Who am I?
I’m no one special.
I’m just a person who volunteers on a film festival selection committee at a non-profit theater. I’ve judged direct-submission short films and features in the horror, science-fiction, dark fantasy, and mystery / psychological thriller genres since 2011. I’ve hosted a fair number of filmmakers in that time period. I have friends who are filmmakers. How cool is that?
Through volunteering with the film festival, I’ve seen a lot of early career filmmakers who don’t know what they’re getting into with regards to intellectual property.
I’ve seen how excited fledgling filmmakers are to be successful (which is great). But keeping track of chain of title, contracts, and copyright is probably not the first thing on their radar.
I also volunteer weekly with the same theater for the double feature helping people sign up for door prizes. The patrons tell us their number one film from the 30’s to the 90’s they would like to see in the future, and we talk about film. And so a number of my friends and acquaintances are film buffs. (Also, I wind up overhearing conversations between the patrons and the senior programming director about which distributor owns the rights to a particular film and what that means about whether the theater can show it or not.)
I know brilliant people with an encyclopedic knowledge of film who are terrified of making their own film because they don’t want to make a mistake with regards to use of works and then get into legal trouble. Or they’re afraid that the cost of gaining the necessary content rights would bankrupt them.
I’ve never made a film myself. And I’m not a lawyer. The authors of the sites that I link to are the professionals, not me. I just happen to find this stuff fascinating and I enjoy research. But having volunteered at the theater so much, I know a fair chunk about film. And after doing all of the research for this site, I hope that I’ve gained enough knowledge to help aspiring and novice filmmakers learn about some resources and avoid some mistakes.
I do have a Masters in History and a Masters in Information Science, for what it’s worth. I’ve worked in several university libraries. I did a lot of Library Science curriculum in my Information Science degree, because I almost went to the library side. I have many years of experience in computer support, so I’m used to poring over software licenses and Secure Data Room agreements and enforcing their use. I’ve written my share of technical documentation for computer support, so hopefully that helps this site to be user-friendly. I started looking into intellectual property when I began volunteering with a local Buddhist Center and I was trying figure out how to use public domain content to save money. And then I started noticing the intellectual property issues with film through volunteering with the theater.
The purpose of this site is to enable people to do more and get into less trouble. To help people educate themselves so that they can be empowered to make good decisions about the use and management of intellectual property in their projects. And to help people make decisions that will protect the intellectual property that they create.
The purpose of this site is not to be a be-all and end-all declaration on intellectual property. This is intended to be a resource site. A very general discussion of the intellectual property issues surrounding independent filmmaking. So that the reader can have a little bit of hopefully solid information to use to do more research or discuss their project with a legal professional.
I have tried to de-commercialize this site to the greatest extent possible. I’ve tried to use the publisher’s pages for any book references and not major book retailers. I’ve tried to reference government agencies and professional organizations for outside sources of help. Obviously some of the people that I’ve cited do this for a profit. But if I named people on this site, I’ve tried to vet them to the best of my ability. If you choose to do business with any particular service, person, or organization, you are on your own with regards to your choice of their services and your dealings with them.
Please read the Legal Disclaimer and the Terms of Service for more information. Again, I am not a lawyer, nor do I aspire to be. And, even if you see information from lawyers online, I’m sure they have similar language in their Terms of Service that says that legal information is not legal advice. In general, you may only assume that you are getting actual legal, financial, or business advice if you enter into an attorney-client relationship or contractual relationship with another financial or business professional.
Very special thanks to all of the legal professionals, independent filmmakers, librarians, maintainers of databases and information stores, and writers who have created the articles and resources that I’ve referenced. You are the stars of this show.
Vector images used on this site are modified from works by Pixabay.com user gleenferdinand and Pixabay.com user Clker-Free-Vector-Images.
My name is Wendy. You can send me a message through the Contact form on this site.
Some very general sources of external help after your initial research:
- Forming a Production Company
- Also, you can check out the Books and Trainings page on this site.
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