19th TDF: Market Talks 10/3 - A Practical Guide For Documentary Filmmakers

19th Thessaloniki Documentary Festival
3-12 March 2017
 
MARKET TALKS 10/3
A PRACTICAL GUIDE FOR DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKERS

 
The “Market Talks” section of the Doc Market of the 19th Thessaloniki Documentary Festival continued on Friday, March 10th 2017, at the “Room with a view” Cafe of the Olympion Complex, as part of the 19th TDF. This is a successful discussions event in which distinguished professionals in the field of cinema offer useful info and practical tips to Greek and foreign documentary filmmakers who attend this year’s edition.
 
Main speakers of the event were Irina Loukatou (General Manager-Head of Publishing) and Stefanos Ganos (General Manager-Head of Production) of the MuSou company, one of the first companies in Greece offering a wide range of music related services, including custom music creation, sound design, licensing etc.
 
The main focus of the discussion was music copyrights and licensing.
 
Irina Loukatou noted that, when beginning to make a film, the director has in mind a specific piece of music that will accompany it. Oftentimes, however, the director uses that music, but eventually the film cannot be screened, since the music copyrights had not been reserved in advance.
 
Obtaining the usage rights, both from the artists and the record company, can be a time-consuming and costly procedure. The film’s production department should contact the record company and, depending on the available budget, make a plan about how the music for the film will be selected: that is, whether original music will be used or some music piece from the music libraries for which they have pre-reserved rights.
 
MuSou company manages the direct contracts with musicians, represents music copyrights and works with companies abroad for the release of usage rights. Moreover, it offers all music and sound related services as well as music production services, with studios, original music production and sub-publishing from companies such as EMI, Warner and others, while it also manages the rights of the work of Greek artists abroad.
 
The budget determines how film producers will move forward with the music. As it was stressed during the discussion, some artists are not willing to negotiate the price for releasing the rights of their songs, while others may offer to release them at a lower price, depending on the respective movie, or even refuse to release them altogether, in case they disagree with the topic of the film. This mediation is carried out by MuSou, which works as a consulting company.
 
Answering to a question regarding co-productions, Irina Loukatou replied that the usage rights are determined by the country of the main producer, who owns the production rights and the copyrights.
 
There was another question from the audience, regarding the music we hear in a movie, be it original or a cover version. It was highlighted that the original music rights are automatically guaranteed, but whichever piece of music accompanies the film’s image must in all cases receive copyrights.