Where do you buy films?
I typically acquire home movie collections by making deals directly with the filmmakers themselves or their heirs.
What film transfer system do you use?
I use the FilmFabriek HDS+ system for scanning films. After scanning, I proceed with the restoration process using Davinci Studio and its plug-in Neat Video. This software combination yields exceptional results in terms of cleaning dirt, color correction, and stabilizing the footage, providing the best possible output quality.
How big is your project?
Currently, I have approximately 2000 home movie reels and over 22 thousand videos ranging from 4 to 30 seconds available for sale on this site.
I also have a YouTube channel with 120k+ subscribers and tens of millions of views. Through this site and my side project, footageforpro.com, I have served hundreds of customers, including TV shows and documentary productions broadcasted by Netflix, Prime Video, Apple TV, BBC, Fox News (you can find the partial list of the productions that used my footage on this page).
Why should I choose your footage over other footage I can download using software on sites like YouTube?
The quality of the video available on this site is perfectly compatible with professional productions, thanks to the use of top-notch equipment and meticulous restoration work.
When you purchase the footage, you will receive a license that grants you the rights to use the video worldwide, all media, and in perpetuity.
Moreover, the uniqueness of the footage, created by scanning unreleased home movies, offers you the opportunity to use videos that have never been utilized by other productions before. This exclusivity adds a special touch to your projects, setting them apart from others in the industry.
Why should I choose thearchivefootage.com instead of your professional competitors?
Because other microstocks do not focus on historical footage, and other archive footage collections do not have this user-friendly site where you can easily find what you need and download it in one minute.
On this site, you don’t need to use a contact form to ask for a quote and wait days for an answer. There is:
- a single price that is the same for all the videos
- a single kind of license
- no quality surprises.
What’s the resolution, format and codec of the video I will download?
The video is a .mov, resolution 1920×1080, codec h.264.
How many frames per second do your footage have?
Even though 8 and 16 mm films used to be shot at 16 or 18 frames per second, I use a state of the art software interpolation technique to transform them into 25 frames per second like no one else does (the other companies add repeated frames to achieve today’s number of frames per second).
Please, watch this video:
Do you always have a document signed by the original filmmaker where they declared they sold you the copyright of their films?
As my footage was shot from the 1930s to the 1990s, in most cases, the filmmakers passed. So it is not always possible to have their signed documents, and it’s even difficult to have their heirs’ signatures.
But please don’t worry; this is something well known in the historical footage industry.
Please, read this:
Practically speaking, however, in the case of orphaned, unidentified home movies, the old adage that “possession is nine-tenths of the law” could probably be stretched to 99-100ths, because it is so unlikely that the re-use of such footage would be noticed or challenged by someone with a valid and verifiable claim of ownership. This means that home movies may be re-used in new projects in relative safety; even so, documentarians who wish to use orphaned home movie materials may encounter objections from the legal counsel or clearance specialists who prefer to have evidence of explicit rights clearance, which may be impossible to acquire.
From http://www.centerforhomemovies.org
I own the only physical copy of the films. Besides this, if 99% of the law is not enough for you, and you want to be 100% risk-free, you can use the digital copy of the footage you can buy in this site with the Fair Use right (please read the Best Practices in Fair Use statement for documentary filmmakers created by The Center for Media and Social Impact).
Where can I use the footage I’m buying on this website?
You can use the footage for editing your project that you can distribute everywhere in the world with every broadcasting system (TV, VOD, OTT, YouTube). What you can’t do is sell the footage to someone else to allow them to use it in their own projects.
Please, read the sales agreement to learn more about it.
Why are home movies the perfect media to tell your story?
Home movies represent real life.
Regular historical footage bought from other archives was made by a professional filmmaker and their crew, so it cannot show how people actually lived their lives, as those who were shot by professional crews knew that they were in front of a TV camera.
In my footage restored from home movies, you can watch men with flared pants walking in the streets of Paris in the 1970s or women with Doris Day-style hair waiting for the green light in New York in the 1960s as they really were, without them even realizing that the small thing held by that tourist was actually a camera.
How can I have confidence in providing my credit card information on this site?
You don’t have to trust me, you have to trust Stripe, where you’ll be redirected after clicking the “Buy now” button on single videos pages.
By the way, it’s quite a strange plan for a hacker to buy and restore thousands of films to cheat somebody.
Do you have more footage besides what I found on this website?
I used to buy films almost every week, so I always have a queue of videos that my team hasn’t had the time to publish yet. You can always contact me to know if I have what you need.
Besides this, you can find some unreleased footage on my other project, footageforpro.com.
How do I download the video I buy?
After the payment, the download of the file will start automatically. The video you’ll have is exactly the same you watched on the page, but with no watermark.
Can I have the invoice for the purchase?
Yes! Please, write a note on the checkout page or contact me and my team and give us your Company name, address and, if possible, your TAX id, especially if your Company is in the European Union. We’ll issue the document by the next working day.
By the way, what’s your name?
My name is Daniele Carrer. I founded this archive and, as you can hear, I’m in love with this job.
Top Collections:
- You can buy videos from 30 seconds to 20 minutes on
- You can watch our historical films without the watermarks on
- You can digitize and restore your 8mm, super 8 and 16mm films with our technlogy on
- You can watch our films on our YouTube Channel:
- © Daniele Carrer archive