DVD Bundles
How Our Video Streaming Works
Once you've purchased your Video On Demand title, you will need to set up an account in order to generate your personal Access Tokens.
Access Tokens are used to link your Puppy Culture account with a specific device and web browser combination.
The following 6 steps explain the process:
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Step 1 After completing your purchase,
Create a Puppy Culture account -
Step 2 Use the same email address that was entered when purchasing the VOD
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Step 3 Once the account has been created, go to the My Access Tokens section within your account page
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Step 4 Copy or make a note of an Access Token from the two provided
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Step 5 Visit My Puppy Culture on the device you wish to stream with and select My Video Library
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Step 6 When accessing the Video Library for the first time on a device, you will be asked to enter an Access Token. Otherwise, select the User Settings icon and then enter the Access Token.
Issues With Private Browsing and Incognito Mode
Once an Access Token has been entered and your device + web browser combination has successfully been linked, you should not need to enter an Access Token again for that same device / browser combination.
If you are asked to enter an Access Token each time you visit your Video Library, it could be down to one of the following reasons:
- You have Private Browsing or Incognito Mode enabled - the Access Token will not be remembered as it is disposed of when the browser window closes.
- The web browser settings have been configured in such a way to not allow website data to be stored locally between sessions.
- You are actually using a different device, or a different web browser on that device.
- Your web browser data has been cleared either manually, or via a system update (although that shouldn't happen under normal circumstances).
Devices You Can Use For Streaming
When we talk about devices, we are actually refering to a combination of:
- the Physical Device - desktop computer, laptop, phone, tablet, smart tv, etc.
- and the Web Browser - Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Microsoft Edge, etc
Because our Video Streaming solution has been built as a Progressive Web App (PWA), it should work consistently well across all Physical Devices which have support for modern Web Browsers.
Issues With Private Browsing and Incognito Mode
Once an Access Token has been entered and your device + web browser combination has successfully been linked, you should not need to enter an Access Token again for that same device / browser combination.
If you are asked to enter an Access Token each time you visit your Video Library, it could be down to one of the following reasons:
- You have Private Browsing or Incognito Mode enabled - the Access Token will not be remembered as it is disposed of when the browser window closes.
- The web browser settings have been configured in such a way to not allow website data to be stored locally between sessions.
- You are actually using a different device, or a different web browser on that device.
- Your web browser data has been cleared either manually, or via a system update (although that shouldn't happen under normal circumstances).
What About Poor Network Connections?
It goes without saying that with Streaming and Video On Demand solutions, a good network connection is a key factor in ensuring a good experience.
Our Video Streaming solutions and Video Player use something called Adaptive Bit Rate (ABR) which, simply put, periodically looks at changes in your network conditions and then automatically selects the best quality video to play based on this.
This process will happen seamlessly and the switch in quality can happen many times during the course of a video - and normally it would have no impact on the overall video playback.
If your network quality varies a lot in a short time period for some reason, this can cause the player to re-buffer different qualities unnecessarily and cause what appears to be broken playback.
In this scenario, you can actually override the ABR process and instead select a specific quality:
- select the "cog / gear" icon in the video player
- change "Video quality" from "auto" to a specific bitrate
- the higher the bitrate, the better the quality, but also a greater need for a good network connectivity
Our Offline Video Solution
Our modern Video Streaming solution includes the ability for you to select one* of your purchased Video On Demand titles at a time, download it's chapters, and then view them when offline.
Additionally, when a chapter has been downloaded and you subsequently select it for playback, the downloaded data will be used for playback, even if you are online - saving your network bandwidth costs!
When downloading your video chapters, there are no "files" for you to access as such - everything stays within the web browser.
By bookmarking a link to the My Puppy Culture Progressive Web App (PWA) in your web browser - or by adding a shortcut to your device's Homescreen - you can quickly access your downloaded chapters, even when offline.
* Only chapters from a single Video On Demand (VOD) title can be downloaded to a device at any one time - selecting a different title or quality will automatically remove any previous downloads.
Please note: The download/offline playback functionality is currently being a offered to everyone for free - as part of a trial. In the future, this feature will become a paid subscription add-on.
How To Use Your Roku Device To Access Our Streaming Videos
If you have a Roku device, you can access the Puppy Culture Video Library directly through our Puppy Culture - Video Library Channel.
In order to link your purchased Video On Demand titles to your Puppy Culture Channel within Roku, please perform the following steps:
- Access the Puppy Culture - Video Library Channel on your Roku device.
- Now either:
- Press the Options (*) button.
or - Under the 1. Setup section, select the icon titled "Enter your Puppy Culture Access Token".
- Press the Options (*) button.
- Using the on-screen keyboard, enter the Roku Access Token* - which can be generated/found in the My Access Tokens section on your main account page.
- Exit, and then re-enter, the Puppy Culture Channel.
- The titles from your Video On Demand purchases will now appear in the viewing list of your Puppy Culture Channel on Roku.
* If you wish to link your Roku device, you must first convert one of your General Access Tokens into a Roku Access Token. General Access Tokens will not currently work with Roku devices - they need to be converted first.
Other Viewing Options
Casting to other Devices
With this option, you can cast the media available in your Video Library to other devices.
This allows you to access your Video Library on your Phone, Tablet or Laptop, but to view it on a big screen TV - the device you are casting from will then act as a remote controller.
Chromecast and Apple AirPlay are supported for the purpose of casting.
Screen Mirroring
With mirroring, you would typically access your Video Library on your Phone, Tablet or Laptop as normal, but then you would "mirror" the screen to a bigger screen via a mirroring device.
Amazon Firestick is just one of a number of devices which support screen mirroring.