June 30, 2005 Rethinking the Soundtrack to Your Life: Flexibility and Adaptability Are the Keys to Clearing the Music for Your Film This past year has been a watermark year for documentarians, with documentaries moving more and more into the mainstream of public awareness and Read more
June 30, 2005 Documentarian in a Rights Dance Over Matisse Imagery Documentaries about 20th century artists are rarely produced these days, and for a very good reason: The filmmakers can't afford to pay for rights. Read more
June 30, 2005 Fair Use: The Documentarian's Best Friend By Pat Aufderheide and Peter Jaszi A study conducted with some 50 documentary filmmakers over the course of a year, the American University's "Untold Read more
June 30, 2005 Little Orphan Indie: The Problem of Rights Clearances and the IDA Solution If you have ever used a clip or a photo or an existing piece of music in your documentary, you must have spent more than a little time looking for Read more
March 31, 2005 Forecast Cloudy for Rights Clearance Copyright clearance seems like the weather. You can complain about it, but you can't do anything about it. Or can you? When we did some research at Read more
August 31, 2004 A Cultural Shift in Copyright: Creative Commons Fosters File-Sharing Concepts Who owns the images of our world? Where do ideas end and images begin? How can we both defend the freedoms and rights of filmmakers and encourage the Read more
May 31, 2004 Keeping Your Film's Soundtrack on Track: Why You May Need a Music Supervisor Documentary filmmaking continues to enjoy a surge in popularity, visibility and exhibition, in styles and formats ranging from short to feature- Read more
April 20, 2004 All Clear? Addressing the Complexities of Entertainment Law A review of Michael Donaldson's 'Clearance & Copyright: Everything the Independent Filmmaker Needs to Know,' 2nd Edition Read more
November 1, 2003 DVD Rights Clearance: Brand New Format, Same Old Laws A client once asked me if the legal and business issues concerning an audio-visual project would change, since mediamakers are producing more Read more
June 19, 2003 Fair Use Is Free Speech: Don't Lose It By Succumbing To Censorship If you work in contemporary or historical documentary or satire, chances are you've asked about rights: "Can I use this shot?" "Whom do I pay?" "Can Read more