Morning Service). You can show a GA video live, as it's occurring, or stream it later.

Online Events

Depending on how you stream your online events, you have several options:

  • You can provide your event participants with a link to the UUA.org page for the event and schedule everyone to watch it at the same time. When the video ends, you can start up a social hour or discussion using Zoom or whatever platform your congregation uses to gather.
  • If you use Zoom for your event, you can share a video player window in Zoom to display the UUA.org page.

Showing a UUA Video in a Zoom Meeting

If you want to include a UUA video (like the GA Sunday Morning Worship) as part of a Zoom meeting (like your congregation's service), here's how.

Once the Zoom meeting is started, one of the hosts or co-hosts of the Zoom meeting (someone with permission to share their screen) can show the video by following these steps:

  1. Open the UUA.org page that shows the video.
  2. Click the full-screen icon in the player to enlarge the video player.
  3. Switch back to the Zoom window. Use Alt-Tab (on Windows) or Command-Tab (on a Mac) to switch among your running applications while leaving the video player full-screen.
  4. Click Share, make sure both checkboxes are checked (so you share the sound of the video at high-quality), select the full-screen player, and click Share.
  5. Start the video player.
  6. When the video is over, stop sharing the screen and continue your Zoom meeting.

We recommend testing this beforehand with any video on UUA.org. Try the 2019 Sunday Morning Worship video.

Pro tip: If you have two monitors, enlarge the video player on your second monitor, so your Zoom window is on one screen and the video is on the other. This makes it easier to switch between the video player and Zoom.

In-Person Events

You need:

  • A computer that can play the video.
  • A projector and a film screen or blank white wall. Be sure the display is bright enough to look good in morning light.
  • A sound system that can connect to the computer and is loud enough to project to your entire audience.
  • An Internet connection that is fast enough to receive the streaming video without a lot of “buffering” pauses (we recommend 1.5Mbps or greater download speed).

Test

Whether your event will be online or in person, test your setup with video that's streaming live on YouTube now—our public live-streamed events will use embedded live-streaming YouTube videos.

Also test with video from past General Assemblies, as that's a good back-up plan in case live-streaming goes awry.

Available Video

You can show:

  • Videos from past General Assemblies.
  • The live stream. We will begin to stream video about 10 minutes before the event starts. You'll usually see a slideshow with news for GA attendees until the event begins.
  • Events that are over. Video will be posted 5-10 minutes, after each live-streamed event.
  • YouTube live streams include DVR functionality that allows you to pause, rewind, and play during the live event.

Permissions

  • The Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) adheres stringently to permission and copyright restrictions imposed by composers, authors and performers.
  • It is permissible to show streamed video from General Assembly to your group if you are not charging admission.
  • It is not permissible to record or download content streamed from UUA.org due to music licensing.

Help

Some very kind members of the websters email list have graciously agreed to help troubleshoot screenings held during GA. Join Websters to review their archives or ask for help.