Hi ,
This is my first post ever. I have been a voluntary tour manager for various heavy metal / punk / hardcore groups ( i.e. no money but free food and travel ) and filmed these tours with the agreement at the time from the bands themselves. A lot of it is backstage / on tour buses + hotel rooms aswell as live music.Plenty of one to one with the bands . My filming started in 1996 and ended around late 2003 .About half my tapes are broadcast quality at the time on mini dv shot with a sony vx2000 .The rest are hi8 / 8mm home movie quality shot on a sony handycam 8mm. After dusting down the tapes some of the stuff is pretty good and could be worth selling / producing my own film . All the tours were within Europe/Uk . So my questions are
1) Who owns copyright to the live music ?
2) Do i have to inform the relevant record companies ?
3) Does the nationality of the band make a difference ?
4) How do i copyright my material as i have approx 100 tapes
5) Would i be better off producing a film myself or selling the rights?
6) Whats the best way to sell my footage? , and what mistakes too avoid.
Pretty much all the bands i filmed at the time were at the infancy of their careers and went on to do better things and get signed by bigger labels etc. I have them playing smaller venues , festivals , award cermonies etc. I feel my footage is worth something and could be sold and would like to know how much , as no-one has ever seen it before.
I'm not naming any bands that i have filmed as i would like to keep that anon , none of the bands are selling millions but are all doing well enough and have enough exposure on magazines/computer games etc to ensure enough people would probably like to see my footage.
many thanks for any help
Matt