Filming at a bar. Do you have to clear all liquor bottles?

JonathanLB said:
This isn't correct, I think that people are getting overzealous, there is actually a rule about this type of thing and I forget the exact number, but my UPM on a music video I shot knew it -- if it's over like 12 bottles, you don't need to clear any specific one. It's only if you're focusing on a few, but if there's a proliferation of them you don't need clearance on them all.

That being said, on our feature we got so much alcohol placement for free, it's really not that tough to do. If you find the companies that deal with product placement, you can get a lot of free product and get it cleared. We got Budweiser, Heineken, Corona, and all of the products those companies make, plus a whiskey company, a vodka company, and could have gotten more hard alcohol but we didn't bother because we really didn't need it.

PS: That's a pretty stupid story about Greeking labels for products you cleared. It's stupid because I hope whoever made that decision was actually paying attention to the contracts the production signed. I saw all of our contracts, and in most of the cases, certainly for anything significant, we were REQUIRED to show their product X number of times, or be liable to pay for what we used. So like with Arrowhead water, we had to show their brand twice in the movie, otherwise pay something like $400 for the water they gave us. Not good. So if anything your paranoia should be over NOT showing the brand you cleared, because that's what gets you in trouble, not showing something you contractually agreed to show. We were also cleared for Dell, by the way. It's very easy to get cleared for most of these products and companies, though I'm a little bit proud of the fact we are cleared for so many things that I see a lot of TV shows aren't and it makes them look cheesy. I notice Dexter uses a fake search engine, for instance, we got cleared for Bing so ours looks real because it is. Their phones also look hokey -- who has texts come in with an all blue background? You can say it looks cinematic, white on blue, but it actually looks Mickey Mouse because nobody has a phone like that. We were cleared for Boost Mobile and also Apple products, thus the iPhone as well. None of that Mickey Mouse crap in my movie! ;)
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Interesting! Great post.
 
*shrug* that's clearly why our clearance staff were hired on to a $1.5 million/episode network series and Jonathan is...

...sorry, what's Jonathan doing, again?

Calling out professionals as 'stupid' is a privilege reserved for their fellow professionals. Who can usually be identified by their reluctance to publicly call other pros 'stupid' when they really have no idea why any given decision may have been made.
 
JonathanLB said:
This isn't correct, I think that people are getting overzealous, there is actually a rule about this type of thing and I forget the exact number, but my UPM on a music video I shot knew it -- if it's over like 12 bottles, you don't need to clear any specific one. It's only if you're focusing on a few, but if there's a proliferation of them you don't need clearance on them all.
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What do you mean by rule? Is that an actual law or a court ruling or a best practices guide?
 
Interesting how people are giving advice based on their ideas/impressions of this matter and not on actual knowledge of the legislation. Trouble with that is that we end up with 5 pages of replies and no real answer. I will link an article explaining the actual legalities at the bottom of this post, but I have also consulted my father, an attorney with Hovey, Williams LLP, a firm that works exclusively with copyright/patent and trademark law.

The reason that people are covering up labels and the like is not to avoid being sued, it is to avoid having sponsorship pulled or from losing potential sponsorship. A trademark represents a brand. That is all we are talking about in this matter, trademarks. Patents and copyrights are different matters. Copyrights would include ideas/characters/creative works that you CANNOT use (i.e. having a character named Captain Picard or Darth Vader in your movie...) Patents are something else entirely that have no bearing on film.

As far as trademarks are concerned, they are designed to protect a company's ability to sell a product and have that product identified as what it is without confusion. As long as you are not selling a product under the same name as a trademarked product or confusing the public as to the nature/use/identity of that product you are not violating copyright law. That means you can have a serial killer who is obsessed with drinking pepsi after he kills and rapes the village kittens and you are safe from any lawsuits. HOWEVER, if you have a character explain that pepsi is made from the blood of Cantonese fire-ants, you can get sued for slander. If you are true, factual and not selling a product, you CAN use ANY trademark.

HOWEVER - it is possible whoever you are selling your film to has contracts with companies that limit how they can use their trademarks, but that is dictated by those contracts, not trademark law. Also, film festivals and other such venues might have similar agreements, or maybe they have an agreement with coke saying they will not show pepsi products in their films. It is for these reasons that often times producers and 'suits' will err on the side of caution and strike the labels to avoid any complications down the road.

Additionally, you can say bad things about a trademarked company/product as much as you like in film/tv, as long as it's true. It isn't the trademark holder you have to worry about, it is your sponsor/distributer. Check with them.

http://ezinearticles.com/?Trademarks-In-Film---Best-Practices&id=1954364
 
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Suicdekng: yep.

The biggest prob you'll have is trying to sell the film to someone who is sponsored by Pepsi, when you have Coke bottle all over the place. Etc.
 
Excellent article, Suicdekng. Thank you. If the film is being used for advertising (i.e. a commercial), there is one other issue: implied endorsement. Releases need to be obtained in that case, otherwise the trademark can argue that you are implying that they endorse your product.
 
Aah, what a breath of fresh air, suicdekng. Pages and pages of pointless speculation, and then you come in and settle the issue. I wish this was the case for so many threads. I've grown increasingly exasperated by self-styled experts who don't actually know anything at all. The old adage "don't believe everything you read" still holds. Thank you for clearing the air. Now if only you could do the same thing with about 1000 more threads out there :)...
 
A thanks to suicdekng for his post, which I would guess is factual. But it ignores the other 2 problems.

1) large, deep pocketed brands can still sue, even if they have little or no basis, causing you to capitulate simply because you don't have the time or funds to defend yourself. Abuse of process - sure. Totally unfair - you bet. Does it happen - all the time.

2) Largely, but not exclusively due to 1, distributors are not going to touch it - they (and their investors) don't want the potential hassle.

Reality sucks sometimes. So do your homework. If it was easy, we'd have more competition.
 
Reverse chuckle - recently watched an episode of a well produced tv series for hot rodders. Set was full of brands all over the place. All the top names - Snap On, Monroe, Moog, Mac, Holly - you get the idea - except for the one large glaring photoshopped smudge on the shop wall for the brand that didn't pony up. Loved it.
 
pixelated said:
A thanks to suicdekng for his post, which I would guess is factual. But it ignores the other 2 problems.

1) large, deep pocketed brands can still sue, even if they have little or no basis, causing you to capitulate simply because you don't have the time or funds to defend yourself. Abuse of process - sure. Totally unfair - you bet. Does it happen - all the time.

2) Largely, but not exclusively due to 1, distributors are not going to touch it - they (and their investors) don't want the potential hassle.

Reality sucks sometimes. So do your homework. If it was easy, we'd have more competition.
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There is certainly that to think about. Additionally, I re-read my original post and realize that when I post things at 2am, I end up sounding like a condescending prick. Sorry to everyone about the tone in that post.

A comment about the 'you could be sued' problem... Yes, a large brand CAN sue you for... well, technically anyone can sue anyone for anything. Most fruitless cases wont ever go to court or cost you any money, but then again, many will never go to court but will cost you a lot of money. There are protections that a person has to insulate them from baseless lawsuits, but unfortunately they are rather complicated and best handled by an attorney. Attorneys cost money...

BUT!!!!!!! This is most important, if you are such a small company/production house that you don't have an attorney on retainer or one that you have used before who can help you with lawsuits like this, there is a 1 to 9823748923798436 chance that you are going to ever get sued. Yes, we can sit around and talk about what CAN happen, but to be honest, if you make a short film, show it at a couple film festivals and maybe even sell a couple copies and in that film you show trademarked logos, products and everything your chances of getting sued are still smaller than dieing in a car wreck on the way to the festival. So sure, just like you should wear your seatbelt you might want to use fake product names if you are saying bad things about the product or have a serial rapist with an infatuation with Mrs. Buttersworth. Unless you don't want to. Just decide, is it worth it to you to strike all trademarks to protect yourself from the infinitely small chance of a lawsuit or would you rather show products and items in your work the same way we all see them in the real world but risk a frivolous lawsuit?

Believe it or not, Coca-Cola does not have a division of lawyers combing Vimeo(tm) looking for people they can sue. Even though these corporations have millions of dollars, they aren't going to waste any of it suing someone unless it is worthwhile to them. They are smart enough to know that they aren't going to get any money from suing an indie filmmaker even if they win, so the only reason they would sue is to force you to pull your film or remove the trademarked scene and re-shoot. AND they will only do that if your film threatens them in a big enough way to be worth the expense of a lawsuit.

In short - YOU NEVER HAVE TO WORRY as long as you are not doing one of the two no-nos, selling a product under their trademark or saying untrue things about their product. The reason I say this is because unless you have a producer in charge of you telling you that you can or cant use a trademark then you are too small of an operation to ever even show up on their radar. If your production company doesn't have a legal department, you aren't a big enough threat to ever be sued. Yes, there is still a chance, so decide for yourself, but DO NOT let your fears of this impact your art.

This is one of those issues that people get hung up on in preproduction and spend hours stressing about that is really a non-issue. It is misunderstood by most, and really is a matter for TV companies and studios to worry about and does not impact the users of this forum in most any way. Spend much more time worrying if your lights are going to blow the circuit in the location you are using or if you need property/event insurance to book a location and stop worrying about trademarks.

Happy filming!
 
jleo said:
fake liquor labels for movies and Tv...

http://www.theearlhayspress.com/id10.html
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eek.. me double posting... sorry.

This is more trademark infringement than actually using the real product. The trademark for products nearly always includes the shape of the bottle, label, colors, text, layout, ect. Using something like this where you change only the letters in the name and keep the entire layout can be more troublesome for you. Either that or it will in NO WAY help. See, if you started bottling whiskey in Johnnie Walker bottles with correct labels and I started selling whiskey in the fake Johnnie Walker bottles we would both be equally breaking the law. Maybe mock-ups like these will make a producer happier, but they do NOT protect you in ANY way from any litigation.
 
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