What makes a catalog licensable

A request to license a song for a film, a photograph for a book or footage for a documentary rarely comes with a generous schedule. The buyer has a cut to lock, an edition to print or a launch to hit. The owner who can answer quickly gets the deal. The one who has to go looking often doesn’t.

The difference is almost never the quality of the work. It is whether the catalog is ready to be licensed.

Here is what ready means.

1. Know what you have

You can’t license what you can’t find. Start with an inventory of every master, alternate take, photograph, reel, tape and document: what it is, what format it is in and where it physically or digitally lives. Old formats count. A box of unplayed tapes is part of the catalog, and it can’t be licensed until someone knows what is on it.

2. Keep masters and versions straight

Most catalogs hold several versions of the same work: the original master, remasters, edits, a scan made for a magazine in 1998. A buyer needs the right one, at full quality. Mark which file is the master and how every other version relates to it.

3. Metadata that survives

Titles, dates, credits, locations and people, attached to the file rather than kept in someone’s memory or a spreadsheet that drifts out of date. Use the industry identifiers where they exist, such as ISRC for recordings and ISWC for compositions, so your records line up with everyone else’s.

4. Chain of title

Who owns what, and how do you know? Licensing needs the paper trail: contracts, assignments and splits. Don’t assume. The copyright in a photograph often belongs to the photographer, not to the band in the picture or to whoever paid for the shoot. Find the agreements, record what they say against each item and note the gaps.

5. Clear what’s inside the work

A recording can contain samples. Footage can contain other people’s music, faces and logos. A licensable item has its contents cleared, or at least flagged, so the buyer knows what they are getting and what they still need to clear.

6. Deliver it, and keep a record

When the deal is signed, the buyer needs the file in the right format and resolution, quickly and securely, with access that ends when the license does. Then keep a record of what went where, under which agreement. That record is what lets you renew a license, catch a use you didn’t agree to and price the next deal.

The order matters

These steps build on each other. Rights can’t be recorded against files nobody has inventoried, and delivery can’t be controlled for items whose rights are unknown. The owners who license well are rarely the ones with the biggest catalogs. They are the ones who did this work before the request arrived.

Where Starchive fits

Starchive builds and runs archives for artists, estates and rights holders. We ingest the catalog, including the formats nobody has touched in decades, attach the metadata and rights to every file, and deliver exactly what a license covers, with a record of every use.

This post is general information, not legal advice. Talk to your lawyer about your own catalog and contracts.