Current Practices in Corporate Video

In this essay I will be looking at the current practices in Corporate video and how they are used/misused in videos by looking at copyright; privacy; defamation; fair use; ethical and; technologies.

Copyright

When someone creates anything from a film, to an illustration, to a piece of written work, that work is then protected by copyright, which means the creator owns the right to that piece of work. If another person was then to come along and take your work and try to pass it off as their own then they are breaching copyright and can be taken to court by the true owner.

Fair Use

There are some exceptions to copyright laws,. Though copyright and fair use vary depending on country, fair use generally dictates that a person can use copyrighted material for:

• Research or Private Study
• Criticism or Review
• Reporting Current Events
• (as of 2014) Parody/Pastiche/Caricature

Fair use is a term that these days you hear too often associated with content on the video hosting platform YouTube due to its strict copyright infringement system. If a video is thought to have infringed copyright it will be taken down. There are 2 main ways YouTube goes about finding copyright infringement, first they have an automated Content ID match system which will run all videos through a system to check against a library of copyright material. The second way is that the copyright owner themselves can file a complaint with YouTube, who will then take the video down. The user that has had their video taken down for infringement can dispute this with YouTube if they can prove that either no copyright has been breached, or the so called infringing content is under "fair use".

Privacy

Privacy laws come into effect when concerning someones image, information, and personal lives. An example of breaching someones privacy is if you are interviewing someone who has not given permission for their image to be used and you later include them in your video anyway. Another way of breaching someones Privacy is by using private information such as their finances or health without either permission or justification of public interest. 

Defamation

Defamation is the process of damaging a persons/companies reputation through use of an article or video etc... If a person is found to be defaming a person/company they affected party can take legal action and sue them.

Ethical

When making anything from books to videos you need to think about ethical issues to try and not offend people/groups over gender, race, religion, class/backgrounds.

Releases

When making any type of professional video you need to make sure you have signed releases otherwise you could get into legal trouble.

A Talent release would be needed in order to use an actors image in your production. It is usually  a form signed by both actor and photographer agreeing the terms of when the actors image will be shot, what there image will be used for and how it will be distributed.

A Location release is needed in order to film in a private residence or building. It is also a signed agreement between the photographer and the owner of the property and acts a consent from the owner for their property to be filmed in and that footage to be distributed.

A Material release is an agreement to use thing such as documents, photographs etc... in your film.

Technologies

There are many different types of equipment that can be used to make a corporate video some examples are:

CAMERA: Canon EOS 750D
This consumer DSLR camera, though mainly used for photography, can also be used for lower budget video productions due to it being a consumer camera at around £600 which is cheaper than both prosumer and professional model cameras/camcorders but still delivers quality video performance.

AUDIO: Rode NTG2 Shotgun Mic
DSLRs as mainly photography cameras aren't really designed with sound in mind so a shot gun mic is handy to have to simply plug in and attach to the camera and get more professional sounding audio. Even though the mic costs around £180 it is worth spending that much on a mic for peace of mind with audio.

LIGHTS: 50x70cm Soft Box Lightes x2 (amazon)
These are just an example of low budget (£45) portable soft box lights i found on amazon, which are useful to even out or add lighting to a room/spot during an interview.