ASK & DISCUSS INDEX

10 years, 11 months ago - Jinan C

Thanks for the reply. Yes I hear you! Not very likely chances - I guess I don't have a lot of experience with knowing the standards that festivals have for covering themselves in any potential legal eventuality, but of course you're right - if the content and film is strong enough, that stands on its own :)

Would the same advice go for focusing in on random people in public or does that start to get tricky?

Thanks again for your input.

10 years, 11 months ago - Marlom Tander

Legal answer, you don't need any releases from anyone, and if the content is powerful enough, no one will ask you for it. Hello covert filming and doorstepping (bastards who need it). If you can get footage of an Israeli minister talking to an IS leader in a Beirut cafe no one is going to ask you for a release :-)

Practical answer, get the releases you can (certainly from anyone who is clearly aware that they are on camera) and don't worry about the ones you can't. If your film is good enough then whatever releases you have will be good enough.

You can't really worry too much about what the attitude of any particular outlet might be as they all have their own opinions, UNLESS you intend to target particular festivals, in which case, ask them their rules. If they want pixellation, at least you'll know up front.

Reality check - what, seriously, are the chances that you film someone in a conflict zone who then, a few months later is one of the modestly sized audience at the film festival screening your movie and thus in a position to complain?

good luck

10 years, 11 months ago - Jinan C

Thanks so much for all of the detailed feedback! I can't tell you how much this has helped.

10 years, 11 months ago - Mät King

Wow, that was eye opening. I have noticed more and more the use of blurred faces in documentary on incidental characters, and obscuring number plates on nearby cars.
We've always gone down the release route recently buttressed with a sign telling you that you may be filmed if you enter. But it is becoming trickier to film in public as everyone seems to think you're not allowed to without absolute position. Of course when you explain about Close Circuit Television, which is already filming you and consists of images...

The idea of public domain would seem to be more and more in doubt as we seem to have this constant encroachment of what is private and what is public. There seems to be a growth of managed public sites that are taking a position of being private property although they are public but are managed by a management company.

10 years, 11 months ago - John Lubran

The style of the documentary should not be an issue just so long as the production and content is fair comment factual. If it were otherwise the whole basis of reportage and journalism would be impossible. It comes under our constitutional rights concerning freedom of speech. Yes we do have a written constitution even if not codified, we can even go and read the 'Constitutional Instruments' themselves in the Palace of Westminster 'Constitutional Library;' we even have a Constitutional Monarch to prove it. You couldn't make it up! But that's another story

10 years, 11 months ago - John Lubran

I'd add that here in the UK and throughout much of the western world, USA, Europe, Canada, Australia etc., Anything recorded audio visually within the public domain and importantly, even on private property recorded from the pubic domain is lawful without a by your leave from anyone and that includes police, government ministers, the Queen and even, despite the nonsense asserted by some, citing what might otherwise be legitimate concerns, children; EXCEPT for libel, slander, misrepresentation or any damage caused deliberately or negligently constructively by such, provided that any programme using the material is factual, fair comment and not acquired by UNREASONABLE deception or the use of technology that unreasonably breeches privacy (this issue is regularly being tested in Law and ultimately has to be decided by a jury on a case by case basis) Even vox pops where people clearly volunteer their voiced contribution to a clearly presented camera or mic don't require a release per se, even though it's usually wise to get one if only to save any potential hassle. It's only where a production is fiction or purely arts based that nearly everything must be covered by agreements.

But as Paddy suggests, there's no accounting for the unwarrantedly risk averse distributor who adds their own rules beyond what the law demands; good examples of which are where corporate logos are blurred out on t-shirts worn by potentially disreputable individuals on the grounds that any such business might be adversely affected by association, but even this would be hard to challenge under law. Fighting law suits however, even when you win, can be a major pain in the neck, hence sensible caution is wise.

One last point is that sync sound and image of any copyrighted entity, including the latest hit music, presented within a factual programme is also free to use provided that the sound and picture are not separated (other than during a momentary split audio edit) and are incidental or parallel action to the subject matter. Any such usage however must be reasonable and not exploited by such things as over use in terms if duration and repeated cues, again a matter for that fundamental point, particularly within Common Law jurisdictions (the Queens realms plus the USA) of what is reasonable, which again can only ultimately be decided by a jury.

10 years, 11 months ago - John Lubran

In Law there's no doubt about what is private or public domain although as Mat observes there are arguments that sometimes have to be made before a judicial definition can be asserted, such as;

Any place, property, premises or domain that is common land or owned by the state on behalf of the public is public domain, which brings up such issues as high security places like military, national intelligence, nuclear facilities etc., etc; where the common law defence of 'duress of circumstance' can be invoked (which although ultimately the only lawful basis that allows government to restrict public access to a public domain by means of restrictive statutes is, ironically, also equally an argument available to anyone for breaking or temporarily suspending, by an action, those very same statutes; no doubt we'll be hearing more and more about this in the future). Any private place that the public are given free access to without specific condition is also public domain. However the legal private owner of such a place, such as a shop, shopping mall or any other private institution, may ask you to stop filming either by clear signage at the entrance to that property or by asking you to stop. Their power to actually enforce that request is not so simple though. Nevertheless hassle is usually best avoided. Rather more potentially sinister situations arise when for example the state claims that publicly owned facilities such as public transport facilities are not public domain. Currently filming on the tube for example is declared restricted. This would seem to be a perverse assertion according to fundamental Law (Law is always superior to mere statute, even if, for now, perverse courts suggest otherwise) but for now it's not easy to challenge. Put a camera up on a tripod on any Crown property or park and it won't take long before some officious functionary orders you to stop. Whether or not Crown property is publically owned is a more complex debate than it might seem.

So apart from these grey areas of contention most other places owned by and freely accessible to the public are unrestricted public domain where there are no lawfully restrictive powers that can prevent filming absolutely anything or anyone in or from that public place even if the subject itself is not actually on that public place but observable from it, other than that often spurious assertion of ‘obstruction’, which ought to be challenged according to common law definitions rather than those asserted by the lowest form of law we have in the UK, which is the legally dubious and certainly unlawful ‘by-law' erroneously asserted by local council corporations to have statutory authority.

This whole issue has massive ramifications, far beyond the issues of filming, regarding a much greater arena of contention regarding freedom, abuse of power and unlawful governance. It's the second biggest issue for us all after, 'Is the creator of our universe a sentient God?'

10 years, 11 months ago - Jinan C

Thank you all so much for such details replies - a great help!

My last question relating to this ties into John's last comment: "It's only where a production is fiction or purely arts based that nearly everything must be covered by agreements."

I am asking this question with regard to a film that is essentially documentary, but closer to an essay film - i.e. subjective voice-over narration. It will be a reflective film about the themes and subjects within it, so wondering if this changes anything with regard to people in a scene filmed in a public place?

10 years, 11 months ago - Mät King

Re: last post. The third word on the fifth line should read permission.

10 years, 11 months ago - Paddy Robinson-Griffin

Where this all shakes out down the line is when you want E&O insurance to get distribution. If you have releases for world and wife, it'll make it easier and cheaper. That's not the law, that's just practicality!

That said for a documentary on a serious subject it's a different expectation than an expensive drama - in one the background person is truly incidental and you cannot recapture the missed moment, with the drama you expect to do multiple tasks. What it all comes down to is of someone tries to sue or worse still injunct. Being sued is what your E&O is for, and most claims will fail but be costly hassle to defend, being injuncted can kill your profits and release and is a very bad thing. Releases (which are legally questionable anyway) are more a psychological tool, so someone knows they've been filmed and you can refer them to their signature that it was all on at the time and that they shouldn't get silly with you!