News Video Archive

September 15, 2006 7:09 AM

I'm looking for high resolution video of the Mission Accomplished moment, from network perspectives.

President Bush Announces Major Combat Operations in Iraq Have Ended

There appears to be a low quality Real Media (groan) stream of the event on their site, captured from a single camera source. I'm looking more for a handful of network sources; I am nearly positive there was a camera set up to catch him landing on the aircraft carrier and also panning in to catch him beneath the banner. Technically, that's the only footage I'm looking for.

I'm just as interested in a general resource for all news video, however. I know archive.org has some old footage, but that's too far back.

posted by prostyle to computers & internet (8 comments total)

Vanderbilt University has an archive of all network television news programming going back to the late 60's. Some of the clips are available online (if you're affiliated with an institution that subsribes to the archive), and you can order tapes of the relevant segments for a fee.
posted by nixxon at 8:25 AM on September 15, 2006

Copyright issues prevent a general news video archive from existing and being made available to the public over the internet. YouTube is the closest thing to that, actually. I work for a news monitoring company and I checked our archives, but we didn't start permanently archiving to DVD until 2005. Before that we were taping to SVHS and erased and reused tapes after a year. We did save some tapes from certain major news events like 9/11, but not the day you're looking for.

There's also The Museum of Television and Radio, but you can only watch stuff there (in person) and not get copies.

Media Matters tapes a lot of stuff, but I think they've only been around since 2004. You might want to contact them anyways, they'd be motivated to help and may know someone who has it.

If you are willing to pay I know of other news monitors who may have footage. They provide the footage under conditions that it not be rebroadcast and used only for research or the like.

Bacon's Media Intelligence Services
VMS - Video Monitoring Service

They are the two biggest monitors in the country and would be most likely to have what you want. Expect to pay hundreds of dollars. I do not work for either of those companies.

Not that you wouldn't be able to potentially find it online. Just giving you some options. You also might consider posting a dairy on DailyKos asking your question there.
posted by voidcontext at 8:29 AM on September 15, 2006

Nixxon, thanks for that Vanderbuilt University link. I'd never heard of them before. Coming from the more commercial side of news monitoring. , it's good to know that there's another comprehensive archive in non-profit hands.
posted by voidcontext at 8:34 AM on September 15, 2006

Thanks for that link, nixxon. I registered and am browsing around their records, looks like I found a few 40-120 second clips covering the event in nightly news casts, including what is described as his entrance. Problem is, looks like it'll cost me $37 to receive a VHS tape that I would then have to digitize. They have a very extensive archive though, that is really fantastic, and that's really not all that much money - unless the footage is totally masked off by graphics, newscasters, etc, which would make it difficult to utilize. You'd have to take a leap of faith, I suppose.

Ideally I'd really be looking for a TV rip, but as alluded to the copyright issues would probably keep that from being readily available. Not to mention the fact that most people probably wouldn't seed a torrent of a 300MB press event, which would be the most decentralized alternative. I'll contact those services you mentioned, voidcontext, thank you.
posted by prostyle at 8:55 AM on September 15, 2006

My partner, a journalist, remarked at the time that the whole "Mission Accomplished" telecast was a feed, i.e., all the networks basically just relayed the identical images. There may be a few clips either at the beginning or the end of the event "from network perspectives" but otherwise it was as managed and directed as, say, a TV awards show. (If only E! could have sneaked Joan Rivers onto the aircraft carrier...)
posted by La Cieca at 9:09 AM on September 15, 2006

You will have to pay for it but you can contact APTN or Reuters.

If you want to get it for free and you are a student, I suggest contacting your local station and seeing if someone in the newsroom can help you.

Good luck!
posted by spec80 at 9:44 AM on September 15, 2006

call getty images, corbis or the associated press. the bbc archives might help.

these are stock photo libraries. you will have to pay for usage.
posted by krautland at 10:22 AM on September 15, 2006

Tangentially, I'm assuming the Daily Show and other prominent productions that feature news-event clips pay the going rate for these segments and acquire them through similar services? Every now and then Stewart will crack a joke alluding to their use of TiVo, but I really doubt the practicality/legality of that implementation. I'd imagine that'd eat up an enourmous amount of budget to officially purchase rights to each clip. Thanks again, everyone.
posted by prostyle at 10:30 AM on September 15, 2006