V48HOURS 2010 – A Furious Filmmaking Competition

Music FAQ

Ultimately we'd love you to get talented musicians to join in the fun and produce music during the actual shoot weekend. Many teams do this and find it extremely rewarding. However it's not an easy thing to pull off, especially if all you know is some dude who claims he can play the drums, but all you've seen him do is pound his digits on the car's dashboard.

So you have four choices when it comes to music/ scoring your short.

• Record your own music.
• Use Tracks from our Music Partners.
• Clear other music for use within 48HOURS.
• Have no music. Kinda of like NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN.

Need some sound fx for your short -

First - check out this AWESOME post on the 48HOURS Forum, where forum regular Treefrog, with assistance from other regular Nitro for hosting, have posted a bunch of free sound fx files for your use: Free Sound FX Forum Post

Otherwise, a lot of programs (like Garageband or Soundtrack Pro on Apple Macs) come with libraries of free to use sound fx.

This year joining our old Music Partner in crime LOOP are two additional New Zealand Music labels who have kindly offered their fantastic artists and music to the 48HOURS. These labels are offering thousands of tracks for use within 48HOURS.

We really want you to support our Music Partners. There is a huge range of tracks to choose from and the sooner you start familiarising yourself with what's available, the better. The three labels and artists below have really gone out of their way to help. So hurry up and purchase their music and get the music cleared as part of the purchase.

The quicker you can decide on what might be appropriate for the short you're going to make. Obviously we encourage those who have the ability to record new material on the actual weekend but we acknowledge that this is not an option for everyone. If you can't sing or play an instrument, then try whistling or humming and if you can't whistle or hum, then use some of the options below.

Loop

LOOP Recordings have again come back for their 4th year as a music partner and we really appreciate their support and commitment. LOOP also produce a wicked short each year - last years one was picked as a Wildcard by Peter Jackson. Click HERE to find out more about Loop's available tracks for this year's competition.

Arch Hill

Arch Hill have some our favourite bands like Pine, Luke Buda, Fang, Punches and many more on their roster. Click here to find out more about Arch Hill's available tracks for this year's competition.

Kog

KOG have made available a Production Music Library DVD that has over 1000 instrumental & vocal tracks to choose from. It features a fully searchable/ keyword tagged database - ie need to find a sinister track with choir?, simply tick the boxes you need and viola. Click here to find out more about Kog's available tracks for this year's competition.<br/>

Support Local Music!

Music Licensing

Music copyright is important to ensure musicians can earn a living, as they are generally not paid to write songs or music and can often only make money from them by receiving money paid for the right to use them in other ways. This matters to you as a filmmaker because existing music throws up a large amount of copyright considerations. This document will discuss some of your options.

Original Music

In the case of the 48HOURS competition, the best solution if possible is to get volunteer musicians to write, perform and record an original score over the weekend.Not only is it easier in terms of copyright consideration - it's much more in spirit of making the entire short within the 48HOURS. In this case they will need to sign a release giving you and 48HOURS the right to use and edit the music they make, to synchronise it with your short, and to broadcast and distribute you that short in all formats (e.g film, DVD, YouTube etc.) in all territories (countries/places/planets) for all time (so your film can still be shown legally 5, 10 or 20 years from now). This can be a non exclusive licence, which means if they want to use that music for other projects they can - but the other parts are really not negotiable, if it the film can't be played with the same music 5 years down the track, or transfered onto holographic cube disk in 10 years time because you didn't secure the legal rights in the first place it kinda sucks for everyone involved.

Music Loops

There are many computer programs out there that use looped musical tracks to allow you to generate new songs or music by mixing together the loops. It is important when using looped music that you ensure that ALL the loops you use are royalty free (i.e you don't need to pay to use them) and also allow you to use them for commercial means.<br/> An example program that includes royalty free loops is Garageband for Apple computers. Garageband includes both short loops and complete tracks which are completely royalty free and also don't require that you even credit Garageband as the source (One of the downsides to this is that they tend to get used a lot and are easier to spot and not very unique.)

Other websites offer various types of 'royalty free' loops. You must be careful when downloading 'royalty free' loops because often the sites have provisos, either stating that the loops are only royalty free if used for non profit or personal projects (which isn't suitable for the 48HOURS competition), or at the least they require some sort of mention in the credits for their use. So while a lot of sites may advertise 'free music' or 'royalty free music' you should always read the terms and conditions and abide by them. <br/> One site which offers such 'royalty free' loops, just in exchange for a credit, is LooperMan As you can provide a credit, this should be absolutely fine.

Production Music

Production Music is music specifically made for inclusion in film, tv or internet production.

Production music will often come from a library and there is a charge for using production music.

However it is designed to be easier to get the rights to use than other published music so you won't need to negotiate on a case by case basis for your tracks.

There is a pre-arranged rate to use the track (broken into how many lots of 30 seconds you use, and where and what you are using the music for.)

For V48HOURS 2010 AMCOS has once again offered a cost-effective solution to your music needs by providing special rates for Production Music in V48HOURS films. The fees include both publishing and sound recording rights.

$12 per 30 seconds (or part thereof) + GST

$100 + GST flat fee per film for as much music as you want

All music must be entered on a music cue sheet and sent to us. A $10 administration fee is applied to all cue sheets.

Your contact at APRA|AMCOS for Production music queries is Amy Bodsworth, email:abodsworth@apra.com.au or ph: 09 623 4711.

Recorded Music and Songs

Apart from selected tracks from the three 48HOURS Music Partners (Loop, Arch Hill, Kog), recorded music and songs, the sort that you hear on the radio or buy in the CD shop, will not have a flat rate included for its use and you will negotiate with the respective copyright owners over permission to use any part of that song

Published (or commercial) music requires two clearances, one from the songwriters (usually looked after by a music publisher) and the other for the sound recording (through a record label). It is a time consuming and expensive exercise, but your film cannot be screened or broadcast without those permissions.

As there are not flat rates and everything is negotiable, actual costs can not be given, but generally this is viewed as the most expensive and potentially difficult option in terms of getting music for the 48HOURS , and we would suggest you will be better off looking at other options first.

Getting require clearances can be very time consuming to negotiate as well as potentially very expensive, and is very unsuitable for use in a V48HOURS film. Especially as it requires even MORE paper work than production music, as there are a bunch more people involved.

Recording covers of original songs

Recording a new version of an existing song will not excuse your from copyright obligations to the original song writer, even if they never performed the song themselves. As such the costs aren't necessarily all that different from using other popular recorded music and songs. You would need permission to re-record the song from the original songwriter/s and it is likely that they have contractual obligations to a publisher or record company. Again, this is generally totally unsuitable for use in a 48 Hour film due to the potentially time consuming and expensive nature. And did we mention that there could be tons of paperwork involved.

Recording Classical/really old music

Songs which are a couple of hundred years old are generally ok to perform and record - but just because a song is really old doesn't mean you can use any old recording of it. Each individual recording has it's own copyright, so you are going to have to record a whole new version of the song - or find a copy of the song that was recorded no later than the the early 1900's and is definitely in Public Domain (much harder to do than you'd think).

So if you've got a great pianist in your team (and a piano) who can do a ripping Four Seasons - then recording them playing it is fine. but if you've got a great copy of Four Seasons recorded by the London Symphony Orchestra you're in the same boat as if it was a Beatles track, you really can't use it without the London Symphony's permission, and that's going to be time consuming and very costly to get - so isn't really suitable for the 48HOURS competition.