Do I need to inform the Internet Archive and/or Prelinger Archives when I reuse these movies?
No. However, we would very much like to know how you have used this material, and we’d be thrilled to see what you’ve made with it. This may well help us improve this site. Please consider sending us a copy of your production (postal mail only), and let us know whether we can call attention to it on the site. Our address is:   Rick Prelinger PO Box 590622 San Francisco, CA 94159 United States  

How can I get access to stock footage from these films?
Access to the movies stored on this site in videotape or film form is available to commercial users through Getty Images, representing Prelinger Archives for stock footage sales. Please contact Getty Images.   Please visit us at prelinger.com for more information on access to these and similar films. Prelinger Archives regrets that it cannot generally provide access to movies stored on this Web site in other ways than through the site itself. We recognize that circumstances may arise when such access should be granted, and we welcome email requests. Please address them to Rick Prelinger.   The Internet Archive does not provide access to these films other than through this site.  

An article on re-coding Prelinger Archive films to SVCD so you can watch them on your DVD player.
See archived version of moviebone.com

Do I need to credit the Internet Archive and Prelinger Archives when I reuse these movies?
We ask that you credit us as a source of archival material, in order to help make others aware of this site. We suggest the following forms of credit:   “Archival footage supplied by Internet Archive (at archive.org) in association with Prelinger Archives”   “Archival footage supplied by Internet Archive (at archive.org)”   “Archival footage supplied by archive.org”  

Are there restrictions on the use of the Prelinger Films?
The films are available for reuse according to the Creative Commons licenses, if any, that appear with on each film’s detail page. Pursuant to the Creative Commons license, you are warmly encouraged to download, use and reproduce these films in whole or in part, in any medium or market throughout the world. You are also warmly encouraged to share, exchange, redistribute, transfer and copy these films, and especially encouraged to do so for free.   Any derivative works that you produce using these films are yours to perform, publish, reproduce, sell, or distribute in any way you wish without any limitations.   Descriptions, synopses, shotlists and other metadata provided by Prelinger Archives to this site are copyrighted jointly by Prelinger Archives and Getty Images. They may be quoted, excerpted or reproduced for educational, scholarly, nonprofit or archival purposes, but may not be reproduced for commercial purposes of any kind without permission.  

If you require a written license agreement or need access to stock footage in a physical format (such as videotape or a higher-quality digital file), please contact Getty Images. The Internet Archive does not furnish written license agreements, nor does it comment on the rights status of a given film above and beyond the Creative Commons license.

We would appreciate attribution or credit whenever possible, but do not require it.

Can you point me to resources on the history of ephemeral films?
See the bibliography and links to other resources at www.prelinger.com/ephemeral.html.

Why are there very few post-1964 movies in the Prelinger collection?
Largely because of copyright law. While a high percentage of ephemeral films were never originally copyrighted or (if initially copyrighted) never had their copyrights properly renewed, copyright laws still protect most moving image works produced in the United States from 1964 to the present. Since the Prelinger collection on this site exists to supply material to users without most rights restrictions, every title has been checked for copyright status. Those titles that either are copyrighted or whose status is in question have not been made available. For information on recent changes in copyright law, see the circular Duration of Copyright (in PDF format) published by the Library of Congress

For more information check out our Prelinger Archives Forum

At this time, we do not derive HD files and so it is not possible to specify it. Once we do, then the HD button will appear in the player.

How do I embed a movie?

Click the Share icon near the player.

A pop-up will appear with URLs for embedding, as well as Share options.

For more advanced options, click the Advanced embedding details, examples, and help! link at the bottom of the pop-up.  

How can I link to a start in the middle of a movie?

To set a start time add: ?start=XXX (where XXX is the start time calculated in seconds) to the end of the URL. At this time there is not a way to specify the end time.

The example below shows where the user has specified the move to start at 60 seconds in. As can be seen in the URL, this matches with the time on the progress bar.

Where is the hi-res file?

If a hi-res source file was uploaded it will be available in the DOWNLOAD OPTIONS section or by clicking SEE ALL.

Can I change the static start image in the movie player?

That is not possible at this time.

How do I add closed captions?

You can upload a properly formatted .srt file for closed captioning.

The file should be named IDENTIFIER.srt.

If you have more than one language add the language to the file name e.g. IDENTIFIER_english.srt

Are there thumbnail images?

Yes. Once the video is started and file has sufficiently loaded you can see thumbnails by mousing over the play or progress bar. They should pop up above the bar.

What is an editable file?

An editable file is a file which can be downloaded and used in an editing program.

The MPEG-4 are the highest bitrate versions we could do with the linux mpeg-2 to mpeg-4 conversion tools we use. These files can be read directly into FinalCut-Pro from Apple, and can be converted to mov using Quicktime-pro and read directly into iMovie from Apple.

My movie doesn’t start fast or buffers a lot?

The in-browser player typically uses an mp4 file. Most encoding (codecs) that are used do not add a “fast start atom” to the file to get it to start without the file having to load.

If you are uploading an mp4 it is best to use .mpeg4 rather than .mp4 as the extension in the file name. That way our system will create an mp4 with the fast start atom.

Why is it that sometimes when I play a movie, the video is choppy or very pixelated?

Sometimes choppiness occurs when we can’t stream it to you quickly enough (because your connection is slow or our servers are overloaded). If this is the case, try downloading the movie to your computer and watching it locally, this will remedy the bandwidth problem.

If you’re watching an MPEG-4 that we derived from an original MPEG-2, we first reduce its size to 320 x 240 – a quarter of the resolution of NTSC video. We then translate it at 350 kbps, which is really borderline for that resolution. You see errors occasionally because there simply isn’t enough bandwidth available, so the MPEG-4 encoder either drops frames, resulting in jerky or choppy motion — or drops macroblocks, resulting in a blurred or pixelated video

That is the price we pay for the small file size – 80 MB for a 1/2-hour clip is really very small in the digital video world. If this is the case, download the original MPEG-2 to solve the problem.

Why do I get errors when I try to play a movie?

The best all-around, free player is VLC Media Player— it handles most of the movie files you will find on this site. If you’re seeing errors when you try to play movies, please try downloading VLC and using that instead. This clears up many people’s problems. You can download the player here.

Here are some other possible problems:

1. Heavy Traffic – Our site might be experiencing heavy traffic. If you experience a delay, please try again later or at a different time of day.
2. Firewall Interference – You’re behind a firewall and the firewall software is attempting to modify incoming bits. Contact your network or firewall administrator as they may be shaping your traffic.
3. Network policies – Your Internet connection went down or timed out. Check with your ISP or network administrator to see if there’s a special policy about keeping a connection live.
4. No more space – If your browser seems to hang after a “100% downloaded” message, check to see that you have sufficient hard-disk and TMP disk space. Rebooting the system sometimes helps.
5. Operating System – You are trying to play an MPEG-2 file on a platform other than Windows or Linux. At present, you need VLC (http://www.videolan.org). Please contact us at info@archive.org if you have information about other players that work on platforms other than Windows.
6. Player trying to stream – Your player might be trying to stream the movie, and it isn’t streamable. Download the movie first, and then play it. (Right-click > Save As)
7. Conflicting computer configuration – Sometimes conflict exists between your computer’s configuration and the player you’re using. Unfortunately, because PCs can be set up in so many different ways and because different standards exist for playing video, finding a player that will work is a hit-and-miss process.

You may upload any movies that you own the copyright to or are in the public domain.

However, copyright is tricky so if you are uncertain, it’s best to do your research or even consult a copyright researcher in order to make sure that the material you choose to upload is not an infringement of copyright.

One of our volunteers has compiled a list of movies that are verified to be in the public domain. To the best of our knowledge, it is accurate but we can’t make any guarantees.

Click on the link to view the list of movies.

The points below refer to movies produced in the United States only:

1. Copyright notice location.

You will usually view the copyright notice with the title or at the end of the film.

2. Works that were completed in 1923 or earlier are generally in the public domain.

Note, this does not pertain to restored versions of films, new soundtracks or additional enhancements post 1923. Usually, a copyright notice for a new soundtrack or restoration will appear in the film.

3. For works made from 1923 to 1949.

You can post a question to the movie forum on this site before you upload, but remember there is no definitive online way to check on the copyright and the copyright could have been renewed.

4. For works made from 1950 to 1963.

You can check the title at the Library of Congress Copyright Database for copyright renewals: Library of Congress Copyright Database 

5. If the copyright notice is 1964 or later. 

The copyright is probably still valid and the film should not be uploaded unless you are the copyright holder.

How do I know if the copyright notice is in the correct format?

The copyright notice needs to state four things:

– The word “copyright”

– The copyright symbol   or (C)

– The year 

– The copyright owner

If it’s missing one of those elements or if there is no notice, it could be in the public domain.

If you aren’t sure, please post a question to the movie forum on this site.

What is the copyright on a foreign film (not in the U.S.)?

Foreign titles might not have a copyright notice but still may be copyrighted in their country of origin.

Traditionally the U.S. wouldn’t recognize the copyright unless the notice was registered in the U.S.

However, this has changed with the General Agreements on Tariffs and Trade or GATT treaty. Many foreign works have had their copyrights restored.

Before you upload, please post a question to the movie forum on this site regarding these films.

What kind of movie file should I submit?

Our archive is all about providing free access to information so please submit file formats that are easy to download or stream.

We prefer that you submit the highest quality format that you have available, and then we will attempt to create smaller file sizes and formats automatically with our deriver program.

In general, MPEG2 files have been the easiest file type for us to deal with.

We recommend that you do not attempt to do any special encoding of your files. We have found that the more the settings have been manipulated, the less likely it is that our deriver program will be able to process the file.

The table on the  Derivative Formats page describes what file formats we will attempt to derive depending on what type of file you submit.

Can I upload compressed or zipped files?

We don’t recommend that you do because uploading content in a .zip or .rar file makes your item significantly less accessible to others and they are unable to stream it.

If you upload .zip, .rar, non-video formats (like .exe), or password-protected files, they may be removed by our moderators.

We have a table of file formats that we will derive from your source file, go to the following link to see them Types of Derivatives for Movie Items.  

Who owns the rights to the movies that have been uploaded?

This will vary from movie to movie but many of the films are licensed with Creative Commons Licenses. Uploaders may designate whether or not an item has a CC license.

Generally, the Creative Commons logo will appear on the left-hand side of the movie’s detail page. Click on this logo to see the details about the specific type of license that the uploader has assigned to the movie.

Some films may have the contact information listed for the filmmaker. If the information is provided, feel free to contact the filmmaker or organization the film comes from.  

Unfortunately, Archive.org cannot guarantee the accuracy of uploader-provided information.

Can I stream the movies?

There are several programs you can use to stream movies in the Archive. The type of player is determined by the format of the uploaded movie.  

Some files simply can’t be streamed and this usually occurs when the program that was used to create the file used a codec that our software can’t interpret.

When this happens, you might get an unsupported media type of error. If this occurs, rather use the download links instead.

What are some free players I can use to play films offline?

Quicktime

If you have Quicktime installed, many mp4 streaming movies will play right in your browser window just by clicking a stream (or download) link.

Make sure you have the latest version so that you can play the widest array of files.

You can download Quicktime here

VLC Media Player

VLC will stream mp4, avi, mpg, and other file formats, so it is quite useful for viewing the majority of the files in the archive.

To stream a movie using VLC, do the following.

Open your VLC Media Player and go to File. This is under the Media tab on the menu.

Select the Network Stream Option

Open Network Stream. You will see a pop-up modal box. Capture the URL of the file from the Internet Archive and insert it here.

You can use the following URL to test https://archive.org/download/ArcherProductionsInc/DuckandC1951.mp4

You can download VLC here.

What encoding specifications are best for .mp4 files?

For your original mp4 to work in the online player we currently require the file to have:
audio: aac
video: h.264
moov atom: front
pixel format: yuv420p

If this is not the case we will derive a new mp4 with the file name suffix .ia.mp4

What are the archive.org encoding specifications?

You can find the specs we use for encoding in the “Additional info on audio/video derivatives” section.

Below is an example of good metadata:

Plan 9 From Outer Space
https://archive.org/details/plan-9-from-outer-space