What you actually sell, the duration of a licence, image rights, and the five lines that prevent disputes.
The four questions of the licence
Four, and they are enough to describe what is being sold.
Which channels: the brand's account, paid advertising, the website, the product page, the shop, a trade fair.
What duration: in months, from the first publication and not from the delivery.
What territory: a country, a zone, a language.
And what modifications: re-editing, cutting, subtitling, dubbing, changing the burnt-in text.
One rule simplifying everything: what is not named is not transferred. The creator therefore keeps the rest, and the brand knows exactly what it can do without asking again.
Image rights are separate
That is the point most agreements confuse with the licence on the video.
The video is one thing, a person appearing on screen is another: they are two distinct permissions, each with its own duration and scope.
Three cases to handle explicitly.
The creator themselves, for their image and voice.
Third parties present in frame, including in the background.
And minors, who require particular attention and the agreement of those responsible for them.
One useful precaution: plan for withdrawal. A person may ask to stop appearing, and it is better to have written in advance what happens then, rather than discovering it mid-campaign. The exact arrangements are checked with a lawyer.
The five lines that prevent disputes
Five, and they fit in a message.
What is delivered: number of videos, formats, lengths.
What is transferred: channels, duration, territory, modifications.
What is not transferred: everything else, named in one sentence.
The price, and what triggers payment.
And the end procedure: who takes it down, within what deadline, and what happens if the video stays online beyond that.
A sixth line, often decisive: exclusivity. If the brand wants to stop the creator working for a competitor, that is priced separately and limited in time and by category.
What is really enough
A one-page document, signed, is worth more than a ten-page contract nobody reads.
Three reasons. It gets reread before every campaign. It is understood by somebody who did not take part in the negotiation. And it can be found again, because it is short.
Three precautions all the same. Have your template read once by a lawyer, then reuse it. Keep every signed copy, dated, with the associated permissions. And never modify an agreement by a spoken message: a sentence added in conversation does not survive a change of team.
What each document covers
| Document | What it settles | When it is signed |
|---|---|---|
| The accepted quote | Price, content, date | Before the shoot |
| The rights licence | Media, duration, territory | With the quote |
| The image release | The people filmed | On the day of the shoot |
What is most often missing
The third-party release. A friend, a child or an employee filmed without a written form makes the video unusable, and it is discovered at release time.
What is re-read before signing
Automatic renewal, transfer to a third party, the exclusivity clause and the fate of the source files, to be confirmed with a lawyer.
The renewal
Two moves, and they take five minutes.
A reminder thirty days before the end date, set on the day of signature.
And a written decision: extend against payment, take down, or renegotiate a wider scope.
One last point, valid on both sides: an extension is better negotiated before expiry than after. The brand asking for an extension three days before the end gets a price; the one asking after leaving the video online is negotiating something else.
