6.  FOOTAGE WE ARE LOOKING FOR...

6.1  The Basics

First of all, we are looking for the highest quality footage and motion backgrounds.  We seek to be a community of artists who set the bar when it comes to creativity and production values.  Get creative, but please only submit your best and most professional work.  That said, the basics of stock footage are always needed as a basis for our library.

 Basic needs include:

FOOTAGE:

• Landscapes
• Places
• People
• Aerials  
• Urban Scenes
• Time Lapse 
• Flags
• Business/Financial Scenes
• Sports
• Extreme Sports 
• Nature Scenes
• Roads
• Science/Medicine
• Elements (Fire/Water/Smoke)
• Transitional Effects (Film Effects, etc.)
• Computers and Technology
• 3D Animations (Globes, Planets, Models, etc.)
• Holidays
• Weddings

MOTION BACKGROUNDS

• Abstract
• Liquid Textures
• Natural Textures
• Elements (Fire/Water/Smoke)
• Techno and 3D
• Text/Matrix Effects
• Fractals
• Wedding and Holiday Imagery

FX/TRANSITIONS

• Explosions
• Composited Transitions
• Fire
• Blasts
• Muzzle Flashes
• Transitions

6.2  The Good Stuff

Get creative!  While stock footage in the past has been based upon DVD volumes rather than individual clips, our setup will allow you to create on a clip to clip basis freeing up your creativity!

Here are some ideas:

• Macro Shots - Use a macro lens or add-on to create some very interesting close up shots of various moving objects like clocks, gears, antique items, basically anything that looks interesting and moves!
• Fisheye - Use a fisheye lens to achieve some unusual wide shots.  Fisheye shots are especially good for extreme sports.  Note:  Sometimes fisheye add-on lenses show a black ring around the footage if not zoomed in a bit.  These shots will not be accepted.
• Models - Create a series of creative and interesting model shots.  Look for interesting "camera-friendly" people.  Have them look into the camera and draw out their expressions.  Get real close up.  Use interesting framing.  
• Slow Motion - Most "post" slow motion effects are not preferred as they tend to look jittery, however, HD cameras that have variable frame rates like 60p produce smooth film-like slow motion effects.  These cameras are capable of capturing true slow motion which is very valuable as it has only been achieved with expensive film cameras in the past.  If your footage was not originally captured in slow motion, in general, it is a better idea to upload it in full motion and allow the purchaser to choose the slow motion settings they would like to use.

As you watch television keep your eyes peeled for interesting shots for inspiration.

6.3 What NOT to upload - Here are some examples of the types of footage that get rejected more regularly.

• Still shots of still scenes - RevoStock.com is a stock footage website.  May times we will get uploads that are still shots of still scenes with no movement of the camera or the subject.  These are kind of like low-resolution, 15 second long, overpriced stock photos.   Choose shots that have motion.  A good way to add motion to an outdoor scene is to shoot a time-lapse with clouds moving in the background.  We are also rather strict on simple pans, tilts and zooms of still objects like landscapes, walls, landmarks and other still subjects.  In some cases we will accept footage like this if the subject matter is interesting or creative enough.
  
  
• Improperly encoded footage: Footage must be encoded per the specs on our site or it will definitely be rejected.
  
  
• Footage that includes audio that is just ambient noise: Audio should only be included with your clip if it useable, necessary and high quality.  Most audio captured with your on-camera mic would not fit into this category.  For example, the audio of a pistol firing would be something you might want to include.  However, the white noise captured when shooting a waterfall you would not want to include.  In most cases, do not include audio.
  
  
• Shaky footage
  
  
• Dark footage

7.  Title, Descriptions and Keywords

Upon uploading your footage, you will be responsible for entering in a title, description and keyword for that piece of footage.  

7.1  Titles

Use a simple title to describe your footage, like "Spotted Dog Running," "Blonde Girl Laughing," "Urban Night Life," or "Ticking Clock."  Your title should be around 1-4 words.

We have our pages set up so that search engines such as Google will find the file information page for your file if someone searches a term that is included in your title. So descriptive titles are important.

Don’t use underscores in the name of your clip.

Don’t use words such as “HD”, “photojpeg”, etc. in your titles. Words describing format or codec are not needed. Users can specify format within the search engine.  The codec also shows on the file information page.

7.2 Descriptions

Your description allows you to go into more detail about what exactly is happening in the shot.  It doesn't have to be long and drawn out.  For instance, the description for your footage title "Urban Night Life" might be, "A fast motion shot of people walking outside of a nightspot in downtown Seattle."

Descriptions are also indexed by major search engines.  So help people find your files by giving a good description.

7.3  Keywords

Keywords are the most important factor in making your footage easily accessible to your potential buyers.  RevoStock.com uses a primary and secondary keyword system in order to make our search engine return the most relevant results to our users.

PRIMARY KEYWORDS:  In the "Primary Keyword" field you should enter only 4-5 keywords that exactly describe your footage.  For instance, in the subway image below you might use: subway, train, and metro.  Be absolutely exact as possible so that if someone types in "subway" and chooses to search only by primary keywords, they will only get footage of a subway.

SECONDARY KEYWORDS:  In the "Secondary Keyword" field you are given more freedom.  You should still only include keywords related to your footage, but you may enter keywords that may not exactly or directly describe your footage.  For example, for the image below you might enter: Railway, Transportation, Underground, Waiting, Busy, Travel, City, Urban, Move, etc. etc.  Users will be given the option of choosing to search by primary keywords, secondary keywords or both.  When entering your secondary keywords, try to imagine what someone might be searching for and enter keywords that would relate.  Here is an example of keywords to use for the following file: Subway, Urban, Green, Transportation, City, Commute, Fast, Underground, Tube, Public, Lights, Motion, Atlanta, Train, Tunnel, Transit, Metro, Rail, Ride, Wait, Station, Stop, Fast, Lights, Railway, Work, Move, Downtown, Rush, Platform

 

Do not attempt to include words in your title, description or keywords that attempt to unfairly bump your footage above anyone else's.

Remember these things when entering your keywords-

• Keywords must be relevant to the clip. If others look at your clip, they should be able to instantly identify why particular keywords are used for a clip.  This is especially true for concepts. Concepts must be easily identifiable and not too abstract.
  
  
• Generic keywords such as film, video, high definition, animation, graphic, etc. aren't necessary. Users can select what format they want when searching for footage or music, so no need to specify high definition, pal, or ntsc in your keywords.
  Using video and film for a keyword in every clip skews the results if someone is really looking for a clip with a video related item in it, such as a VCR or maybe an old retro betamax machine. Film is a great search term for old film leaders or film effects. But you don't need those terms in every shot you upload b/c they are not specific to the shot.
  
  
• The search engine will return results on the singular and plural versions of a word. For example, if you have a shot of cows. If you put cow or cows (but not both) in your keywords, the search results will return the cow footage. This should save some time only having to type one.
  
  
• Don't use your producer name in your keywords. If users want to see everything by a particular producer they can use the "By producer" link on the left hand side or they can click on the producer name under the clip.
  
  
• Enter your keywords with one space only between the words and no commas.
  
  
• Please use more than 3-4 keywords for a clip. 99.9% of clips can be described by more than just 3-4 keywords. If you miss keywords that are relevant to your clip, you may miss sales b/c the user couldn’t find your clip. Don’t go overboard, but spend some time with a thesaurus or ask your friends for words they would associate with a clip.
  
  
• Be global in your thinking. For example, in the US a mobile phone is called a cell phone, but in many European countries it is called a mobile. So think globally in generating your search terms.

 

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