Welcome to your guide to Apple Motion – from what opportunities are available to the assets you need to deliver – we’ve got you covered. Your questions, answered!
What is Apple Motion?
A feature on Apple Music which allows artists to get creative with their profile page and their releases by supplying alternative, dynamic artwork for their page and albums.
What are the available opportunities?
There are two types of Motion available.
Artist Page Motion
| What is Artist Page Motion? | A graphic used on the profile page of the artist.
They are intended to be an engaging space, extending on the mood and story of the artist. |
| Who is this for? | Anyone. You might want to go with creating an Artist Page Motion if the artist isn’t in release cycle just to jazz up the page. |
| What we need? | Here are the specs and templates: https://help.apple.com/itc/artistmotionguide/#/b2c49587f1b1 |
| Type of content? | Video / filmed content.
E.g. content sourced from music videos, b-roll footage, behind the scenes, filmed especially for the artist page or a combination of these. Not motion graphics/animation. Footage can’t contain any performance, singing, mouth movement or playing of instruments. |
| Examples? | https://music.apple.com/us/artist/parker-mccollum/733165597
https://music.apple.com/us/artist/abbey-cone/632263884 https://music.apple.com/us/artist/afternoon-bike-ride/1454332177 |
Album Motion
| What is Album Motion? | Graphics used on an album as alternative, more interesting artwork to the pack shot. Similar to Spotify Canvas in that way. |
| Who is this for? | Any album you have released/are releasing. We can supply artwork for an album pre or post release, so long as it’s been delivered. |
| What we need? | Here are the specs and templates: https://help.apple.com/itc/albummotionguide/#/bc6b082efca4 |
| Type of content? | Animation/Motion Graphics (not video content).
Animation start frame must match the album cover and seamlessly loop. |
| Examples? | https://music.apple.com/us/album/the-ground-might-disappear-ep/1587988572
https://music.apple.com/us/album/30/1590035691 https://music.apple.com/us/album/the-walls-are-way-too-thin-ep/1575561183 |
Who is eligible?
Any artist or album. There is no minimum streams or social following requirements. This is open to everybody.
Please Note: this is not an opportunity available for single/s. Must be an EP, Album, or Artist Page.
What happens next?
Once you’ve created your footage & it’s to spec, contact your Label Manager to get the assets submitted.
Here are Apple’s downloadable guides on Artist Page and Album Motion.
Apple advise that where there is discrepancy between what’s online and what’s in the guides, follow the online version as they will be the official guides moving forwards, and will contain updates to their policies, procedures or specifications that may change in the future.
