# Festival settings

> From FilmScorecard Help: https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/festival-settings

Settings is where a festival's own details are kept: its name and web
address, and whether it has a public page; what the season you are standing in
is called, its description, location and contact address, its time zone and
every date it keeps; the rules judging follows; and when results reach
filmmakers. It is also where a season's categories and awards get their fees
and prices, where a
season's judges get their pay rates, where a season is opened to judge
applications, where a season's submitters are invited to their submission
pages, where a season's scorecards are released to the people who submitted
them, where you decide when the two emails that send themselves go out, where
the festival's FilmFreeway account is connected, and where the three big
one-way actions live.

The screen has nine tabs — eight on the rare screen with no FilmFreeway tab
(see [FilmFreeway](#filmfreeway)). Festival, Season, Judging, Results and
Emails each save with one
**Save changes** bar that appears at the bottom of the screen while the tab has
unsaved changes; Categories and Awards keep a Save button on their own cards;
**FilmFreeway** does each thing the moment you press its button; and **Season
actions** only acts through confirmation dialogs. Knowing which is which is
most of what this guide is for.

## Finding the screen

**Settings** is the last row in the season block of the left navigation, under
Awards. It opens the season you are currently in:

```
/org/<organization>/<festival>/<season>/settings
```

**While the FilmFreeway tab has something waiting for you, the Settings row
carries the same amber count** — see [FilmFreeway](#filmfreeway) — and opens
straight on that tab instead.

Each tab has its own address, so you can bookmark one or send it to a
colleague, and reloading keeps you where you were:

| Tab | Address |
| --- | --- |
| Festival | `…/settings` |
| Season | `…/settings?tab=season` |
| Categories | `…/settings?tab=categories` |
| FilmFreeway | `…/settings?tab=filmfreeway` |
| Awards | `…/settings?tab=awards` |
| Judging | `…/settings?tab=judging` |
| Results | `…/settings?tab=submitter` |
| Emails | `…/settings?tab=emails` |
| Season actions | `…/settings?tab=actions` |

An address with no tab, or with a tab name FilmScorecard does not recognise,
opens **Festival** rather than an error — and so does the FilmFreeway address
on a screen that has no FilmFreeway tab. The Results tab's address still ends
`tab=submitter`, so a bookmark saved before the tab was renamed keeps working.

**The season home's Set dates button opens the Season tab**, where the judging
dates are — see [Finishing setup](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/finishing-setup.md).

**On Festival, Season, Judging, Results and Emails, every setting is a row.**
On the left, its name and a sentence or two saying what it does and where it
shows up; on the right, the control, with a line under it stating the result —
the address a page will live at, the date a choice depends on, how far a send
has got. There is nothing to press to read what a setting does.

**Each of those five tabs opens with one sentence saying which seasons it
applies to**: "These settings apply to every season of *your festival*. Changes
also show on past seasons' scorecards and emails." on Festival, and "These
settings apply to the *Spring 2026* season only. Other seasons keep their own."
on Season, Judging and Results. Emails says the same in its own words.

## Who can open it

**Organization owners, org admins, and festival admins** — anybody holding
**Edit festival settings and team** on the season, with a role that can change
it. See [Festival access](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/festival-access.md#capabilities). Everyone else is
kept out:

- **Coordinators, programmers and viewers** do not have the **Settings** row
  in their sidebar, and opening the address takes them to the season's
  dashboard instead.
- Anyone outside your organization sees the same "page not found" as a
  mistyped address. Your festival's existence is never revealed.
- A logged-out visitor is sent to the log-in screen first.

Attaching categories and awards from your organization's library takes an
owner or org admin as well — see
[A season's categories and awards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-categories-and-awards.md).

Every change on this screen is checked again when it is saved, so a refusal
is a refusal however the change was attempted.

## The header

Above the tabs, **Settings** on the left and a **judging pill** on the right.
The festival and season you are in are named in the switchers in the top bar,
not here. The pill has three possible readings, worked out from the **Judging**
dates — **Opens** and **Closes** — on the Season tab:

- **Judging not scheduled** — no opening date has been set, or it is still
  ahead.
- **Judging open** — indigo, with a solid dot. The opening date has passed and
  the closing date has not — **on a season that has been opened**. A season
  still in draft never reads Judging open, whatever its dates; see
  [When judging counts as open](#when-judging-counts-as-open).
- **Judging closed** — the closing date has passed, or the season is still in
  draft with its opening date behind it.

**On a draft season the banner sits above all of this.** Every screen of a
season nobody has opened judging on — this one included — carries a banner
across the top: "Judging hasn't started. Judges see no films until you open
judging.", turning amber once the opening date has passed. See
[Opening judging](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-judging.md#until-it-is-pressed).

## The two save models

**Five tabs save with one bar.** Festival, Season, Judging, Results and Emails
each have a single Save for everything on the tab. While the tab matches what
is stored there is no bar, and the tab ends with a quiet line instead — **"All
changes saved. Last saved Aug 6, 2026, 10:04 AM"**. The moment you change
anything:

- a bar appears, floating at the bottom of the screen: an amber dot,
  **Unsaved changes on Season** — naming the tab — **Discard** and **Save
  changes**. It stays in reach while the tab scrolls under it, and settles
  under the last card at the end of the page;
- a small **amber dot** appears next to that tab's name, so unsaved work is
  visible from any other tab.

**Discard** puts everything on the tab back to its last saved values, with no
confirmation. **Save changes** saves every card on the tab that has a change,
one after another, and reads **Saving…** while it works. When it is done the
bar goes and the "Last saved" time moves.

**A card that is refused stays unsaved, and the others still save.** Save
carries on past a refusal: each card saves on its own, so one card's problem
never throws away another card's work. The refused card shows why —
under the field, or in amber at the top of the card — and the bar stays, adding
"Some changes weren't saved. The card above says why."

**Some mistakes stop Save before it starts.** A setting that is wrong on
screen — a season with no name, shares that do not add up to 100, a judge call
missing something it needs to be listed — is marked in amber as soon as it is wrong. **Save changes** is then
greyed out, with "Fix the highlighted setting before saving.", until you fix it
or discard. That holds back the whole tab, not only the card with the mistake.

**On a tab with more than one card, the cards fold away.** On Season, Judging,
Results and Emails every card starts collapsed, showing its title, its status
pill if it has one, and the sentence saying what it is for — and on some, a
line or two more, such as who gets an email. Click
the title to open the card, and again to fold it. **A card that needs you opens
itself** — one holding a highlighted mistake or a refused save — and **a folded
card holding unsaved edits shows an amber dot** beside its title. The Festival
tab's one card, **Festival profile**, is always open.

**One setting is on two tabs.** When scorecards become available is set on
Results, and the Emails tab's **Step 2 · Scorecards ready** card sets the same
choice as **When it sends**, because that email goes out as each scorecard is
released. Save a change on either tab and the other shows it.

**A Save made in several parts may save some of your change.** On the Season
tab the description, location and contact email are written first, then the
two judging times, then the name, year, time zone and the other dates; if a
later part is refused, the earlier parts are already saved, and the message
points at the field still to correct. On Judging and Emails each card saves on
its own, so one can save while the other is refused.

**Categories and Awards keep a Save button on their own card.** Every change
on them — a typed judge pay rate, the season's Paid or Volunteer setting,
**Reset pay to library**, attaching and detaching — shows on screen at once and
is stored when you choose **Save categories** or **Save awards** in the card's
footer, which has its own **Discard**; the tab's amber dot works the same way
as everywhere else. See
[A season's categories and awards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-categories-and-awards.md) and
[Judge pay](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/judge-pay.md).

**Two tabs do neither.** Season actions never saves anything directly: each
of its three buttons opens a confirmation dialog first. See
[Season and festival actions](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-actions.md). **FilmFreeway** has no Save
at all: each of its buttons, and each category choice on it, takes effect the
moment you make it, so it never shows the bar or the amber dot. See
[FilmFreeway](#filmfreeway).

### Switching tabs is always safe

Moving between tabs never prompts and never loses an edit — your unsaved work
stays on its tab with its dot showing until you save or discard it.

**Leaving the screen does prompt.** With anything unsaved, clicking a
navigation row, closing the tab or reloading raises a plain browser
confirmation:

> You have unsaved changes on this page. Leave without saving them?

Cancel and you stay, with the edit intact. Accept and the edit is gone. The
dialog is the browser's own, so it looks different in each browser and cannot
be restyled.

### The saved-at line

A tab with nothing unsaved ends with **"All changes saved."** and the time of
its last save — "Last saved Aug 6, 2026, 10:04 AM" — shown in the season's own
time zone.

**Season, Judging, Results and Emails are stored in one record, so they share
that time**: saving any of them moves it on all of them. The **Festival** tab
keeps its own. The **Judging** tab shows whichever is later, the season's time
or the open judge call's, because the call is a record of its own.

**Saving the festival's public page moves these times too.** The page's
**Save changes** writes the same festival and season records — see
[The public festival page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md#some-of-these-are-the-same-values-settings-edits)
— so a "Last saved" time nobody remembers here may be an edit made on the
page.

## Festival

**Festival profile** — "How your festival is named and presented to
judges, submitters and the public." — **belongs to the festival**:
changing it changes what every past and future season shows, which is what the
tab's opening sentence says. What belongs to one season — its description,
location and contact email — is on the Season tab's
[About this season](#about-this-season) card.

**The FilmFreeway card is no longer on this tab.** Connecting the festival's
FilmFreeway account has a tab of its own — see [FilmFreeway](#filmfreeway).
The Festival profile's **FilmFreeway submission link** row stays here, and
saves with this tab's **Save changes**: it only tells filmmakers where to
enter, and has nothing to do with the connection.

| Row | What it does |
| --- | --- |
| **Public festival page** | "A page anyone can visit, with your festival's name, logo and links. Turn it off to hide it." A switch, first on the card, beside **Visible to anyone with the link** or **Hidden from the public**. Saved with the tab, like everything else on it. See [The public festival page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md#turning-the-page-on). |
| **Page link** | Under the switch, a box holding the page's saved address, with two buttons. **Copy** copies the full address and reads **Copied** — or **Copy failed** if your browser refused. **Open ↗** opens the page in a new tab, so anything unsaved here stays where it is. Both work whether the page is on or off; while it is off, only the people who can open Settings can see it, and the line under the box reads "The link keeps working once you turn the page back on." |
| **Festival name** | Your festival's name everywhere in FilmScorecard: the top bar, the switchers, the sidebar and every screen header — and the festival's public page. Its sentence: "Shown to judges and submitters, on every scorecard, and in the festival switcher at the top of this app." Required, up to 120 characters. |
| **Public address** | "The last part of your public page's web address. Use lowercase letters, numbers and dashes." The line under it reads "Your page lives at filmscorecard.com/f/…" and follows what you type — see below. |
| **Website link** | "Your festival's own website, if you have one." A full web address including `https://`. It is the website on the festival's public page, and can be changed there too. It may be left blank. |
| **FilmFreeway submission link** | "If you take entries through FilmFreeway, paste your festival's FilmFreeway page here so submitters know where to enter." **It must start `https://filmfreeway.com/`** (or `https://www.filmfreeway.com/`); any other address is refused. It drives the **Submit on FilmFreeway** buttons and the Submissions row on the public page. It may be left blank, and then none of those are drawn. |
| **Logo** | One square image per festival — "Printed at the top of every scorecard, on screen and in the PDF." See [The logo](#the-logo). |

**The scorecard preview**, beside the logo slot, shows the logo, the
festival's name and "SCORECARD · Spring 2026", with "How the top of a scorecard
will look." under it. It re-draws as you type — it shows the current contents
of the fields, not the saved ones, so you can see a change before committing
it.

### Changing the public address

The public address is the middle part of every address for this festival.
The field takes only what an address can hold, as you type — capitals become
lower case, a space becomes a hyphen, and anything else is dropped — and the
line under it shows the result as the address of the festival's public page:
`filmscorecard.com/f/<organization>/<festival>`.

Three things it refuses:

- an address with no letters or numbers in it at all;
- one of the six names FilmScorecard's own organization screens use —
  `categories`, `scorecards`, `judges`, `settings`, `festivals`, `overview`;
- an address another festival in your organization already has.

**Saving a new address moves the festival**, and the screen goes with it: you
land on Settings at the new address. The old address stops working
immediately — there is no forwarding — so any link or bookmark anyone saved
to the old one will show "page not found". Tell whoever has one.

**That includes the public page.** It moves to the new address with everything
else, and every link to the old one — shared with judges, posted, or sitting in
somebody's inbox — answers "page not found". See
[The public festival page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md#the-address).

### The logo

The square slot holds one image per festival. With none uploaded it shows a
striped placeholder reading "FESTIVAL LOGO / SQUARE"; the row's sentence says
what to bring — "Use a square image at least 512 pixels wide, as PNG, JPEG or
WebP."

1. Choose **Add a logo** (or **Replace logo** if there is one already) and
   pick a file.
2. The slot and the scorecard preview both show it straight away. **Nothing
   is stored yet** — the tab is now unsaved, like any other change.
3. Choose **Save changes** on the bar at the bottom of the screen.

Rules, checked in the browser and again on the server:

- **PNG, JPEG or WebP only.** SVG is deliberately refused.
- **4 MB maximum**, measured on the file you pick.

**Your browser shrinks it before it is sent**: to at most 512 pixels on its
longest side, saved as a PNG so a transparent background survives. If the
browser cannot do that, the file is sent as you picked it — and then it must be
under 1 MB on its own. A bigger one is refused in amber at the top of the card,
"That image couldn't be resized for upload. Choose one under 1 MB.", and the
save does not go through.

There is no Remove button — a logo can be replaced but not taken away, and
saving other fields never disturbs it.

**The festival's public page can replace it too**, with **Replace logo** in
its edit mode. It is the same logo either way: whichever was saved last is the
one on scorecards, film pages and the public page. See
[Images](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md#images).

> **One thing to know about replacing a logo.** The image is uploaded before
> the rest of the card is written. If the same save is then refused — most
> likely because the public address you also changed is already taken — the
> new logo has already replaced the old one even though the save failed. Save
> again with a valid address and everything lines up.

### What is stored and what is shown

The **festival name** and the **public address** are used throughout
FilmScorecard. On filmmakers' public film pages your festival appears as a
laurel with its **name**, the season's year and the film's first category —
see [The public film page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-page.md#what-each-festivals-tile-shows).
Neither the logo nor the website is used on those pages.

**The festival's own public page** uses the name, the logo, the website and the
FilmFreeway submission link from this card, and the season's description,
location and contact email from the Season tab — once the **Public festival
page** switch is on. See
[The public festival page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md).

**The season's description and location are shown to judges on its open judge
call** — on the call's own page, where the description shows two lines with a
**More** that opens the rest, and beside the application — when the season has one; see
[Opening a judge call](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-a-judge-call.md). **The contact
email** reaches submitters in the places listed under
[About this season](#about-this-season). None of the three is on the scorecard
preview on this tab.

## Season

Everything about the season you are in, on two cards under the tab's opening
sentence: **About this season** says what the season is, and **Dates** holds
every date it keeps, with the time zone they are read in. Both start folded.
Saving writes this season alone — every other season of the festival keeps its
own — and when you start next season it begins as a copy of them.

**The two cards are one form.** One **Save changes** stores whatever you
changed on either of them, and one **Discard** puts both back.

### About this season

Its sentence: "The basics judges and submitters see for this season."

| Row | What it does |
| --- | --- |
| **Season name** | "A short name that sits in front of the year." The line under it reads "Shown as Spring 2026 to judges and submitters." Up to 80 characters. **It cannot be left blank**: emptied, the line turns amber — "A season needs a name, such as Spring." — and Save is held until it has one. |
| **Season year** | "The year this season belongs to." Four digits, between 2000 and 2100 — the same range the festival setup form accepts. Fixed while judging is open — see [When the year locks](#when-the-year-locks). |
| **Description** | "A short description of this season, shown on your public festival page." **Up to 640 characters**, in a four-row box with "0 of 640 characters" under it. **Line breaks are saved as spaces**, so it is always one paragraph. It was called **Tagline** until recently; it is the same field. |
| **Location** | "Where the festival takes place this season." Free text, up to 120 characters. |
| **Contact email** | "Where submitters can reach your team about this season. It's printed on every scorecard and shown on each submission page." **It is where filmmakers' messages are emailed** — **Contact the festival** on their submission page and their scorecard, and **Write to the festival** on Submission details; see [Messages from filmmakers](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/submission-links.md#messages-from-filmmakers). **The submission page does not print the address itself**, whatever the sentence says. It is also the reply address on their results email and their submission-page email. Left blank, your organization's support address stands in; **with neither, filmmakers are offered no way to message you.** It is not used for judge invitations. |

The description, location and contact email may all be left blank. Until
recently they had a card of their own, **Season identity**, on the first tab;
they are the same fields. **The time zone used to sit on this card**; it is on
[Dates](#dates) now.

**The limit was 160 until recently.** A description stored longer than 640
still loads whole and still shows wherever it did, but its count reads in red, the box will
not take another character, and **Save changes is held for the whole tab** —
"Fix the highlighted setting before saving." — until it is trimmed to 640 or
fewer, whatever else on the tab you changed. The festival's public page and the
**Add festival** form hold it to the same 640.

**A season saved without a name before names were required** shows the amber
line as soon as the tab opens, and in the same way nothing on the tab saves
until you give it one.

**The description, location and contact email are on the festival's public
page as well.** The description is its hero line, wrapped to two lines with a
**More** that opens the rest when it runs longer, the location is in the hero and in its Details card, and the contact
email is its **Festival office** address — and the page edits the same values,
so a change on either side is a change on both. See
[The public festival page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md#some-of-these-are-the-same-values-settings-edits).

**Where these came from.** Seasons that existed before these fields did took
their festival's tagline and location, and a season with no contact address
took the festival's old public contact email. A festival made with **Create
festival** or **Add festival** writes what you typed on that form into its
first season. A season made from another one — by **Duplicate season** or
**Start a new season** — copies that season's description, location and
contact email.

### Renaming a season moves its address

A season's part of the web address is built from its name and year, so
changing either one changes the address of every screen in that season.

**FilmScorecard takes you to the new address when you save** — the same thing it
does when you change the festival's public address. There is nothing to do,
but any bookmarks or links you had saved to the old address stop working, so
update them.

A cosmetic edit that does not change the address — trimming spaces, say —
leaves you where you are.

### When the year locks

The **Season year** becomes a padlocked value instead of a field for one
reason: **judging is open** — opened on the season's dashboard, and inside its
dates. The line under it reads "Locked while judging is open."

The lock is applied when the change is saved as well as on screen, so it
holds however the change is attempted. A season that already holds
submissions may still change its year — the submissions stay with the
season, and the page's address moves the way it does when the season name
changes. Nothing else on the tab locks: the season name, time zone and every
date on the Dates card stay editable throughout.

### Choosing a time zone

The **Time zone** row is on the [Dates](#dates) card. Its field opens a list
with a search box at the top rather than a plain dropdown. It offers about
forty main time zones, each by the name people use and a city or two —
"Central Time (Chicago, Dallas)", "UK and Ireland (London, Dublin)". The US
zones come first, starting with Eastern Time, then **UTC**, then the rest of the
world from west to east. There is no blank choice.

**A season already saved on a zone the list leaves out keeps it.** That zone is
the first row, under its everyday name and then its standard one — "Eastern
Time, America/Detroit" — and saving without touching it works as it always
did. A zone with no everyday name shows the standard name alone.

1. Click the field. The list opens under it with the search box ready to type
   in.
2. Type any part of a zone's name or one of its cities. Case does not matter,
   so `central`, `chicago`, `new york` and `london` all find what you mean.
3. Choose the row. The list closes and the field shows your pick — the tab is
   now unsaved, like any other change.

If nothing matches, the list reads `No match for "…".` with a **Clear search**
link; it is never simply empty. **Escape** clears what you typed if there is
any, and closes the list if there is not. Clicking anywhere else closes it
too. Opening it again always starts from the full list.

**A season still on UTC says so.** While the field reads UTC, the line under
it reads "UTC is what a new season starts with. Pick the time zone your festival
runs in." A festival created now — with **Add festival**, or as your first
festival when you set up your organization — starts its first season in the
time zone of the browser it was created in instead — see
[Adding a festival](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/adding-a-festival.md#what-the-first-season-starts-with)
— so this line is mostly for older seasons, and for a browser whose zone
FilmScorecard did not recognise.

The **Start a new season** page's Time zone works the same way, prefilled from
the season you are modelling it on — see
[Season and festival actions](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-actions.md#the-other-route-add-new-season).

### Changing the time zone

Changing the time zone **re-labels** the times already stored; it never moves
them. A judging opening saved as 9:00 in Los Angeles reads as noon after you
switch the season to New York — the same moment, named differently. Times you
type afterwards are read in the new zone. The moment you pick a different zone,
the line under the field says so: "Changing the time zone doesn't move a saved
time, only how it reads. Check the judging times after you save."

**Notification date and Award winners announced are read in it too.** A public film page decides
whether a date has arrived by asking what day it is in the season's zone, so
a festival in Auckland announces some hours before one in Los Angeles that
set the same date. The festival's own public page greys its past dates by the
same zone.

### Dates

Every date the season keeps, and the time zone they are read in. Its sentence:
"The deadlines and milestones that run this season, and the time zone they're
in." The rows run in this order, the festival itself first, and each row's own
sentence says what its date does.

| Row | What it does |
| --- | --- |
| **Event dates** — **Starts** and **Ends** | "When the festival itself runs. Shown on your public festival page." Both optional here; **Ends** needs **Starts** to be set too, and cannot be before it. Display only — nothing in FilmScorecard schedules against them — but they are what the festival's [public page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md) prints in its hero, its Details card and the **Festival** row of its Dates tab, and **the public page will not save without a start date**. |
| **Time zone** | "Every date and time on this card uses this time zone, and so do the dates judges and submitters see." See [Choosing a time zone](#choosing-a-time-zone) and [Changing the time zone](#changing-the-time-zone). |
| **Final submission deadline** | "The last day to enter. Submissions imported after this date still join this season." It was called **Submission deadline** until recently, **Final deadline** before that, and **Submissions close** before that; the public page and the **Add festival** form call it Final submission deadline too. **It does not block anything** — imports still land in this season after it passes. Once the date is behind you, the line under it reads "Passed." |
| **Judging** — **Opens** and **Closes** | "Judges can score submissions between these two times." A date field and a time field each, read in the season's time zone. **The date alone is enough**: picking it fills the time with 12:00 am for **Opens** and 11:59 pm for **Closes**, and clearing a time puts that default back rather than losing the date. The time field is greyed out until its date is set. While **Opens** is empty, **Today** sits under it: it fills in today's date, in the season's time zone, at 12:00 am — an unsaved change like any other, until you choose **Save changes**. While judging is open, a **Close judging now** link sits under the row's sentence — see [Closing judging](#closing-judging). **Opens**, once [Open judging](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-judging.md) has been pressed, is the moment judges are offered films — and, on a season you have not opened, **the moment its automatic email to submitters starts waiting for Open judging**; see [Inviting submitters](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/inviting-submitters.md#when-the-invitations-go-out). **Closes** is required whenever an opening is set, and must be after it. The line under them reads "Moving the closing time into the future re-opens judging." — see [Re-opening judging](#re-opening-judging). |
| **Notification date** | "The day you tell submitters whether they were selected. Sending the notices is a separate step." It was called **Selections announced** until recently, and **Selection date** before that; it is the same date, it does the same things, and the public page and the emails print it as Notification date too. "Not set." under it while it is empty. No email is sent when it arrives. **It has real effects.** On a season that releases scorecards **When selections are announced**, this is the date the scorecards open — from midnight, in the season's own time zone; see [Releasing scorecards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md). And from the same midnight, a filmmaker's [public page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-page.md#notification-date) shows **Official Selection** on your festival's tile for a Selected submission — a submission still in consideration or not selected gets no tile at all — and filmmakers who have saved the submission to their FilmScorecard account are told in their bell whether you selected it. Before the date, nothing about the selection shows anywhere — so do not set it before you are ready to tell filmmakers. **The results email names it too**, under "What happens next", while it is still ahead; see [What a submitter gets](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md#what-a-submitter-gets). |
| **Award winners announced** | "The day you announce award winners. From then, public submission pages show the awards. Optional." "Not set." under it while it is empty. From midnight on this date, in the season's zone, a filmmaker's [public page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-page.md#award-winners-announced) shows what this season's award pools decided about their film — one laurel with the film's highest standing — **Winner**, **Honorable Mention**, **Nominee**, **Finalist**, **Semifinalist** or **Quarterfinalist** — and filmmakers who have saved the submission to their account see the standing in their bell, and an **Award winner** pill on their Festivals tab for a win or a mention. No email is sent. Before the date, or with no date, nothing from the pools reaches any filmmaker. It is independent of the Notification date: each date answers for its own results. It was called **Awards announced** until recently. |

**The two judging dates used to be on the Judging tab.** They are the same
dates, they do the same things, and they save with the Season tab; the
Judging tab now holds only the rules judging follows.

The two **Event dates** replace the old **Festival dates** box, which took
free text. **What was typed there is not turned into dates.** While both date
fields are empty, a season that had something in the old box shows it under
them — "Until you set these, your public page shows the dates as you first
wrote them:" and the old text — so you can see what to enter. Fill in the dates
and the line goes. **Despite what that line says, the public page does not show
the old text**: it shows no festival dates at all until **Starts** is set.

### When judging counts as open

**Judging is open when two things are true together**: somebody has pressed
the **Open judging** card on the season's [dashboard](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-judging.md),
turning the season from a draft into an open one, **and** the dates on the
Dates card are running — the opening date has passed and the closing date has
not. That is what judges need before they are offered any film, and it is what
Settings reads too: the pill in the header, the locked fields and **Close
judging** all wait for both. **Opening judging touches none of these dates**,
and the dates alone open nothing: a draft season whose opening date has passed
still offers judges nothing, and every screen of it carries an amber banner
saying judges are waiting. See [Opening judging](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-judging.md).

### While judging is open, two fields lock

A season still in draft never locks, whatever its dates say, and its pill
reads **Judging closed**, as on the Season overview. Once judging is open, two
fields become fixed values, and each says so on its own row — no notice heads
either card:

- the **Season year** on this tab, with "Locked while judging is open." under
  it;
- the Creative row's **Judges** figure on the Judging tab's Scoring card, with
  "The creative judge count is locked while judging is open." at the foot of
  its table.

The Dates card's **Judging** row gains a **Close judging now** link under its
sentence — see [Closing judging](#closing-judging). Everything else stays
editable, including **Skipping a submission**, the shares (until a scorecard
has been released — see [When the weights lock](#when-the-weights-lock))
**and the whole open judge call card**.

**Both judging times stay editable.** Push the closing time further into the
future and judging simply keeps running; pull it into the past and judging
closes. The opening time can be corrected too: moving it past the current
moment holds judging until then. The line under the two says both: "Moving the
opening time later holds judging until then. Moving the closing time into the
future keeps it open."

### Re-opening judging

Because judging is worked out from the dates, **setting the closing date back
into the future re-opens judging** on a season you have already opened. That
is intended, not a loophole: it is how you extend a judging period you closed
too early. The pill returns to **Judging open** and the two fields lock again.
**It also unlocks the press kit's points** until the new closing time passes —
see [Freezing the press kit when judging closes](#freezing-the-press-kit-when-judging-closes).

### Closing judging

**Close judging** is only offered while judging is open — on an opened season,
inside its dates. On a draft season there is nothing to close: no judge can
score on it.

1. Choose **Close judging now**, under the **Judging** row's sentence on the
   Season tab's Dates card.
2. A dialog opens: "Close judging now?" — "Judges can no longer score
   submissions, and the season year and the number of creative judges can
   change again. You can re-open judging by moving the closing time into the
   future." — with the currently scheduled closing time on its monospace line
   ("Scheduled to close …").
3. Choose **Close judging**.

That sets the closing time to this moment. The **Close judging now** link
goes, the two fields unlock, the pill reads **Judging closed**, and **Archive season**
becomes available on Season actions.

**It is checked again when you confirm.** A dialog left open on a season that
has since closed, or one that was never opened, is refused with "Judging is
not open, so there is nothing to close." and nothing moves.

> **One consequence to check first.** If the season releases scorecards
> **When judging closes** — on the Results tab — then closing judging, here or
> by pulling the closing date into the past, opens every eligible scorecard in
> the season to
> its submitter straight away, and their results emails follow. If you are not
> ready for that, move the season to **Only when I release them** and save
> before you close. See [Releasing scorecards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md). It
> also locks the section weights, for the same reason.
>
> On **As each submission is approved**, closing judging is not a release
> trigger: it is what lets the season be marked released once every
> submission is out — see
> [As each submission is approved](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md#as-each-submission-is-approved).

**Closing judging does not close your judge call**, and closing your judge
call does not close judging. They are two independent dates: judging closes
here, and the call's **Applications close** is on the Judging tab.

## FilmFreeway

**The tab after Categories connects the festival's FilmFreeway account**, so
its submissions come into one season by themselves every six hours, with a
**Sync now** for in between. It used to be a card on the Festival tab; the
Festival tab's **FilmFreeway submission link** row is a different thing and
stayed there. Everything on this tab is in
[Connecting FilmFreeway](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/connecting-filmfreeway.md).

- **It belongs to the festival, not to one season**: every season's Settings
  shows the same tab, and the films go into the one season you choose.
- **It has no save bar.** Connect, Sync now, each category choice, Remove key
  and Undo sync each take effect the moment you make them, and nothing on the
  tab is touched by **Discard**.
- **Its label carries an amber count** while something there needs a person —
  a category waiting to be matched, a film FilmFreeway has flagged, or a pause —
  visible from whichever tab is open.
- **It is on every organization's Settings unless FilmScorecard has turned
  FilmFreeway sync off for yours.** Then it shows only while there is something
  to clean up — a saved key, or films the sync brought in — and offers nothing
  but **Remove key** and **Undo sync**; with nothing to clean up there is no
  FilmFreeway tab, and `…/settings?tab=filmfreeway` opens Festival. See
  [When FilmFreeway sync is turned off for your organization](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/connecting-filmfreeway.md#when-filmfreeway-sync-is-turned-off-for-your-organization).
- **Its times are in your own time zone**, not the season's, unlike the rest
  of this screen.

## Judging

Two cards under the tab's opening sentence: **Scoring** — the rules judging
follows — and, under it, the season's **Open judge call**. Both start folded.
The dates judging runs between are on the Season tab's [Dates](#dates) card.

The Scoring card's sentence: "How judges score this season's submissions, and
how their scores add up." Four rows:

| Row | What it does |
| --- | --- |
| **Skipping a submission** | "Whether a judge can pass on a submission they were assigned, for example if they know the person who made it." A choice of three, each with a line saying what it means: **Not allowed** — "Judges must score every submission they're assigned."; **Allowed, with a written reason** — "The judge tells you why before the submission leaves their list."; **Allowed, no reason needed** — "The judge can pass without explaining." It was called **Skipping a film**. What a judge sees under each is in [Skipping a film](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/skipping-a-film.md). |
| **How a score is made up** | A small table, one row per kind of scorecard — **Creative**, **Technical**, and **Press kit** ("Tagline, synopsis, statement and poster") — under three headings: **Scorecard**, **Counts for** and **Judges**. **Counts for** holds each scorecard's share of a submission's 100 points — three whole-number percentages that must add up to exactly 100; a new season starts at 60 / 20 / 20, see [Section weights](#section-weights). **Judges** is how many of that scorecard each submission needs: for Creative, a whole number from 1 to 20, counted **for each category a submission competes in** — see [Judges per category](#judges-per-category); for Technical and Press kit, always **1**, because each is filed once for a submission. **How scoring works ↗**, under the row's sentence, opens the [guide to the model](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/how-scoring-works.md) in a new tab, so nothing unsaved here is lost. |
| **Creative judging waits for technical approval** | A switch, **on** for every season unless you turn it off. While it is on, a judge is offered a film's creative scorecard only once its technical review has been approved — see [Creative judging waits for technical approval](#creative-judging-waits-for-technical-approval). |
| **Blind judging** | **Always on**, padlocked — see [Blind judging cannot be turned off](#blind-judging-cannot-be-turned-off). |

**What a judge is paid is not on this tab.** It belongs to the season's
categories — see [Judge pay](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/judge-pay.md) — and what any one judge is paid
belongs to their invitation, see
[What an invitation pays](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/what-an-invitation-pays.md).

**There is no Written comment rule any more.** The tab used to carry a
**Written comment** select — Optional, Required on every scorecard, or
Required when a score is below 3 — and it never changed what a judge had to
write. It is gone from this tab, from the Start a new season page and from
season duplication. **What a judge writes is now decided by the creative
scorecard itself**: its two written-feedback switches, **Positive Feedback**
and **Opportunities for Improvement**, set in the scorecard builder. A box
whose switch is on is shown to every judge filing on that scorecard and must
be filled in before the card can be filed; a box whose switch is off is not
shown and not asked for. See
[Written feedback](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/building-a-scorecard.md#written-feedback).

**There is no Reminder to judges setting any more.** The card used to offer
reminders — weekly, or every three days in the final week — but no reminder
was ever sent, so the choice has been taken off the screen. FilmScorecard
sends judges no progress reminders.

### Judges per category

**Creative's Judges number counts per category.** The figure sits in the
**Judges** column of the Creative row, in the **How a score is made up** table,
and the row's sentence says so — "The creative count is for each category a
submission is in." It is how many creative scorecards each category a
submission competes in needs. **It used to
be called Judges per film**, and the queue followed that name: a film stopped being offered to judges once that many judges had it,
however many categories it competed in. It now works per category — the way a
score, the Scores in ticks and a finished season have always counted it — so a
film in two categories stays on offer until each of them has its full panel.

Four things follow:

- **One judge takes one creative card on a film**, for one of its categories.
  At 3, a film in two categories needs six creative scorecards, which is six
  different judges unless your own team fills some of the places.
- **A creative scorecard your own team files counts toward the number** exactly
  as a judge's does — see
  [Filling out a scorecard yourself](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/filling-out-a-scorecard.md#what-it-does-not-do).
- **A judge scoped to one category stops being offered a film once that
  category is full**, even while the film's other category is still short.
- **Judges are given the category that is furthest behind** when they take a
  film, so a two-category film's panels fill evenly.

How the number, the order and a judge's scope combine to decide what each judge
is offered is on
[How the judging queue works](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/how-the-judging-queue-works.md#7-every-place-on-it-is-taken).
Whether your roster has enough judges to meet the number at all is on the
season's dashboard — see
[The two warnings](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-judging.md#the-two-warnings).

### Section weights

For the model behind these numbers, with one film worked through and how to
fit your festival's own way of judging into it, see
[How scoring works](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/how-scoring-works.md).

The **Counts for** column of the Scoring card's **How a score is made up**
table holds the three shares — the season's section weights — for
**Creative**, **Technical** and **Press kit**, with a running line under the
table: "The shares add up to 100%." The weights are the one setting that
decides what a score *means* at your festival.

**Every category a submission can be scored in is scored out of 100.** Each of
the three kinds of scorecard earns a share of that 100, in proportion to what
was marked on it. A technical card worth 20 points, on which a reviewer passed
15, earns three quarters of the Technical share.

**A score is what has been earned so far, and the Creative share is divided
among the panel.** The technical and press-kit reviews are filed once for a
submission, so the whole of their share lands when that one review is
approved. The Creative share is split equally between the judges **Judges per
category** expects in that category, and each approved creative scorecard
earns one of those shares — so a film with one of three judges in carries a
third of the Creative share and grows as the other two are approved. See
[Overall is points banked, not a forecast](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/submissions.md#overall-is-points-banked-not-a-forecast).

A new season starts at **60 Creative / 20 Technical / 20 Press kit**. Change
them to anything you like, as long as the three add up to 100:

1. Type over the three **Counts for** figures. The line under the table keeps
   count as you type, and turns amber while the three do not add up — "The
   shares add up to 90%. They need to add up to 100%." Meanwhile **Save
   changes** is greyed out, with "Fix the highlighted setting before saving."
2. Once they make 100, choose **Save changes** on the bar at the bottom of the
   screen.

Six things worth knowing:

- **They are shares, not fixed points.** A category renormalizes over the
  sections it actually uses, so on a 60/20/20 season a category with no press
  kit is scored Creative 75 and Technical 25 — and still out of 100. The split
  one category ends up with is written out on its own section of a
  submission's
  [Scoring tab](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-a-submission.md#what-the-100-is-divided-into).
- **Zero is allowed, and it means "collected but not scored".** A section
  weighted 0 is still judged, the filmmaker still reads it, and a submission is
  still not complete until it is filed — it simply adds nothing to the score.
- **Judges per category is part of this arithmetic**, not only of who is
  offered a film: it is what the Creative share is divided by. It is locked
  while judging is open, so it cannot move under a score somebody has already
  read.
- **The submissions list calls the press-kit section "Marketing".** It is the
  same section under a different heading; nothing else in FilmScorecard uses that
  word.
- **They change nothing a judge sees or does.** Judges never see weights,
  totals or bands — see [Blind judging](#blind-judging-cannot-be-turned-off).
  Changing the split re-reads every score on your own screens the next time
  they are drawn; no scorecard is rewritten and no marks move.
- **Next season inherits them.** Duplicating a season carries its split, like
  its other rules — see
  [Season and festival actions](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-actions.md).

#### When the weights lock

**The split is fixed for good the moment any scorecard reaches a filmmaker** —
whether that is the season's own release, or one submission released ahead of
the rest, by hand or by the **As each submission is approved** schedule. The
three shares become plain figures you cannot type over, the running total goes,
and the foot of the table reads "Shares are locked because scorecards have been
released." A save that changes them anyway is refused with "Section weights are
locked once a scorecard has been released."

That is the one lock on them. **They stay editable while judging is open**,
which the rest of this card does not: a change to the split touches no
judge's marks, and until a scorecard is out nobody has read a score it would
move. Once one filmmaker has their scorecard — and possibly paid for it — a
change would move a percentage and a season rank somebody has already seen.

Every other rule on this card, including **Skipping a submission**, stays
editable after release.

**While judging is open, Creative's Judges number locks**, and the foot of the
table says so — "The creative judge count is locked while judging is open." —
beside the shares' own line when both apply. See
[While judging is open, two fields lock](#while-judging-is-open-two-fields-lock).

### Creative judging waits for technical approval

The third row of the Scoring card is a switch, and it is **on** for every
season — seasons that were already judging when it arrived included. While it
is on, **a judge is offered a film's creative scorecard in a category only once
the technical review that category uses has been approved** in the
[Review Queue](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/review-queue.md#what-approving-does). Filed is not enough: a
technical review waiting for approval, or one you sent back to its judge, keeps
the creative scorecard waiting.

- **Each category waits on its own.** A film in two categories opens in each as
  the technical review that category uses is approved; two categories sharing
  one technical scorecard open together.
- **A category with no technical scorecard never waits.** Its creative
  scorecards are offered as they always were.
- **Your own team is never held.** A creative scorecard you fill in yourself
  can be filed at any time, and a technical review you fill in yourself is
  approved as you file it, so it opens the film to creative judges at once —
  see [Filling out a scorecard yourself](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/filling-out-a-scorecard.md). A film
  you hand back to a judge from the [Issue tab](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/screener-problems.md) is not
  held either.
- **Work already in a judge's hands is left alone.** A judge holding a creative
  scorecard when the switch goes on can still file it, and one you sent back to
  them can be filed again. Only new creative scorecards wait.
- **An approval can be lost.** If the judge who filed an approved technical
  review later withdraws from the film — a conflict of interest, or a screener
  that will not play — their review goes with them, and the film's creative
  scorecards wait again until another technical review is approved.
- **Judges are told how many films are waiting, and nothing else.** A waiting
  film counts among a judge's upcoming films, and a judge with nothing else to
  score is told how many films are waiting for their technical review — never
  which ones, or who is reviewing them. See
  [Nothing to score right now](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/your-judging-home.md#nothing-to-score-right-now).
- **The season's dashboard tells you when nobody can file the review.** Its
  "No technical judge yet" line then reads "No technical judge yet, so
  creative judging is on hold" — see [The two warnings](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-judging.md#the-two-warnings).

**Turning it off opens every waiting creative scorecard** the next time each
judge looks. The switch is not locked while judging is open, and saves with
**Save changes** like the rest of the tab. **Duplicating a season carries it
over**, on or off — see [Season and festival actions](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-actions.md).

### Blind judging cannot be turned off

The last row of the Scoring card, **Blind judging**, is a statement, not a
setting. Its value is a padlocked **Always on**, and its sentence reads:

> Judges never see each other's scores, averages or names. This is how
> FilmScorecard works, so it can't be turned off.

There is no control behind it anywhere in FilmScorecard.

### The open judge call

The second card on this tab, headed **Open judge call** — with its `CALL-`
code once it exists, and a pill reading **Accepting applications** or **Closed
to applications** — is how a season is advertised to judges who do not work for
you yet. **Saving it with Accepting applications on puts the season on the
judge portal's open-calls board**, where any judge on FilmScorecard can read it
and apply; saving it off takes it back down. Invitations by email are
unaffected either way. Folded, the card still shows its requests line and
**Review requests**.

The card holds one call per season and is the only place a call exists — there
is no other screen for creating, editing, opening or closing one.

In short:

- **Accepting applications** is the switch. While it is off, the card shows
  only **Applications close** and **Where applicants send questions** under it
  — the two things a closed call saves. The roles, submission types and
  categories you had picked are kept for when you turn it back on, and the
  line under the switch says so.
- **Applications close** is a date, read in the season's time zone, and the
  call closes at the end of that day. It has nothing to do with the judging
  dates on the Season tab.
- **Judge roles wanted** and **Submission types open to applicants** (which
  was called **Work types open to applicants**) decide who may apply and which
  of your categories can be opened to them.
- **Pay shown to applicants** is derived from the per-category rates on the
  Categories tab and cannot be typed here — **Open Categories** takes you
  there. It is the *season's* span; what a judge is quoted is the span across
  the categories you opened. **An applicant may also choose to volunteer
  instead**, on the last step of their own application — nothing on this card
  advertises that or switches it off.
- **Categories open to applicants** decides which of the season's categories a
  judge is shown, quoted a price for, and can ask to be assigned from. Left at
  **All categories** it opens the whole line-up, including categories you
  attach later.
- **Where applicants send questions** (which was called **Questions from
  judges**) is an optional email address. It is shown on the festival's
  [public page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md), as **Judging coordinator** in its
  Contact card, while the call is open. Left blank, the page shows no address
  for judge questions.
- **There is no Copy link on this card any more.** The public page's address,
  with **Copy**, is on the [Festival](#festival) tab.
- The four "cannot be listed without one" rules gate *listing*, never closing:
  a call can always be turned off and saved.

**While the festival's public page is on, an open call is also its Judging
tab**, and somebody without a FilmScorecard account can create a judge account
from that tab's **Apply to judge** button — see
[Applying to judge from the page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md#applying-to-judge-from-the-page).

The whole card, field by field — including what a judge then sees — is
[Opening a judge call](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-a-judge-call.md).

## Results

Two cards under the tab's opening sentence: **Releasing scorecards** — "When
submitters can see how they scored, and what every scorecard says." — and **Set
by blind judging**. Both start folded. This tab was called **Submitter
profile** until recently; it is the same settings, without the invitation
ones, which are on the [Emails](#emails) tab's **Step 1 · First contact** card.
The address a filmmaker's questions and messages go to is the **Contact email**
on the Season tab's [About this season](#about-this-season) card.

**Releasing scorecards** holds these rows:

| Row | What it does |
| --- | --- |
| **Scorecards become available** | A choice of five, in this order, each with a line under it: **When judging closes** — the saved closing time, or "Uses the judging close time on the Season tab."; **When selections are announced** — the Notification date, or "Uses the selections date on the Season tab." (this choice was called **On the selection date**); **As each submission is approved** — "Each submitter gets theirs as soon as every scorecard on their submission is approved."; **When every submission is approved** — "Everyone gets theirs together, once the last submission is approved."; and **Only when I release them** — "Nothing is released until you do it yourself." Under the list, a dated choice whose date is not set gets an amber warning — "No judging close time is set yet, so scorecards won't be released until you add one on the Season tab.", or the same for the selections date — which does not stop you saving. The two approval choices get how far the season has got: "Waiting on 14 submissions." or "Every scorecard is approved, releasing on the next sweep."; "12 of 40 submissions released. Waiting on 28." or "No submissions yet." The row's sentence: "From this moment submitters can see their scores, and the Scorecard ready email goes out. A submission with no approved scorecard gets neither. Releasing can't be undone." The [Emails](#emails) tab's **Step 2 · Scorecards ready** card sets the same choice, as **When it sends**. |
| **Release scorecards** | A row with a button, shown only on a season whose *saved* choice is "Only when I release them" and whose scorecards have not gone out yet. It opens a confirmation dialog and cannot be undone. |
| **Release the rest** | A row with a button in the same place, shown only on a season whose *saved* choice is "As each submission is approved" and that has not been marked released yet, with the season's "12 of 40 submissions released." line under it. It releases every submission still waiting — or, with none waiting, only marks the season released — after a confirmation dialog, and cannot be undone. |
| **Released** | The padlocked row that takes the place of either once a season's scorecards have gone out, under any of the five choices: the date and time, "Aug 17, 2026, 3:20 PM", in the season's time zone, with "This season's scorecards have gone out. Submitters open theirs from the link in their Scorecard ready email." It was called **Scorecards released**. |
| **Press kit after judging closes** | **Keep its score as judged** — "The press kit can still be edited, but the score it earned when judging closed doesn't change." — or **Keep counting edits** — "An edit made after judging closes can still change the score." Whether a change made to a submission after judging closes can still move its press kit points. **Keep its score as judged** unless somebody has changed it. The row's sentence names the press kit's share from the Judging tab: "The press kit is the tagline, synopsis, statement and poster on a submission's page. It counts for 20% of the score." See [Freezing the press kit when judging closes](#freezing-the-press-kit-when-judging-closes). **Keep its score as judged** was called **Lock its points**, and before that the choice was a switch named **Freeze press kit after judging closes**; on is **Keep its score as judged**, off is **Keep counting edits**. |
| **Note on every scorecard** | "A short message added to the closing lines of every scorecard submitters read this season. Use it to thank them or explain how scoring works." Up to 320 characters, with "0 of 320 characters" under the box. |

**Releasing is a fourth one-way action**, and it is not on the Season actions
tab. Releasing emails every submitter with an approved scorecard and lets them
unlock what their judges wrote; there is no un-release anywhere. **Saving can
release too**: moving a season to **As each submission is approved** while some
of its submissions are already fully approved releases them, so **Save
changes** asks first — "Save and release 12 scorecards now?" — and **Cancel**
saves nothing.
[Releasing scorecards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md) covers the whole of it —
what opens when, what the two approval schedules measure, who gets nothing,
and what a submitter then sees. **It also locks the season's section
weights** — see [When the weights lock](#when-the-weights-lock). **An owner or
org admin can put a promo code in those results emails** from the release
dialog — see
[Including a promo code](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md#including-a-promo-code).

**One submission's scorecard can also go out ahead of the season**, from the
**Scorecard link** card on that submission's own detail panel rather than from
here. The padlocked row on this tab records the season's release only; a
submission released on its own — by hand, or by **As each submission is
approved** — is recorded on its panel. See
[Releasing one submission's scorecard](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-one-scorecard.md).

**What a new season starts on.** A festival's first season — the one **Create
festival** or **Add festival** makes — starts at **As each submission is
approved**. A season made from another one, by **Duplicate season** or **Start
a new season**, takes that season's release choice; the Start a new season page
lets you change it on the way. Seasons that already existed keep whatever they
had.

The second card, **Set by blind judging**, states platform behaviour you
cannot change — "These protect judges and keep judging fair, so they can't be
changed. They're listed here so you know what submitters will and won't see."

| Row | Value | Its sentence |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **Judge names** | Never shown | "Comments are labelled Judge 1, Judge 2 and Judge 3 instead." |
| **Rank against other submissions** | Only on an unlocked scorecard | "A submitter sees where they placed this season only after unlocking their full scorecard." |

They are padlocked facts, not settings. The card was the two **Fixed by blind
judging** rows at the foot of the old Results card, and the rank row was
called **Ranking against other films**. The ranking row used to say a
submitter never sees one; a submitter who unlocks their scorecard now reads
their place in the season — films against films, screenplays against
screenplays — and their place in each category they entered, **once a
coordinator has released that category's rank** from the
[Awards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/awards.md#releasing-a-categorys-rank) screen. Until then the page
reads "Calculating". Beyond that page the season rank appears nowhere in
FilmScorecard unless the submitter chooses to put it on the share card they can
build from it (see [Releasing scorecards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md)); the
category positions are on the Awards screen for staff.

### Freezing the press kit when judging closes

**A press kit's field items answer for themselves**: fill in a tagline or put a
poster on a submission and the item counts, and the press kit's share of the
score rises with it — see
[The press kit card](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-a-submission.md#the-press-kit-card). **Press kit
after judging closes**, on the Results tab, set to **Keep its score as
judged**, stops that once the judges have finished, so the score a filmmaker
reads — and may have paid for — counts the press kit as it stood when it was
judged.

**Every season is on Keep its score as judged** unless somebody changes it: a
festival's first season, a season made from another one, and every season that
existed before the setting did. Choose **Keep counting edits**, and save, only
if changes made after judging closes should go on counting.

What locking does:

- **It starts when the season's Judging closes time passes** — the date on the
  Season tab's [Dates](#dates) card, whether it passes by itself or you press
  [Close judging](#closing-judging). It goes by that date alone, not by whether
  judging was ever opened on the season's dashboard. A season with no closing
  date never locks.
- **Nothing is blocked.** Your team can still change every field of a
  submission after judging closes.
- **The first change to a submission's record after that moment keeps a copy
  of how its press kit stood just before it**, and from then on that copy is
  what counts for that submission. The change itself is saved, and shown
  wherever the field is shown; it simply moves no points. Each submission is
  copied once, and later changes do not replace the copy. A submission nobody
  changes needs no copy: it already stands as it did when judging closed.
- **What counts the frozen press kit:** every score — on the submissions list,
  the submission's Scoring tab and the Review Queue — the filmmaker's scorecard
  and share card, and the press kit checklist on the filmmaker's
  [submission page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/your-submission-page.md#the-press-kit-checklist): its
  ticks and crosses, the press kit score on the checklist card and on the
  overview's Submission details tile, the Filled / Empty pills on How it's
  judged, and the marks beside the fields. So does the list of what is missing in a submission-page
  email sent after judging closes. The lines of the Scoring tab's Press kit
  card show what each field held at that moment.
- **What shows the current value:** the submission's Information tab, the boxes
  on the filmmaker's submission page, and the filmmaker's own project. **So a
  filmmaker who fills in a missing field after judging closes sees it saved in
  its box while its checklist row keeps its cross and the box still reads
  Missing** — and nothing on their page says why.

Changing your mind:

- **Choose Keep counting edits and save**, and every copy in the season is
  dropped: current values count again at once, scores included.
- **Choose Keep its score as judged again and save**, and the season locks again from
  the next change — at what the record holds then, not at what it held when
  judging closed.
- **Move Judging closes into the future, or clear it**, and the copies are
  dropped too, as they should be when judging is re-opened. When the new
  closing time passes, the lock starts over from the first change after it.

**Who can change it:** anybody who can open Settings — see
[Who can open it](#who-can-open-it). Neither judging nor a release locks it.

**Duplicate season** and **Start a new season** copy it from the season they
are made from; the Start a new season page has no control for it.

**A season whose judging closed before the setting was added** is on Keep its
score as judged too. A change made to one of its submissions between that close and the
setting's arrival has already counted; the lock keeps what the record held at
the first change since.

## Emails

**The two emails that send themselves, and what decides when they go.** Every
other email FilmScorecard sends for your festival goes because somebody pressed
a button, so it needs no setting here. This tab holds the two that can go on
their own: the link to each filmmaker's submission page, as each submission
arrives, and the Scorecard ready email. The tab opens with "Emails FilmScorecard
sends to submitters for the *Spring 2026* season, on your festival's behalf.
Each one has its own settings." What every email is, and what it says, is in
[Emails your festival sends](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/emails-your-festival-sends.md).

**One card per email.** Each card's head carries the email's name, a status
pill, a **Preview email** button that opens the email itself — see
[Preview](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/emails-your-festival-sends.md#preview) — a sentence saying what the
email is for, and two lines that describe it rather than set anything: **Who
gets it** and **What's in it**. The settings are the rows under them. **The two
cards are numbered in the order the emails go out**: **Step 1 · First contact**, the
submission-page link, then **Step 2 · Scorecards ready**, the results email.
They were called **Before judging starts** and **Scorecard ready**.

### Before judging starts

The card titled **Step 1 · First contact**: the email with the link to each
filmmaker's [submission page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/submission-links.md), where they fill in what
judges read. Its pill reads **Not decided**, **On arrival** or **Manual**, from
the saved setting. Its sentence: "Asks each submitter to finish their
submission page."

- **Who gets it**: "Every submitter, one email for each submission they
  entered."
- **What's in it**: "A link to their submission page, where they add the
  tagline, synopsis, statement and poster judges read. Anything left blank
  earns no points."

| Row | What it does |
| --- | --- |
| **How it sends** | **As each one arrives** — "Each new submission gets it on its own, once it's in a category." — or **Only when I click Send now**, which means "not on its own", not "never". **A new season has neither selected** and reads **Not decided**: nothing goes on its own until somebody picks one, here or on the [season overview](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/inviting-submitters.md#deciding-on-the-season-overview), and once picked nothing takes it back to Not decided. **As each one arrives** replaces **Automatically**, which counted a set number of days back from the judging start, and the **When it starts sending** day count is gone. It was called **Send it**. |
| **Sent so far** | How far the season has got, and **Send to 25 now** — see below. |

**Saving As each one arrives covers only what arrives afterwards.** When the
season already holds submissions in a category that have not had the email,
an amber line under the choice counts them — "28 submissions already here in a
category haven't had it. Only new arrivals get it on their own, so use Send
now below for these." Nothing is sent for them until you press **Send to 25
now**.

**Sent so far** reads "No submissions yet." while no submission's page is open
— which includes once the **Notification date** has arrived or the
season is Completed or Archived, but not merely once judging has closed — and
otherwise "112 of 140 submissions have been sent it", over a progress bar,
then **Sent.** "Emailed to the submitter.", **Not sent yet.** — the ones in a
category — and, only when there are any, **Waiting for a category.**, with a
**See them in Submissions** link to the Submissions list showing only the
submissions in no category. The Not sent yet line reads "Nothing goes out on
its own until you choose how it sends.", "Nothing goes out until you send
it.", "New arrivals go out on their own. Any others wait for Send now.", "New
arrivals are held until you open judging. Any others wait for Send now.",
"Every submission in a category has it." or "Everyone has it.". While anybody
in a category is waiting, **Send to 25 now** sits under them — whatever the
setting — beside "Sends to the 25 submissions in a category that haven't had
it.", and asks first: "Send to 25 submitters now?", "Each gets an email with a
link to their submission page. Submitters already sent their link are
skipped.", **Send to 25 now**. Once you confirm, the button reads **Queued**
and greys out, the waiting line reads "Sending now. Queued *the time*.", and
"This takes a few minutes. You can leave this page." until the counts move.

**This setting sends email to people outside your organization**: under **As
each one arrives**, within minutes of each submission arriving, with no
confirmation. **Every new season starts Not decided**,
except one made with **Start the next season**, which takes its source
season's choice. A season that was set to **Automatically** now reads **As
each one arrives**; one that was set to **Only when I click Send now** now
reads **Not decided**. When the email goes, who gets it, what it says and what
**Send to 25 now** does are all in
[Inviting submitters](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/inviting-submitters.md).

### Scorecard ready

The card titled **Step 2 · Scorecards ready**: the email that tells each
filmmaker their scorecard is ready, with the link to it. **That link opens
their submission page's overview, with the scorecard put first** — "Your
scorecard is in" — and its **View scorecard** goes on to the scorecard,
carrying the email's promo code when it has one. What sends it is the season's release choice. Its pill reads **Not sent
yet**, **Sending** once some submissions have been released on their own, or
**Sent** once the season is marked released. Its sentence: "Tells each
submitter their scorecard is ready to view."

- **Who gets it**: "Every submitter whose scorecard has been approved."
- **What's in it**: "A link to their scorecard. Reading what the judges wrote
  is a paid unlock."

| Row | What it does |
| --- | --- |
| **When it sends** | **The same setting as the [Results](#results) tab's Scorecards become available**, and you can change it here: the same five choices with the same line under each, and under the list the same amber warning for a dated choice with no date, or a line such as "Judging closes *the date*.", "Selections are announced *the date*.", "Nothing is released until you release it." or "Waiting on 14 submissions.". Its sentence: "The same setting as on the Results tab, so the email and the scorecard arrive together." It saves with the tab's **Save changes**, and **switching to As each submission is approved while some submissions are already fully approved asks first**, exactly as on Results — "Save and release 12 scorecards now?" — because saving releases them; **Cancel** saves nothing. **Once the email has gone** — the season's scorecards are out — the row is a padlocked "Sent" and the date and time, its sentence reads "It followed the release setting, so the email and the scorecard arrived together.", and **Open Results** takes you to the Results tab. |
| **Promo code** | **No promo code**, or one of your organization's active promo codes that covers this season, listed as its code and offer — `SPRING · $5.00 off`, `PANELIST · Free`. **Shown only to owners and org admins**, and only while at least one such code exists. It was called **Promo code on automatic releases**. See below. |

**A promo code on the emails that send themselves.** A release you start by
hand — **Release scorecards**, **Release the rest**, or one submission's own
release — lets an owner or org admin pick a code in its dialog. A release that
happens on its own has no dialog, so this is where its code is chosen: when
the season's scorecards go out on any of the four schedules, each Scorecard
ready email carries this code, with the discount it gives worked out for that
filmmaker. The row's sentence says so — "A discount on unlocking the judges'
written comments, added to each Scorecard ready email that sends on its own. A
code that has expired or stopped covering this season sends the plain email
instead." — and the same goes for the email to any filmmaker on your promo
suppression list. The line under it reads "No discount is included." or "Each
email carries this code, with its discount worked out for that submitter."

- **On a season that releases only by hand, the field is greyed out**, with
  "Promo codes are only added to emails that send on their own. When you
  release by hand, you pick a code then."
- **A saved code that no longer applies** stays in the select, reading "A code
  that no longer applies", so the field never reads No promo code over a
  stored code. Choose **No promo code** or another code, and save.
- **A code that stopped being offered between loading the page and saving**
  is refused with "That promo code can't be included. Refresh the page and try
  again."
- **A new season starts at No promo code.** **Duplicate season** and **Start a
  new season** do not carry the code.

See [Including a promo code](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md#including-a-promo-code)
and [Promo codes](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/promo-codes.md).

## What this screen does not do yet

Some of what is set on these tabs is **stored and validated here, and acted on
elsewhere**. Being plain about it:

- **Add-on prices are configuration only.** They are stored and displayed;
  nothing charges anyone. A season records no entry fee at all — entry fees
  are collected on FilmFreeway. See
  [A season's categories and awards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-categories-and-awards.md).
- **Judge pay rates are configuration only too.** They are stored, carried
  into next season, and recorded against each scorecard as it is filed —
  and nothing pays anybody. No judge is shown them either. See
  [Judge pay](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/judge-pay.md). What the records add up to, and the payments
  you make outside FilmScorecard, are tracked in the season's **Payouts**
  section — see [Paying your judges](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/paying-your-judges.md).
- **The season's Paid or Volunteer setting does not decide what every judge is
  paid.** It is a ceiling: a paid season can hold a judge taken on as a
  volunteer, and each place carries its own terms. See
  [Judge pay](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/judge-pay.md#paid-or-volunteer-is-a-ceiling-not-a-rule).
- **Narrowing a call's categories does not warn you about applications you
  already hold.** The restriction now decides what a judge sees and can apply
  for, but closing a category says nothing about the requests already on your
  Requests tab — and it does not change them. See
  [Opening a judge call](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-a-judge-call.md#what-the-restriction-does-on-the-judges-side).
- **What a scorecard costs is not set here, or anywhere else on your
  screens.** A released season's submitters pay a platform-set price to unlock
  what their judges wrote, the same figure at every festival, and no field on
  any screen changes it. Your side of it is the organization's Stripe payout
  account (see [Connecting payouts](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/connecting-payouts.md)) and the season's
  Revenue card — the whole of it is
  [Selling scorecard access](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/selling-scorecard-access.md).
- **The Final submission deadline does not enforce anything.** Imports still
  land in the season after the date passes.
- **Neither the Notification date nor Award winners announced sends an
  email.** The Notification date opens scorecards on one of the five release
  choices and puts **Official Selection** on a selected film's public page;
  Award winners announced lets a film's public page show its awards. Both reach the filmmakers who have saved the
  submission to their account as updates in their bell — no email and no post
  goes out for either. A film whose filmmaker has not saved it to an account
  shows nothing anywhere, whatever the dates say. See
  [The public film page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-page.md#the-two-dates).
- **The festival's own dates schedule nothing.** **Event dates** — Starts
  and Ends — are printed on the public page and nowhere acted on.
- **The note in the sidebar's bottom corner — "Judging window not set. Add
  dates in Settings." — is fixed text.** It does not check your judging dates
  and does not change once you set them. The dates are on the Season tab.
- **Section weights are one split for the whole season.** There is no way to
  give one category a different balance from another.
- **Judges per category is one number for the whole season, too.** There is
  no way to ask for more judges in one category than in another.
- **Written feedback is not a season setting.** Which feedback boxes judges
  fill in follows each creative scorecard's own switches, and there is no way
  to ask for a box but make it optional.
- **No season-wide list of who was invited.** The **Sent so far** count on the
  Emails tab is the only figure across the season; each submission's own
  Audit tab lists the emails sent about it — see
  [The Audit tab](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-a-submission.md#the-audit-tab)
  and [Inviting submitters](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/inviting-submitters.md#what-it-does-not-do).
- **A festival's name, address, website, FilmFreeway page, logo and Public
  page switch cannot differ by season.** The season's description, location
  and contact email, on the Season tab, are per season.
- **Judges get no scoring reminders.** There is no reminder setting, and
  nothing emails a judge on its own about films still to score.
- **Most of the public page is not edited here.** Its About text, founded
  year, backdrop, social profile, the season's edition, director, programming
  partner, office phone, extra dates and venues, and its Show on page switches
  are edited only on the page itself — see
  [Editing the page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md#editing-the-page).

## Messages

Every sentence Settings can answer a change with, and what it means. Field
messages appear under the field; the rest appear in amber at the top of the
card they belong to, on the Save bar, or inside the dialog you were using.

| The message | What it means |
| --- | --- |
| Enter a festival name. | The name field is empty. |
| Enter a public address. | The address field is empty. |
| That public address has no letters or numbers in it. | What you typed cannot become an address. |
| That public address is reserved. Choose another. | It is one of `categories`, `scorecards`, `judges`, `settings`, `festivals`, `overview`. |
| That public address is already used by another festival in this organization. | Pick a different one. None of the text fields were saved — but see the note below if you also picked a new logo. |
| Enter your festival's FilmFreeway page, starting with https://filmfreeway.com/. | The **FilmFreeway submission link** is not an `https` address on `filmfreeway.com`. Nothing on the card was saved. |
| Keep the description to 640 characters. | The season's **Description** is longer than 640 characters. Rare here, because Save is held while the count is red; shorten it to 640 or fewer. |
| A season needs a name, such as Spring. | Under **Season name**, the moment it is empty. Save is held until it has one. |
| Logos must be a PNG, JPEG or WebP image. | Wrong file type. |
| That image is larger than 4 MB. Choose a smaller file. | Too big. |
| That image couldn't be resized for upload. Choose one under 1 MB. | Your browser could not shrink the logo, and the file as picked is over 1 MB. Nothing was saved. |
| The logo could not be uploaded. Try again. | The upload itself failed; nothing was saved. |
| Enter a four-digit year. | The year box does not hold four digits. |
| Enter a year between 2000 and 2100. | Four digits, but outside the range FilmScorecard accepts. |
| This festival already has a season with that name and year. | Another season of this festival already answers to that pair. |
| Choose a time zone from the list. | The time zone was not one FilmScorecard recognises. |
| Enter the start date as well as the end. | The **Event dates** row's **Ends** is set and its **Starts** is not. |
| The festival can't end before it starts. | The **Event dates** row's **Ends** is before its **Starts**. |
| Set a close date as well as an open date. | The **Judging** row's **Opens** is set on the Dates card and its **Closes** is not. |
| Judging must close after it opens. | The two dates are the wrong way round. |
| Enter a number of judges. / Judges per category must be between 1 and 20. | Creative's **Judges** figure in the Scoring card's table. Shown under the table. |
| Judging is open, so that field is fixed. Close judging first, or change the close date. | You tried to change a locked field while judging runs. |
| Judging is not open, so there is nothing to close. | Close judging was pressed on a season that is not open: it had already ended, a colleague closed it first, or it is still in draft and has never been opened. |
| Judging is still open. Close judging before archiving the season. | Archive refuses while judging runs — on an opened season, inside its dates. A draft season is never refused this way. |
| Enter a whole number from 0 to 100. | A share in the **Counts for** column is not a whole number from 0 to 100. Shown under the table. |
| Each weight must be between 0 and 100. | A share is a whole number above 100. |
| The shares add up to 90%. They need to add up to 100%. | The running line under the table, in amber, while the three shares do not total 100. Save is held until they do. (Should a split that does not add up reach the save anyway, it is refused with "Weights must add up to 100.") |
| Section weights are locked once a scorecard has been released. | The split cannot change any more — see [When the weights lock](#when-the-weights-lock). Everything else on the card still saves. |
| Set the date applications close. | The open judge call's **Accepting applications** is on with no closing date. |
| That date has passed. Pick today or a later date. | The call's closing date is before today in the season's time zone. |
| Pick at least one judge role. The call cannot be listed without one. | Neither Technical nor Creative is picked on the call. |
| Pick at least one work type. The call cannot be listed without one. | Neither Film nor Screenplay is picked on the call. |
| Pick at least one category. The call cannot be listed without one. | The call's category picker is empty. |
| Attach a category of this type in Categories before the call can be listed. | The submission types the call wants reach no attached category at all. |
| A paid offer or application is still open on this season, or a judge has accepted paid terms, so it cannot become a volunteer season. | The Categories tab's Paid/Volunteer setting is locked at Paid. Revoke the open paid invitations, decline the open paid applications — accepted paid terms settle it for good. See [Judge pay](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/judge-pay.md#volunteer-to-paid-is-always-allowed-paid-to-volunteer-is-not). |
| Every category already matches its library default. Nothing was changed. | **Reset pay to library** found nothing to do. |
| This season releases scorecards on its own schedule, so there is nothing to release by hand. | **Release scorecards** or **Release the rest**, on a season whose saved choice has no button: When judging closes, When selections are announced or When every submission is approved. |
| Scorecards for this season have already been released. | **Release scorecards** or **Release the rest**, on a season that has already gone out. Reload — the padlocked row is what you will see. |
| The scorecards could not be released. Nothing has been sent. Try again. | **Release scorecards** or **Release the rest** failed before anything was released. Nobody was emailed, and the dialog stays open so you can try again. |
| 28 submissions already here in a category haven't had it. Only new arrivals get it on their own, so use Send now below for these. | Under **How it sends**, after saving **As each one arrives**: those submissions were already in the season, so they are not sent it on their own. Nothing was sent; **Send to N now** sends them. |
| Every submission in a category has already been sent it, or is being sent it now. | **Send to N now**, when every submission in a category with an open page has been invited or is already waiting to be sent. Nothing was queued; press Cancel. |
| The invitations could not be queued. Nothing has been sent. Try again. | **Send to N now** could not set the send up. Nobody was emailed and no access code changed. |
| That promo code can't be included. Refresh the page and try again. | **Promo code** on the Step 2 · Scorecards ready card names a code that stopped being offered for this season after the page loaded — archived, expired, or no longer covering it. The code was not saved. |
| Fix the highlighted setting before saving. | On the Save bar, while something on the tab is marked in amber. **Save changes** is greyed out until it is fixed or discarded. |
| Some changes weren't saved. The card above says why. | On the Save bar, after a Save that one card refused. The other cards' changes were saved. |
| Something in the form is not valid. Check the fields and try again. | The change was rejected before it reached the database. |
| You do not have permission to change this festival's settings. | Your account does not hold **Edit festival settings and team** on this season — or the address is not one you can reach. |
| The change could not be saved. Try again. | Anything else. Nothing was released or sent. On a tab whose Save is made in several parts, the earlier parts may already be saved — see [The two save models](#the-two-save-models). |

## Related guides

- [The public festival page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-festival-page.md) — what the **Public
  page** switch puts up, how it is edited in place, and which of this screen's
  fields it shows.
- [Connecting FilmFreeway](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/connecting-filmfreeway.md) — the FilmFreeway
  tab: bringing a festival's FilmFreeway submissions in by themselves,
  matching categories, what each sync changes and never changes, Needs
  attention, the pauses, removing the key and undoing the sync.
- [Opening a judge call](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-a-judge-call.md) — the Judging tab's second
  card: putting your season on the judge portal's open-calls board, the four
  rules that gate a listing, closing without losing your work, and what an
  applicant then sees.
- [Opening judging](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-judging.md) — the dashboard button that, with the
  opening date, lets judges see films, and the banner a season carries until
  it is pressed.
- [How the judging queue works](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/how-the-judging-queue-works.md) — what
  **Judges per category** does to each judge's queue, and the order films are
  offered in.
- [Building a scorecard](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/building-a-scorecard.md#written-feedback) — the two
  written-feedback switches that decide what judges write, now that this tab
  has no Written comment rule.
- [Inviting submitters](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/inviting-submitters.md) — the Emails tab's Step 1 ·
  First contact card: emailing each filmmaker their submission page as their
  submission arrives, what the email says, the count and **Send to N now**.
- [Releasing scorecards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md) — the Results tab's
  one-way actions: the five schedules, **Release scorecards** and **Release
  the rest**, what each submitter is emailed, and who gets nothing.
- [Releasing one submission's scorecard](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-one-scorecard.md) — the
  same thing for one submission, from its detail panel, ahead of the season.
- [Emails your festival sends](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/emails-your-festival-sends.md) — every email
  FilmScorecard sends for the festival, who gets it, what sends it, and what
  the Emails tab's Preview email shows.
- [The public film page](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/public-page.md) — what the Season tab's Notification
  date and Award winners announced change on a filmmaker's public page, and what your
  festival's logo is used for there.
- [Selling scorecard access](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/selling-scorecard-access.md) — what a submitter
  pays to unlock a scorecard, what the festival earns, and why the price is not
  a field on this screen.
- [A season's categories and awards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-categories-and-awards.md) — the
  two tabs with a Save button of their own: attaching library records to a
  season, and add-on prices.
- [Judge pay](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/judge-pay.md) — the Categories tab's other half: the two rate
  columns, the season-wide Paid or Volunteer **ceiling** and its lock, and what
  a filed scorecard records.
- [What an invitation pays](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/what-an-invitation-pays.md) — what one judge is
  paid under that ceiling, including inviting somebody as a volunteer.
- [Paying your judges](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/paying-your-judges.md) — where the recorded amounts
  are added up and the payments you make are logged.
- [Connecting payouts](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/connecting-payouts.md) — the organization-wide Stripe
  payout account, which is not on this screen and is not set per festival.
- [Opening a submission](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-a-submission.md) — where the section
  weights show up in practice: one submission's score, category by category,
  and the Press kit card that Keep its score as judged holds still.