Stock imagery: With demand for emotional footage at an all-time high, stock houses consider future growth via HD and the Web

Post, Jan, 2002 by Edmond M. Rosenthal

Flag waving, Americana and escapism have all become prominent themes as advertising agencies and other users of stock footage respond to the September 11 attacks and its aftermath. How long these themes will remain in vogue is anyone's guess. Meanwhile, on a more longterm basis, some libraries are taking a closer look at the requirements for a future possibly including high definition and Webcasting.

"Everybody is using flags in many different ways," comments Peter Klein, president of Best Shot Stock Footage (www.bestshotfootage.com) in Tampa. "This may be temporary. We'll have to see how American sentiment goes." He notes that the trend since Sept. 11 also has been toward family liftestyles, including picnics and other family gatherings. Not certain whether it fits into this new emphasis, he reports an upsurge in requests for old 8mm home movies that have been transferred and cleared.

While adding more Americana themes to its library, Best Shot has picked up four new stringers who have shot not-seen-elsewhere footage of the Sept. 11 scene. It has also unearthed Afghan footage from the '60s.

Documentary and entertainment clients have shown a heightened interest in international news images, according to David Seevers, director of sales and for ABCNews VideoSource (www.abcvsource.com) in New York. Marketing with footage of the attacks and subsequent rescue efforts, he notes, clients are demanding material from around the world, including street protests in the Middle East and Pakistan and shots of prominent leaders in these areas.

A recent client was the CBS series JAG. They requested footage of the Pentagon attack. More unusual was a request from Bayer Pharmaceuticals for Sept. 11 footage to be used in a presentation to distributors of its biological products. Such demands are not only serviced by footage from ABC News but also through representation of Associated Press Television News and British Movietone News. Seevers notes APTN footage has been especially useful in fulfilling such requests as on-the-ground coverage in Afghanistan.

The flip side of the current trend is a move toward escapism, which is being seen by Mark Heidemann, sales director of Historic Films (www.historicfilms.com) in East Hampton, NY. This has been evidenced in a greater interest in entertainment celebrities than in world leaders and events, Going against this trend, though, was an A&E project on the history of West Point.

Historic Films will be digitizing most of its library over time so that it can be put on DVD or made available online, But there are no plans yet to address high definition demand, which has yet to be seen by this library.

HD ON THE WAY

That's not the case for Artbeats (www.artbeats.com) in Myrtle Creek, OR., which specializes in backgrounds, effects, aerials and nature. President Phil Bates reports that almost all of its newly shot product is in HD. While HD sales are increasing, he says, most of them are still in D-1. Artbeats sells its buyout, royalty-free product on CD-ROMs.

The operation recently acquired a Macintosh computer with a Pinnacle CineWave card and Final Cut Pro to capture uncompressed HD footage. The computer, hard drive bay and the CineWave system are all configured in a portable case on wheels. Bates explains, "We can take it to a telecine house and plug it right into the telecine to capture uncompressed high definition.

Another royalty-free, buyout company, Digital Vision (www.digitialvisionononline.com) in New York, is considering the release of some HD material next year. At present, says Jim Pascale, manager of Digital Vision's business development, everything is being shot in 35mm. He notes all CD-ROMs are cross-platform, in the QuickTime format with JPEG codec compression.

A new innovation at Digital Vision is the introduction of its first unrendered, layered stock footage title. Called Subliminal Data, it was produced by D-Fuse, a motion graphic designer in London. It allows extreme manipulation in Adobe After Effects, so that clients can mix and match the clips. Pascale says more of these projects are coming.

Another new development for the beginning of 2002 is the offering of 15 royalty-free music titles to accompany Digital Vision footage. Although the company already has one title with music on it, music and footage will be separate in most cases, Pascale says.

Saul Leyton, president of Air Power Film & Video (www.farflying@aol.com) in Manhasset, NY reports ad agencies are rapidly moving to 16-by-9 aspect ratio. 'This means that everything we send out must have negative or interpositive backup for digital 16-by-9 Betacam. Eventually, everyone will move from Digital Betacam to high definition."

He laments that his libraries of Betacam and 1-inch product that do not have negative or interpositive backup will not make the transition to HD. This means that more footage must be shot on HD or 35mm neg.

"They're also going to want high definition 24p frames," Leyton adds. "Your negative has so much information in the latent images in 35mm or 16mm that it will make the transition to 24p."