After you’ve worked so hard to book that job and delivered a flawless performance on set, you’re gonna want that footage! If not for your demo reel, at least for the memories!
Getting your footage isn’t always easy. No matter your situation, I hope I can help you here.
PLANNING AHEAD
The best way to set yourself up for footage success is to plan ahead.
- While on set: if you have another day player working with you, ask if they’d like to split an aircheck with you and exchange information. No sense in TWO people paying to track down footage.
- Set a reminder in your phone for when you estimate the show will air. You can do this by referencing the episode number compared to which episode is currently airing.
- Before your episode airs, order an HD aircheck. I love using Joe’s Reels because he’s quick, reliable, and reasonably priced! His email is sendmailtojoe@gmail.com
WHOOPS YOU MISSED IT!
If your episode has already aired, but it’s not yet for sale on itunes or something similar, you can still get an aircheck! Call Joe, he’ll hook you up!
HOW TO GET YOUR FOOTAGE IF IT’S STREAMING ONLINE
If you really need it ASAP, you can purchase a screen recording software like Screenflow to record the screen & internal monitor audio. (note: Screenflow doesn’t work on iTunes. I’ve used it with Netflix, Xfinity, & Amazon. I haven’t tried Hulu)
HOW TO GET FOOTAGE OFF YOUR DVR
If you’re reasonably tech-savvy, you can purchase a video capture cable like this one to pull the footage from your DVR to your computer. There are plenty of walkthrough videos on Youtube to walk you through grabbing your footage with this lil’ guy!
HOW TO RIP FOOTAGE FROM ITUNES
If your footage is only available on Itunes, here’s my hack…
- Purchase and download episode from iTunes
- Strip protection by using a program called TunesKit for Mac
- If the remaining video has an echo, you can run it through the iSkysoft Video Converter.
- Presto!
HOW TO DOWNLOAD YOUR FOOTAGE FROM YOUTUBE OR ISPOT.TV
I found this great site to download commercials from Youtube AND ispot.tv. It worked great for me. However, you always download from sites like this at your own risk.
IF YOU’VE BEEN WAITING FOR FOOTAGE FROM A FILM FOREVER!
This happens a lot with low budget films. No one is trying to mess with you but sometimes editing is delayed because of budget problems.
Give your contact (director/producer/creator) a little leeway. If it’s gone on for too dang long, you can request that they just send you one un-polished scene for you to “give to your agent.”
The content creator may not realize that just that tiny scene would be helpful, so let them know. And assure them you will not share it for public viewing.
YOU CAN’T SEEM TO FIND THE EPISODE EVER/YOU WERE CUT/IT NEVER AIRED
Oof, this one hurts. You’re likely out of luck but SOMETIMES, if you can track down someone in production, they might get you a copy of your scenes. I’ve never had luck with this but some people have.
I hope this post helps you track down that footage of your stellar performance. Got any tricks we should add? Let us know in the comments!