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Who owns raw footage?
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[weymar bozo] “Just my 2 cents that doesnt work in court. The best way is to spend the money and copyright it. Then again I am not sure concepts can be copyrighted.”
Practically, anything can be copyrighted – for $35, they are not checking for originality. The synopsis (concept) for a movie can be copyrighted. Most people don’t go public with their concept ideas – for good reason – they get stolen.
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The “tangible expression” of the concept can be copyrighted, but not the concept itself.
For example, I can’t copyright the letters of the alphabet, but I can get a trademark for a font that I designed. (the tangible expression of those letters)
The issue introduced is “how broad does that protection cover the concept”? A large portion of intellectual proerty lawsuits are about that issue.
Obviously, it would be ludicrous to enforce a protection of any “circle representing a ‘close-mid back rounded vowel’, but you could enforce your typeface representation of the letter “O”, if it doesn’t infringe on other’s intellectual property protection filed for the letter “O” as represented in their font or typeface.
With me so far?
I could copyright a script about “a man who escapes his captures and goes on a quest to prove his innocence”, but unless I’m very specific about how the story plays out, I’m not going to be able to claim infringement by any of the hundreds of other treatments and scripts with similar concepts. The more details you include, the better protection you have, but the more you paint yourself into a corner with your concept. The key is having a clear vision and being able to express it well enough so that people can easily identify your concept as unique.
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Hi Bruce
I was just making the point that the originator of the idea should own copyright. In most cases an author will write a book which may eventually be adapted for the screen by a screen writer, A writer may write a script for a play or a movie and a creative team at an ad agency may create a concept for an ad. These are professionals and they cover their butts so they get paid. The average lay person working at charity doesn’t know how to cover their butt however they still deserve the copyright to their own ideas.Most of us on these boards know that if we are having a coffee and get a vision and think OMG! this would be a perfect idea for Apple Computer!… and it’s right up their alley too! The 1st thing we won’t do is call Apple and tell them about it. We would have to script it and pitch a synopsis to them. We could even go so far as to film a mock up. If they liked it, most likely we would not be the ones filming it, they’re going to use the big boys.
We would have 2 choices, sell them the script or go to our local ABC computer store and see if they are interested in sponsoring the shoot on a break even scheme so you can shoot and use the video in your list of credits and they can run it on their web page and maybe run a local commercial and play in their store.
The point I’m trying to make is the originator of the idea should get copyright for it but of coarse they would need to script it first. By telling anyone first you release it into the public domain.
In the case of the original poster I’m trying to find out who provided the concept. It could be the charity did but lacked the knowledge to script it therefor have left themselves open to have that deserved credit taken away.
On the point of original camera tapes, in the digital world it is easy enough to make digital duplicates. If a client wants to take them elsewhere for more editing they will find out no one can do it any cheaper or efficiently than someone who has already been immersed in the footage already during shooting and editing of the previous project.
I’m not advocating they surrender these tapes if they feel this was never part of their original agreement.
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Rennie,
I agree, originators of concepts should get copyright. And believe me, being a director and writer, I really wish it was the case. But unfortunately, copyright is pretty specific and the rules don
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When a client comes to us to produce a project, we quote a price – for a finished project. The client gets a finished tape, or disc, or file, whatever, and that’s it. Anything that our company acquires, makes, films, records, etc. during the production process belongs to us, not our client. If you buy a car from Ford, you don’t have a right to the machinery Ford used to make the car.
On the other hand, the client paid for the finished project. It’s theirs to do with as they see fit.
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Does this mean that despite having copyright to the content of the tapes we shot, we are obliged to give them up to the clients so they can hire someone else to re-edit a new project for them in the future?
The original contract between us was paying per finished minute. We gave them an 8 minute project and we accepted payment for 4.5 minutes… -
[Timothy J. Allen] “I could copyright a script about “a man who escapes his captures and goes on a quest to prove his innocence”, but unless I’m very specific about how the story plays out, I’m not going to be able to claim infringement by any of the hundreds of other treatments and scripts with similar concepts. The more details you include, the better protection you have, but the more you paint yourself into a corner with your concept. The key is having a clear vision and being able to express it well enough so that people can easily identify your concept as unique.”
Right.
OK. Real world. The AFLAC Duck idea probably started with their ad house – a perfect solution for a company nobody could remember. Client likes the storyboards and okays production. Need for a copyright at that point? I doubt it. What would it protect – a talking duck? Good luck defending that concept…
More to the topic – who owns the raw footage? 99.9% of the time – who cares? – it’s unusable for anyone but the client. What about that footage of a happy couple? If unsure, shoot another happy couple – if you can find them…
Bottom line: a copyright or a patent is only as good as the amount of money you (or the other guy) are willing to spend to defend it.
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Unfortunately, I don’t have any real answers to this but yet another question. I generally have clients that want a short promovid but they have no vision of what they want. Since most of my work is for the Web, I use a license agreement that stipulates I retain copyright, I have permission to use finished product for self promotion, and they have license to use finished product, in its finished form. They’re not allowed to re-edit and create derivative works. So far this has never been an issue, everyone has been happy with the finished product and go merrily on their way.
However, I just had a large corporation ask for ALL source materials. Since most of it was custom work (AE, 3D stuff) and can’t be used elsewhere, I don’t have a problem… except, portions of the videos also use royalty free and stock footage which I am licensed to use to make the clients video but I don’t believe the client is licensed to use to make their own re-edits etc.
My thought is to give them the source materials that I created and a list of the Royalty Free clips and vendor and inform them they must purchase their own license for those items to be able to use them legally. Am I correct in my thinking on this?
Bob Russell
PromoBuilderBob
PromoVid Productions -
If you read the license for most stock footage collections, you’ll see that it’s typically licensed to you for use in your productions for your clients. They tend to specifically prohibit re-editing that stock footage from those finished pieces into other pieces.
Arnie
Now in post: Peristroika, a film by Slava Tsukerman
https://www.arniepix.com/blog -
If it wasn’t part of your contract, and the work is now completed, you could just say no. Or you could say yes, that will be $xx extra, I’ll get you a quote, and of course it won’t include 3rd party material like stock shots …
Additional clauses or requests wanted by the client after contract is agreed and in this case after the work is done would require your acceptance (or rejection), and there’s no reason not to charge.
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