# How to reuse a client's past footage in new campaigns > Clear the rights first, then find the shots, then check where they've already run. Canonical URL: https://vivu.ai/guide/how-to-reuse-a-client-s-past-footage-in-new Clear the rights first, then find the shots, then check where they've already run. The rights step is the one that can stop a reuse outright: talent releases, music licenses and stock were usually negotiated for a specific campaign, term and set of channels, and they may not cover a new one. Once the footage is cleared, the practical work is finding usable moments in the client's archive. You can do that from old edit projects, by scrubbing with a shot list, by searching transcripts for spoken lines, or by uploading the footage to a search tool and describing the shots you need. ## Start with what the client actually owns Ask the client for the paperwork before you ask for the drives. For each shoot you plan to draw on, you need to know the term, territory and media covered by talent releases, whether the music was licensed for that one piece, whether any stock clips are cut in, and who holds the raw footage if another agency or a freelancer shot it. Finished ads are easy to get and hard to reuse, since graphics, music and supers are baked in. Raw or near-raw footage is what you want. If the client also hands over a competitor's ads or other third-party material "for reference", confirm the usage rights before that material goes into any tool or cut. ## Inventory before the brief is locked Knowing what exists changes the brief. A campaign concept that needs a product-in-hand shot at golden hour is cheap if last year's shoot has one and expensive if it doesn't. So run the inventory while the brief is still a draft, and keep each client's footage in its own place so nothing from one client ends up in another's search results or edit. ## Ways to find the usable shots The usual answer to how agencies find shots across client footage lists folder conventions, asset management systems, human loggers and, more recently, AI tools. Here is what each costs when the goal is reuse. Old edit projects and selects bins are the fastest start if they survived. They only show what the last editor picked, though, and a new campaign often needs exactly the shots that were left out. Scrubbing raw footage against a shot list is thorough and slow. It's the right choice for a small archive or a single shoot. Transcript search finds spoken material, such as a founder's line about why the product exists or a customer describing a problem. It finds nothing silent, and product shots are usually silent. Uploading the client's footage to a search tool and describing shots covers the visual side. Where a tool offers both a quick mode and a slower, more precise one, use them in that order. On short ads, a quick pass tends to return whole clips, which answers "which files might have this" and still leaves you dragging the playhead. A precise pass on those candidates narrows each result to the stretch where the shot appears and adds a short reason for each segment. It takes longer and costs more of your search allowance, so save it for the shots you actually need. When a reason paraphrases on-screen text, such as a price or a claim, treat it as a pointer and check the original frame before anything goes into a script. In [Vivu](https://vivu.ai/solutions/marketing), each client's footage goes into its own private project and every search runs inside that one project, so a query like "the first time the product appears in someone's hand" only ever returns that client's time ranges. The segments you pick can be exported as original clips for the editor, and the cutting stays with your team. For the narrower case where the client names one particular shot, see [tracking down one shot a client asks for](https://vivu.ai/guide/how-to-find-an-old-shot-a-client-asks-for). For how to structure the libraries themselves, see [setting up one library per client](https://vivu.ai/guide/how-to-set-up-one-ai-video-library-per-client). ## Check where it has already run Before a found shot goes into the new edit, ask the client or their media team where it last ran. A hero shot from last year's campaign, reused in the same channels, can make a new campaign look like a repeat. That's a creative judgment for the agency and the client, and no search step makes it for you. Once the list is settled, [briefing the editor with pulled clips](https://vivu.ai/guide/how-to-brief-an-editor-with-clips-from-existing) covers how to hand it over so the editor isn't hunting all over again. ## When you don't need a search tool If the client's archive is one or two shoots, scrub it. If the last editor left a clean, labeled selects bin, start there and only go further if it comes up short. If the new campaign needs one known shot, ask whoever was on the shoot. A search tool earns its setup when the archive is bigger than anyone's memory of it and the brief calls for shots nobody picked last time. So work out which side your client is on. If the footage is well within your team's memory and the rights are clean, skip the tooling and go straight to the edit. If nobody can say what's on the drives, do the rights check and the inventory before you write the concept that depends on them. ## FAQ ### Can we reuse footage another agency shot for the same client? Often, but it depends on the original contract. Check who owns the raw footage and whether talent releases and music licenses carry over to new work. Ask the client for the raw files and the paperwork together, since having the files doesn't mean you're cleared to use them. ### How do we check if talent releases cover a new campaign? Read each release for term, territory, media and permitted use, and compare those against the new campaign's plan. If a release has expired or is narrower than the new use, either re-license with the talent or pick shots where they don't appear. ### Should we search all our clients' footage in one place? Keep each client's footage separate and search one client at a time. It keeps results, rights questions and handoffs tied to a single client, and it removes the risk of one client's shot turning up in another client's work. ### Is it fine to pull shots from a client's old finished ads? Use finished ads as a map, not as a source. Graphics, music and supers are usually baked into the final file, and the music in particular may have been licensed for that ad alone. Find the matching moment in the raw footage and cut from that.