Corporate Video Pitch

me>

Current Practices in Corporate Video Production

In this essay I will be talking about the legal rules and regulations in the video production industry as well as ways of abiding to them and examples of corporate videos doing so. We will talk about copyright, privacy, defamation, fair use, ethical, releases and also technologies.

Copyright:

‘the exclusive and assignable legal right, given to the originator for a fixed number of years, to print, publish, perform, film, or record literary, artistic, or musical material.’- Google.

More simply put, copyright is a right given by the creator of a product (print, film, artistic, music) to someone so they can use the product in their own production. Without this given right, the product cannot be legally used in another product that is released to the public, and the user of said copyrighted product can be persecuted.

There are number of ways around running into copyright troubles during production of a corporate video. For example, there are websites that provide royalty free music which means you can use that music without breaking any copyright laws because the producer of the music hasn’t copyrighted the music. https://incompetech.com/

https://youtu.be/8toYiGU0sMk

This is a corporate video by Apple™, as a big company they can afford to create their own music for their videos so they don’t breach any copyright laws.

Privacy:

Legal privacy in the context of video production means the court will balance someone’s right to a private and family life against the media’s right to freedom of expression. Basically, People of public interest are often in the eye of the media, and privacy law is what ensures that the person of interest has as much privacy as possible while also allowing the media to express their legal right to publish what they see and hear.

There are a number of aspects that prohibit the media from invading the person’s privacy: reporting stories about people’s personal or sexual lives, finances, information about their health, or filming them in their house without their permission. It can even sometimes include situations where the person is in a public place - for example, at a funeral. These are all breaking privacy law and the offender can be persecuted.

For example, if the corporate video was in an office and you shot someone on their computer, if the computer had personal information on screen, that footage would not be published otherwise the publisher could face persecution.

Defamation:

The law of defamation allows individuals, companies or firms (‘claimants’) to sue for damage to their reputation caused by material that is published and which makes slanderous comments about them. It is considered defamation if something: exposes them to hatred, ridicule and contempt, disparages them in their profession, trade or office, causes them to be shunned or avoided, lowers them in the estimation of right-thinking members of the public, etc.

For example, if a company was to claim that their product was superior to another companies, that could be considered as slanderous and defamation.

there are a number of mediums in which defamation can occur: Newspapers; other printed media, broadcasting on radio or TV, On the web, including social media websites, online forums and microblogging sites, etc.

Fair Use:

A fair use is any copying of copyrighted material done for a limited and “transformative” purpose, such as to comment upon, criticize, or parody a copyrighted work. Such uses can be done without permission from the copyright owner.

http://fairuse.stanford.edu/overview/fair-use/cases/

On this website, there are a number of cases in which content was used in and out of fair use.

Ethical Issues:

In context of corporate video, ethical issues are cases of a company, product or individual being represented in a way that may portray them as prejudice or offensive.

For example, if, in a video, an office was shown and all the employees were Caucasian males, this may raise complaints that the company is prejudice towards women or men of other ethnicity.

Releases:

A release is a form of written legal permission that, in the production of a video a person, their work or their property may be used and published. Without a release, you are not legally allowed to publish footage containing an individual, their work or their property, otherwise you may face legal action.

For example, if you had footage in which an individual is seen and identifiable, you need a talent release from them, otherwise they could persecute you.

Technology:

There is a variety of different technology involved in corporate video production, this includes, computer software, cameras and other hardware. Production companies tend to not have as big of a budget as film production companies may do, meaning the technology they use has to be affordable as well as good quality.

Camera: Cameras used in corporate video production tend to be DSLR cameras, as they produce good image quality and are affordable. An example of an affordable camera good for video production is the Canon EOS 700D. This is a cheap DSLR camera commonly used by students, in colleges/universities and by low budget video production companies. You can find this camera for around £300-400 on the internet, this is a low cost considering the quality of the camera.

Software: There is a variety of different video editing software that can be used in video production, there are a number of programs by big companies such as Adobe, Sony and Apple, which are all very good programs however they can be quite expensive. There is other software which is created by lesser known companies and is cheaper, while being effectively the same quality. An example of this is HitFilm. HitFilm is a video editing software by a small company, HitFilm has a free ‘express’ version which includes less of the features of the full ‘pro’ version, however it does its job adequately. The ‘Pro’ version costs £280, which is a low price considering most other programs have a monthly subscription cost which soon exceeds that cost.

Hardware: There are a number of other bits of hardware involved in video production, specifically involved in the filming part. During filming you may need use of artificial lighting, different lenses for the camera, tripods, microphones etc. and as a small corporate video production company you may be on a budget, in which case you may not want to buy the higher tier products. An example of good quality, affordable hardware is the Joby GorillaPod, this is a versatile tripod which can be reshaped to suit any surface and hold the camera stable at a straight angle. Toy can get this for around £15-20 on the internet, this piece of apparatus is often used by YouTube vloggers but I imagine it was originally intended for nature filmers needing to set up a shots on natural, uneven surfaces like rocks.