The Documentary Filmmakers’ Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use (2005) helps to define specific situations where fair use principles can be reasonably applied in the making of a documentary film.
See also: Examples of Successful Fair Use in Documentary Film
The Documentary Filmmakers’ Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use (2005) lists the following acceptable practices for creating online videos.
1. Employing copyrighted material as the object of social, political, or cultural critique - the specific copyrighted work is the subject of critical analysis.
2. Quoting copyrighted works of popular culture to illustrate an argument or point
3. Capturing copyrighted media content in the process of filming something else (incidental use)
4. Using copyrighted material in a historical sequence
Additional supporting materials from the Center for Media & Social Impact:
A number of "best practices" documents may inform the work you do for your documentary project.
1) The Documentary Filmmakers’ Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use provides a clear, easy to understand statement of fair and reasonable approaches to fair use in documentary film in actual practice by many documentarians. See the full document below, including a summary of the four best practices that have been agreed upon by the professional community and legal scholars.
2) The Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Media Literacy Education describes student use of "language, images, sound, music, and digital media to express and share meaning" in their own scholarly and creative works (see Principle #4). These include transformative uses such as comment and criticism, illustration, to stimulate public discussion, and incidental use of copyrighted materials.
The guidelines also provide the following stipulation:
Students’ use of copyrighted material should not be a substitute for creative effort. Students should be able to understand and demonstrate, in a manner appropriate to their developmental level, how their use of a copyrighted work repurposes or transforms the original. For example, students may use copyrighted music for a variety of purposes, but cannot rely on fair use when their goal is simply to establish a mood or convey an emotional tone, or when they employ popular songs simply to exploit their appeal and popularity.
In addition, proper attribution should be provided where ever possible. Note that just because you cite/provide attribution, it does not make your use a fair one.
If your goal IS to establish mood or convey an emotional tone, consider using materials in the public domain or Creative Commons license instead (see resources on the Copyright-Friendly Resources tab)
The U.S. Copyright Office maintains a copyright public records catalog that can be searched to identify a copyright holder for a particular work. It covers works published since 1978.
A number of communities of practice have published Best Practices in Fair Use, which provide scenarios for how fair use rights apply to common educational situations: