Logos/Brands?

[digitalskylight]

Hey everyone,

We're about to shoot a music video, and the artist wants people in different college sports gear (jerseys, hats, etc.) to come out. They'll also be drinking beer and such.

I wanted to ask: I know for commercials, we've had to ask everyone to wear non-branded clothing. However, for this shoot, if we're not getting paid and the song isn't about the colleges at all, just generally about enjoying college life and sports, is there any way to still shoot with all the logos showing?

The ultimate distribution for this music video would be the artist's youtube + FB pages, as well as blogs (potentially).

Thanks!

 

[Cassius]

If the artist owns copyright this is his liability. The risk I see is that colleges can claim that their brand is being associated with drunkenness and lodge a complaint on that grounds. So it's a matter of context. The fact that universities and their sports teams are public institutions gives you some protection, and I think it's unlikely that you'll run into trouble. If your distribution is only the artist's personally managed pages I really doubt anyone will notice or care, not if the content is as innocent and non-specific as you're saying.

 

[j1clark@ucsd.edu]

Hey everyone,

We're about to shoot a music video, and the artist wants people in different college sports gear (jerseys, hats, etc.) to come out. They'll also be drinking beer and such.

I wanted to ask: I know for commercials, we've had to ask everyone to wear non-branded clothing. However, for this shoot, if we're not getting paid and the song isn't about the colleges at all, just generally about enjoying college life and sports, is there any way to still shoot with all the logos showing?

The ultimate distribution for this music video would be the artist's youtube + FB pages, as well as blogs (potentially).

Thanks!

I would suspect that most 'big name' college teams have trademarked some elements of their jerseys or symbols, and as such the trademark holder may assert their rights at any time, whether the work that includes the trademarked items was 'for profit' or not.

I would say that a video depicting drinking, possibly 'under aged drinking', and placing a college trademarked item in the work, would be considered a violation of the trademark holder's rights, since I doubt if the college would 'license' the mark for inclusion in such a work.

 

[digitalskylight]

I would suspect that most 'big name' college teams have trademarked some elements of their jerseys or symbols, and as such the trademark holder may assert their rights at any time, whether the work that includes the trademarked items was 'for profit' or not.

I would say that a video depicting drinking, possibly 'under aged drinking', and placing a college trademarked item in the work, would be considered a violation of the trademark holder's rights, since I doubt if the college would 'license' the mark for inclusion in such a work.

It wouldn't depict underage drinking. What really catches us is why people can't wear any clothing they want to with whatever logos - didn't they pay for the clothes?

 

[j1clark@ucsd.edu]

It wouldn't depict underage drinking. What really catches us is why people can't wear any clothing they want to with whatever logos - didn't they pay for the clothes?

While people pay to have the cloths, and wear them... what they have not paid for is the right for 'secondary use', such as appearing in a music video, film or other media. News media 'gets away with it' because they are reporting events, and what the public wears is 'incidental' to the news reportage. That would come under 'fair use'.

The same is true if one buys 'record/cd/iTunes' music. The person buys the right to listen to the music, but they did not buy the 'public performance/presentation' rights. DJs at 'events' often slide under the wire since there are not too many industry snoops attending weddings and other similar venues looking for copyright infringements. But videographers who put music on their client's DVD/BD, or 'on the web', have been cited for improper use, and fined.

You can put any music you want to anything you want... if you are the only viewer... 'temp tracks' often have copyrighted music which is only used to give the production a 'suggestion' of what may be good for the film. However, that is only shown to a limited set of people, and never shown outside the production, unless it is illegally taken. Once a music style is determine, a production will go to great lengths to insure all elements are owned or properly licensed before it is presented to 'the public'.

A 'facebook' page is 'public'.

I don't know if you have noticed it... but almost all 'behind the scenes' segments on almost all DVD/BDs these days have the 'logos' that may be incidental to the filming of the BTS clip, 'fuzzed out'. One would 'think' that since the BTS clip is not 'using the logo'... and more like 'news reportage' in that the logo is incidental to the reportage... that it would be 'fair use', but the studios require the BTS to be denuded of logos... (I'm sure someone got sued big time at some point, because I only noticed this for BTS segments in say the last 15 years or so...).

As for 'underaged drinking'... I once entertained doing a alcoholic beverage ad and got a spec, and one of the required items was that no performers are or appear to be under 26 years of age. So, while performer may be in fact over 21, even if they look 'young', there could be some objection.