Casting and Hiring Terms

In short

• Sphere Cinema provides tools for casting, Offers and signing. The Producer and the Talent are the only parties to their Engagement. Sphere Cinema is neither an employer, an agency nor a party to it, and it does not guarantee work, selection or payment.
• Applying and auditioning are always free. Nobody may ask Talent for money, deposits or identity documents to apply, audition or be considered for a role.
• Every Casting Call states the pay honestly and discloses nudity, physical risk, travel, usage rights, AI use and whether Minors may apply. Auditions take place in professional or public places or online, and never involve nudity.
• In the Service, an Engagement is made when the Producer and the Talent both sign the Engagement Terms of an Offer. Pay for the work is agreed and paid directly between them, outside the Service.
• Team Members keep scripts, budgets, call sheets, schedules and other Project materials confidential and use them only for the Project, also after they leave it.

1. Scope and our role in hiring

These terms set the rules for Talent profiles, Casting Calls, Applications, auditions, Offers, Engagements and work in Project teams, including for agents and managers who act for Talent (representatives). They apply together with the Terms of Service: its section 1 "About these Terms" explains which Legal Document applies to what and which prevails, and its section 2 "Definitions" gives the meaning of capitalised words.

Sphere Cinema provides tools for casting, Offers and signing. The Producer and the Talent are the only parties to their Engagement. Sphere Cinema is neither an employer, an agency nor a party to it, and it does not guarantee work, selection or payment.

In practice this means:

• Producers alone decide whom to invite, audition and hire, and on what terms; we take no part in those decisions or in negotiations.
• We do not attend or supervise auditions or shoots, and we do not set, hold or pay anyone's fees.
• We do not check Casting Calls, profiles or Offers before they appear (Terms of Service, section 5 "Our role"); we act on Reports and may remove anything that breaks these terms.

The duties in sections 8 and 12 are owed to us and to the User they protect (the Talent in section 8, the Producer in section 12), and that User may enforce them directly. How signatures in the Service work and what they prove is set out in Electronic Agreements and Signatures. Disputes between Producers and Talent are covered in section 14.

2. Talent profiles and contact details

Your Talent profile presents you and your work to Producers. Keep it true and current: your crafts, credits, skills, photos and showreels must be accurate and your own, as the Community Guidelines, section 5 "Honest profiles, credits and reviews" requires.

Physical details such as height, eye colour and hair colour are optional; once filled in, they can appear on your public profile. Do not add health information, ethnic origin or other sensitive data; the Privacy Policy, section 4 "Sensitive data" explains why.

Who can see these parts of your profile:

The setting that hides email addresses and phone numbers until you reply is on by default, and you can change it at any time in your profile editor. While it is on, first contact with a Producer goes through messages in the Service, so you decide who gets your direct contacts. Everything else about what other Users and the public can see is in the Privacy Policy, section 6 "What other Users and the public can see".

Representatives. Name an agent or manager in your profile only with their agreement, because their details are shown under the rules above. A representative deals with Producers for you within the authority you give them, which a Producer may ask to see, and you are bound by what they agree within it. Only you can sign from your Account; how a representative signs for you outside the Service is set out in Electronic Agreements and Signatures, section 6 "Signing for an Organization or a Minor".

3. Posting a Casting Call

Who may post. A Casting Call may be posted only by a Producer of the Project it is for: the project owner, or a Team Member the owner has allowed to hire. If you post for an Organization, you confirm that you may act for it, and the Organization is bound by what you publish.

What it must say. Describe the role and the Project accurately: the character or crew position, the kind of Project, the dates or period of work, the place (or that the work is remote), the deadline for Applications and who is producing. Keep it current and close it when the role is filled or the deadline has passed.

Pay. State the pay for each role:

• for paid work, the amount or range, the currency and the basis: for the project, per day, per hour or per shift;
• for work that is not paid in money when it is done, the honest label: deferred pay (with when and on what condition it becomes payable), revenue share (with the share and what it is calculated on), expenses only, credit and meals, or unpaid.

Call a role paid only when it pays money for the work. If the law requires the work you describe to be paid, the role must be paid.

Fair criteria. Ask for a gender, an age range, a look or an ethnic origin only where the role genuinely requires it, and only as far as it requires. Ask applicants only questions that relate to the role. These rules reflect the ban on discrimination in hiring under the Labour Code of Georgia.

What a Casting Call is. A Casting Call invites Talent to apply and creates no contract: the Producer need not hire anyone, and Talent need not accept anything. An Engagement is made as section 9 describes or as the parties otherwise agree.

Changes. If you change the pay, the dates, the place or anything listed in section 4 after Applications have arrived, tell the applicants through the Service.

4. Casting Call posting guidelines: what you must disclose

State each of the following in the Casting Call itself, before anyone applies, whenever it applies to the role:

1. Nudity, partial nudity or simulated sexual content.
2. Sensitive themes the Talent will portray or be exposed to, such as violence, abuse, self-harm or drug use.
3. Stunts or physical risk, such as work at heights, in water, with weapons, animals, fire or special effects.
4. Travel and accommodation: where, for how long and who pays.
5. Any cost the Talent would bear, such as their own wardrobe or travel to the set. A fee to apply or audition is never allowed (section 5).
6. Usage rights: in which media and territories, and for how long, the Talent's performance, image and voice will be used, including in advertising.
7. Use of artificial intelligence: digital replicas, voice cloning, face or body scans, AI changes to the performance, or use of the material to train AI models.
8. Whether Minors may apply, and for which ages.
9. Any collective agreement that covers the Project, and its status.

If a requirement arises only after you post, tell every applicant it affects before they audition or sign.

A requirement that was hidden and comes to light later breaks these terms. We may remove the Casting Call and take further steps under the Community Guidelines, section 8 "How we moderate".

5. What is not allowed in casting

Applying is free. No one may ask Talent for any payment to apply, audition or be considered for a role, inside or outside the Service. This covers application, registration, membership and listing fees, deposits, and charges for training, coaching, workshops, headshots or photo shoots. No one may make buying a product or service a condition for a role. Commission that Talent has agreed to pay their own representative out of their earnings is a separate matter between them.

Documents and personal data. Before an Offer is signed, nobody may ask Talent for passport or identity card scans, bank or card details, or other sensitive documents. After signing, the Producer may ask only for what the Engagement needs, such as details for a contract or for paying the fee, and never for such documents as files sent through the Service, where files sit at public web addresses (section 12).

Banned practices. Casting Calls, auditions and casting messages must not:

• ask for nude or sexually suggestive photos or videos, including in underwear, for an Application or a first audition;
• set an audition in a private home or a hotel room;
• present sexual services or work in pornography as a role;
• offer commission-only sales work, multi-level marketing or pyramid schemes;
• recruit people for other websites, apps, paid services, classes or talent agencies;
• use discriminatory criteria (section 3);
• be posted for a Project that does not exist, or to collect people's images or contact details.

The general rules apply as well: the Community Guidelines, sections 3 "Content that is not allowed" and 4 "Conduct that is not allowed". Fees to apply or audition can never be paid through the Service either, under the Legal Compliance Policy, section 4 "Prohibited business activities".

6. Applications

What an Application contains. An Application is free and consists of a short pitch, one link (for example to a showreel or a self-tape) and your Talent profile. If that material is not public, use a link that only its recipients can open, such as an unlisted video. If a Producer gave you sides or other script pages for a self-tape, treat them and your recording as confidential Project material (section 12) and publish the tape only with the Producer's agreement.

Who sees it. Your Application is visible to you, to the Producer and to the Team Members who have access to casting for that Project. It is never public. Notes that the Producer's team makes about Applications stay with the team and are not shown to you.

Statuses. An Application can be applied, viewed, shortlisted, invited to a callback ("Callback invited"), declined or hired. It becomes hired only when both sides have signed an Offer (section 9). When a role is filled, the Producer should decline the remaining Applications so that applicants know where they stand.

Withdrawing. You can withdraw your Application at any time before you are hired, and apply again while the Casting Call is open.

The Casting Call you applied to. The Service stores the text of each Casting Call as the Producer last saved it. A Producer can still edit an open Casting Call, so keep your own copy of the version you applied to. The Offer shows the terms you agree (section 9).

7. Auditions and safety

Where. Auditions, callbacks and casting meetings take place in a professional setting (an office, studio, rehearsal room or casting venue), in a public place or online. They never take place in a private home or a hotel room, whoever it belongs to.

Before the audition. The Producer tells the Talent in writing, through the Service, the date and time, the address or link, who will be present, what to prepare, and whether the audition will be recorded and who will see the recording.

During the audition.

• The Talent may bring a companion, such as a friend, a relative or their agent.
• A Minor attends with a Guardian present throughout (section 11).
• No one may ask the Talent to undress, appear nude or perform sexual content, in person or on camera. If a role involves nudity, it is discussed in writing after a callback and filmed only with the written consent described in section 9.
• The Talent may stop and leave at any time without giving a reason.
• Recordings and notes from an audition are used only to cast that Project (section 8).

The Producer is responsible for the safety of everyone at their auditions and on their set, as the law requires.

Warning signs. Take care when someone asks you for money, a deposit, identity documents, bank details or intimate images, wants to move the conversation to another app or to meet in private, keeps the project, pay or place vague or changes them at the last minute, or presses you with promises that seem too good to be true.

Keep casting conversations in the Service, where you can also block a User in direct messages. Never pay to get a role, and walk away from terms that stay vague or keep shifting. Before you meet, check the Producer's profile and credits. A Verification badge confirms only what we checked, on the date we checked it.

Reporting. Report a suspicious Casting Call, audition or message, with screenshots if you have them, as the Community Guidelines, section 7 "How to report" explains. More advice on scams and Account safety is in the Transaction Security Policy, section 5 "How to protect yourself". If you are in danger, contact the police first.

8. Producer duties toward applicants

When you receive Applications, audition recordings and other materials from Talent, you must:

• use them only to cast the Project they were sent for;
• share them only with Team Members who need them for casting, and give them to nobody outside the Project without the Talent's consent;
• keep them confidential and protect any copies you make;
• when the Talent asks, delete the copies you made outside the Service (downloads, screenshots, notes) and return original materials, unless you need them for an Engagement or the law requires you to keep them;
• use applicants' contact details only for the Project, never for marketing.

You are an independent Controller for what you choose to record about other people in your Project and for any use of Applications and Project data outside the Service; how the Service itself stores and processes that data is our responsibility, as the Privacy Policy, section 1 "Who is responsible for your data" explains.

People in your Project who are not Users. Route sheets, call sheets, location lists and other parts of the Project Workspace can hold data about people who are not Users, such as drivers, passengers, extras and location owners. Add such data only when the production needs it and you have a lawful basis, for example the person's consent or a contract with them. Tell these people what you record about them, why and who can see it, within 10 working days after you add it, or at first contact if that comes sooner.

9. Offers and Engagements

9.1 How an Engagement is made

In the Service, an Engagement comes about as follows:

1. A Producer may first send an inquiry to ask about the Talent's interest, availability or rate. An inquiry commits nobody.
2. The Producer sends an Offer with Engagement Terms: the pay, the dates, the number of days, any revenue share, the tasks and any extra information. The Producer signs those terms in the Service, usually by sending the Offer (Electronic Agreements and Signatures, section 3 "How signing works").
3. The Talent reviews the Offer and may ask questions, decline it or accept it by signing.
4. When both have signed the same version, the Engagement is made on those terms. The Service marks the Talent as hired for the role and, for an Offer made for a Project, adds them to its team.

Until the Talent signs, the Producer may change the Offer, which creates a new version that both must sign, or withdraw it. Once both have signed, the Engagement Terms cannot be edited; how to change or end them is in Electronic Agreements and Signatures, section 8 "Changing or ending signed terms". What a signature in the Service means in law is explained in section 2 "Agreement to sign electronically" of that document.

9.2 What the Engagement Terms leave to you

The Engagement Terms are a short terms sheet without the parties' legal names or addresses, governing law, rights in the work, releases, confidentiality or rules for ending the Engagement; section 4 "What the signed record contains" of Electronic Agreements and Signatures lists what they hold. Agree everything else you need in writing.

9.3 Contracts the law requires in writing

Some agreements need written form under Georgian law, and meeting it is the parties' responsibility:

• employment for more than one month needs a written employment contract with the essential terms the Labour Code of Georgia requires, in a language both parties understand;
• a transfer or licence of copyright or related rights, for example in a script, music, designs or footage, needs a written contract that states the uses, the territory and the period;
• a performer's consent to the recording and use of their performance must be given in writing.

Whether the work is employment is for the parties to settle under the law; we do not decide it. Section 5 "When an Electronic Signature in the Service is not enough" of Electronic Agreements and Signatures explains how to sign such a contract outside the Service and when to add a copy to the Project.

9.4 Image, voice, nudity and AI

• Using the Talent's image, likeness or voice beyond the Engagement, for example in advertising, in another project or after the agreed period, needs the Talent's separate written consent that names the use.
• Creating a digital replica or a cloned voice of the Talent, scanning their face or body, changing their performance with AI, or using their material to train AI models needs the Talent's separate written consent that names each use, the media and the period. A consent to one use covers that use only.
• Nudity or simulated sexual scenes need the Talent's written consent that names the scenes, given before filming. Minors never take part in them (section 11).

10. Payment for work

Pay for work is agreed between the Producer and the Talent and paid directly between them, outside the Service; Sphere Cinema holds, transfers and guarantees none of it and does not arbitrate it. The full rule, including the "Through Sphere" option that the Service shows as "Coming soon", is in the Payment Policy, section 12 "Payments between Producers and Talent".

Record the agreed pay in the Engagement Terms. If the amount is still open or the work is unpaid, the Engagement Terms show that as well.

11. Minors in casting and production

11.1 Talent aged 16 or 17

Who may hold an Account, and when a Guardian must agree, is set out in the Terms of Service, section 3 "Who can use the Service". If you are 16 or 17, your Guardian's agreement to your use of the Service covers your Applications. Before you send or accept an Offer or sign Engagement Terms, you need your Guardian's express written consent: the Guardian gives signed consent to the Engagement, as Electronic Agreements and Signatures, section 6 "Signing for an Organization or a Minor" describes. We may ask for proof of the Guardian's agreement, and a Producer may ask for it too.

11.2 Children under 16

A child under 16 cannot hold an Account. Children under 16 take part in casting only through a Guardian acting from the Guardian's own Account, and only for Casting Calls that say Minors of the child's age may apply. The Guardian may keep a Talent profile for the child in the Guardian's Account. That profile stays unpublished and is used only to apply; with an Application, the Producer sees its name and photo, the pitch and the link. The profile, the pitch and the link never show the child's surname, contact details, school, home address or availability calendar. The Guardian applies, receives messages and Offers, signs and attends for the child. Never create an Account in a child's name.

11.3 Producer duties

If you cast or hire a Minor, you must:

• say in the Casting Call that Minors may apply, and for which ages (section 4);
• deal with the Guardian at every step for a child under 16, and keep the Guardian informed for a Minor aged 16 or 17;
• follow the rules of the Labour Code of Georgia for Minors on age, consent, working time and the kind of work: a person under 16 may work only with the Guardian's consent, and a child under 14 only in sport, art, culture or advertising; where the work takes place in another country, follow its child-performer rules as well;
• make sure a Guardian is present at every audition and on set;
• never involve a Minor in nudity or sexual content, in any Project or Film.

Sphere Cinema has zero tolerance for sexual content involving Minors; the Community Guidelines, section 2 "Protection of minors" sets out what follows. How we handle the Personal Data of Minors is in the Privacy Policy, section 5 "Data of minors".

12. The Project Workspace and confidentiality

12.1 Access

The Producer decides who joins the Project and what each Team Member can open. The project owner and the producers they appoint see the whole Project Workspace. Other Team Members see the stages and sections they are given access to, and a department head can give access within their department. People join by accepting an invitation or by signing an Offer for the Project. The Producer can remove a Team Member at any time. Removal ends that person's access to the Project Workspace and leaves their signed Engagement Terms unchanged; whether it also ends the Engagement is a matter between the parties (section 14).

12.2 Confidentiality

Everything in the Project Workspace is confidential: scripts and sides, budgets, call sheets, schedules, shift and location details, contracts, documents, chats, unreleased footage and anything else the Producer shares with the team. As a Team Member you must:

• use Project materials only for your work on the Project;
• not copy, download, forward, share, publish or post them, or discuss them in public, without the Producer's permission;
• protect them from access by others;
• return or delete the copies you hold when the Producer asks or when your work ends, unless the law requires you to keep them.

These duties continue after your work ends or you leave the Project, until the Producer makes the information public or it becomes public lawfully. They do not cover information that was already public or that you knew lawfully before, information you must disclose under the law or an order of a court or authority (tell the Producer first where you may), or what you share in confidence with your own lawyer, accountant or agent. You may show your own work in a portfolio once the Film is released, or earlier with the Producer's consent, unless your Engagement says otherwise.

A breach can lead to removal from the Project and to Moderation under the Community Guidelines, section 8 "How we moderate", and the Producer may enforce these duties against you directly.

12.3 Files and SPHERIK

Files you upload (photos, videos, audio, documents and attachments) are stored at web addresses that anyone who has the link can open. Do not upload anything that must stay secret. To have a file removed from storage, write to privacy@sphere.art.

Share links to Project files only with Team Members, and ask the Producer before you upload sensitive material.

SPHERIK, the AI assistant, sends what you type and attach, and in the Project copilot also details of the Project, to its AI providers, as the SPHERIK AI Assistant Terms, section 2 "AI providers and what SPHERIK sends them" explains. Use it on confidential Project materials only if you have access to them in the Project and the Producer has not told the team otherwise. Actions that SPHERIK proposes in a Project change nothing until the project owner approves them, under section 6 "Actions SPHERIK proposes" of the same terms.

13. Credits

A credit records a person's role on a Project. It is confirmed only when the person credited accepts it, either directly or by signing the Engagement for that role. Producers credit people accurately, with the name they use in the Service and the role and department agreed, and correct mistakes promptly. Talent accepts only credits they earned and declines any that are wrong.

How credits appear on screen in the Film is for the parties to agree, best in writing. We may correct or hide a credit shown to be false, under the Community Guidelines, section 8 "How we moderate".

Peer reviews that Team Members leave each other when a Project wraps follow the Community Guidelines, section 5 "Honest profiles, credits and reviews".

14. Disputes between Producers and Talent

Disputes about an Engagement, pay, credits or conduct on a Project are between the Producer and the Talent. Try to settle them by talking first; if that fails, either party can go to court or to the competent authority. We do not decide such disputes and do not act as mediator or arbitrator.

On request we give both parties copies of their signed Engagement Terms and Signature Records, and we give them to courts and authorities on lawful request, as Electronic Agreements and Signatures, section 7 "Copies, storage and evidence" explains.

Harassment, threats, scams and other misconduct can also be reported to us under the Community Guidelines, section 7 "How to report", and we may act against the Account involved.

The governing law and the courts are set out in the Terms of Service, section 14 "Complaints, disputes and governing law". What Producers and Talent do toward each other is their own responsibility; our liability is set out in section 13 "Liability" of the Terms of Service.

15. Changes and contact

We may update this document. We tell you about material changes by email and in the Service at least 14 days before they take effect, and at least 30 days before for changes to Seller fees, Payouts or selling rules, as set out in the Terms of Service, section 15 "Changes to the Service and the Legal Documents". Earlier versions of this document are available on request at legal@sphere.art.

Questions about these terms go to support@sphere.art.

Sphere Cinema is a service operated by SPHERE.ART LLC, a limited liability company registered in Georgia under identification code 416396983, with its legal address at 14 Megobroba Avenue, 8th floor, apartment 27, Rustavi, Georgia. Other ways to reach us are listed in Company Details.