FreeGameDev

Hi!

I'd like to use some Red Eclipse gameplay sequences as footage for a music video I'm currently making.
Is this possible? If so, who should I contact?

Thanks for any reply!

B.B.

The game has Creative Commons-licensed art and zlib-licensed source code. These are, for the most part, extremely permissive with regards to what can be shared.

Now, most of the art is under the CC-BY-SA license. The 'ShareAlike' clause is the difficult one. It may require the music video (not necessarily the audio itself) in its entirety to be released under this license. However, I'm not a lawyer and can't confirm this. Almost certainly though, this will be okay. But I'll leave this question open. Xonotic also had a person come to it under similar pretenses and they found no issues with the license, though there were no lawyers there either. Nevertheless, if people don't press charges, you have nothing to be afraid of.

There is a policy on the usage of the Red Eclipse trademark as well which you can read here. From what I've seen, your usage is perfectly permitted but take your time to read it anyway, it's short and easy to digest.

TL;DR Credit us, and tell people your video is CC-BY-SA.

And most of all, spread the word about this awesome game

Thanks for your replies. So if we just use some sequences of Red Eclipse in our video, does it mean that the whole video will have to be CC-BY-SA?

Thanks

I think this would be best answered by arand (possibly on IRC). We could probably grant a limited use license, but this would need thorough review and approval.

bronskybit {l Wrote}:Thanks for your replies. So if we just use some sequences of Red Eclipse in our video, does it mean that the whole video will have to be CC-BY-SA?

Thanks

Basically yes. Really short clips would fall under "fair use" however. And as Quin has mentioned, if all the contributors agree a limited license exemption may be granted to you if CC-By-SA is not suitable for your needs.
But you would probably need to explain what kind of "music video" you are planning to do anyways... for most cases I don't see having the share alike clause as a problem, and after all it is only fair to all the original contributors who allow you to use RE footage under such relative liberal terms for free.

Okay, thanks. I think the the CC-By-SA is suitable but I need to ensure that everyone involved is OK with that as well.
Thanks for your replies, I will come back to you with more information when things are more precise.

For Copyright:

All depends on how much and in what way gameplay footage is used, fair use is very fuzzy as far as I know, and I really don't know much about it, but say we ignore fair use completely...

With some quotes from CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/legalcode):

1. a. "Adaptation" means a work based upon the Work, or upon the Work and other pre-existing works, such as a translation, adaptation, derivative work, arrangement of music or other alterations of a literary or artistic work, or phonogram or performance and includes cinematographic adaptations or any other form in which the Work may be recast, transformed, or adapted including in any form recognizably derived from the original

Given this definition of "Adaptation", I would think that a music video based on gameplay showing the data assets from Red Eclipse would count as an Adaptation of those data assets.

4. b. You may Distribute or Publicly Perform an Adaptation only under the terms of: (i) this License; (ii) a later version of this License with the same License Elements as this License; (...)

Which as far as I read it implies that such a work would need to have a CC-BY-SA-3.0 license. At least if it utilises a substantial amount of gameplay footage.

If You Distribute, or Publicly Perform the Work or any Adaptations or Collections, You must, unless a request has been made pursuant to Section 4(a), keep intact all copyright notices for the Work and provide, reasonable to the medium or means You are utilizing: (i) the name of the Original Author (or pseudonym, if applicable) if supplied, and/or (...)

And it would need to carry *reasonable* credit. I think that for a video, reasonable might mean something like

Gameplay footage in this video was taken from Red Eclipse http://www.redeclipse.net/ . For a full list of credits for Red Eclipse see http://www.redeclipse.net/repo/doc/all-licenses.txt

For Trademark

If you want to use the Red Eclipse Logo or name in a prominent fashion, in general, it needs to be clear that it's an "unofficial work based on Red Eclipse", or "factual reference to Red Eclipse" (for example, when giving credits as per Copyright above, showing the Red Eclipse logo is likely ok since it's clear what it refers to).

Our trademark policy is at http://www.redeclipse.net/trademark

Sounds about right. Put simply, unless you are trying to rip us off, we aren't really going to be too bothered by it. If possible, just point people to our game and I'd say you're sweet. Always a plus to have good promotional stuff out there :-) (see: illumiroom)

Thanks. I keep you posted.