Terms of Service

Overview

These Terms of Service govern bookings with RecFocus Moments, a celebration film and photography studio operating as a sub brand of RecFocus, and use of this website. They cover weddings, baby showers, birthdays, proms and sweet sixteens, anniversaries, graduations, engagements, quinceañeras, retirements, and any other celebration we are hired to document.

By reserving a date, paying a retainer, submitting an inquiry, or using this website, you agree to these terms.

Where a signed booking agreement exists for your event, that agreement controls wherever it conflicts with anything written here. These terms fill in everything the agreement does not address.

Booking, Retainer and Payment

A date is held only when two things have happened: a signed booking agreement has been returned, and the retainer has been received. An email, a phone call, a verbal yes, or a request for a quote does not hold a date. Until both arrive, the date remains open to anyone else who asks for it.

The retainer is a portion of the total, stated in your booking agreement, and it is non refundable. It is not a deposit against services. It buys the date itself: once it is accepted, that date is turned away for every other client who asks for it.

Balance

The remaining balance is due before the event unless your agreement states otherwise. Final delivery follows full payment. Payment is accepted by electronic transfer, credit or debit card, or check payable to RecFocus.

A quote given in writing is held for 30 days unless it says otherwise. Prices change, and dates in peak season are priced differently from dates outside it.

Late balances and forfeiture

If a balance remains unpaid more than 30 days past its due date, RecFocus Moments may treat the booking as forfeited, retain the amounts already paid as compensation for work performed, and retain full ownership of everything produced, with no further obligation to deliver. A late fee of $25 or 1.5 percent of the outstanding balance per month, whichever is greater, may be applied to an overdue invoice.

Chargebacks

If something about a charge looks wrong, tell us first. You agree to raise any billing concern with us directly and give us a fair chance to resolve it before initiating a chargeback or payment dispute. Where a dispute is initiated in bad faith or contrary to these terms, you are responsible for the resulting bank fees, processor fees, and reasonable costs of defending it.

Cancellation, Rescheduling and Postponement

Plans change. Tell us as early as you can, in writing, at moments@recfocus.com.

If you cancel

The retainer is not refunded in any cancellation. Sums paid beyond the retainer are refunded on the sliding basis set out in your booking agreement, which reflects how close to the date the cancellation falls and what has already been scheduled, contracted, or purchased on your behalf.

If you move the date

• One date change may be made without an additional booking fee, provided the new date falls within 12 months of the original and the studio is available for it.
• Rescheduling is always subject to availability. If we are already booked on the new date, the change is a cancellation and the cancellation terms apply.
• A date moved into a higher priced season, or into a longer day, is re quoted for the difference.
• Further date changes after the first are treated as a new booking.

If we cancel

If RecFocus Moments cancels for any reason other than force majeure, every sum you have paid, including the retainer, is returned to you in full.

Coverage Hours and Overtime

Coverage is a continuous block of hours, stated in your booking agreement, beginning at an agreed call time and running without a break in the clock.

• The clock starts when we are asked to start. If the schedule slips and we are asked to begin later, the block simply begins later. If the schedule slips while we are already working, that time counts against the block.
• Overtime is billed in 30 minute increments at the rate in your agreement. It is agreed on the day by you, or by whoever you have named in writing as able to make that call, and invoiced afterwards.
• Meals. A coverage block longer than six hours includes a 30 minute break for the crew, ideally taken while guests are eating so that nothing is missed.
• Split coverage across non consecutive periods, such as a morning and an evening with a gap between, is quoted separately from a continuous block.
• Crew size is whatever your agreement says. A second shooter is an addition, not an assumption.

Tell us your run of show as soon as you have one, and tell us again when it changes. The single most common cause of a missed moment is a schedule that moved and nobody mentioned it.

Weather, Venue Changes and Force Majeure

Celebrations happen outdoors and weather does what it does. We shoot in rain, cold, wind, and heat, and we carry the gear to keep working in it. What we will not do is place equipment, crew, or your guests in danger.

• Lightning, high wind, flooding, extreme heat, or a venue's own safety call stops aerial work first and ground work second.
• Weather that forces a ceremony indoors, under a tent, or into a different room changes the look of the coverage. We will make the best pictures available in the conditions that exist.
• Weather is not a basis for a refund or a reshoot.

Venue changes and venue rules

A change of venue or location is fine. Tell us as early as possible so travel, timing, and light can be replanned. A change made on the day itself that adds travel or setup time consumes coverage hours.

Venue rules override our plans. Houses of worship, museums, historic properties, hotels, and country clubs frequently restrict where we may stand, whether we may move during a ceremony, whether flash or additional lighting is allowed, and whether aerial work is permitted at all. We follow those rules without argument, and we cannot be held responsible for coverage a venue prohibits. Where you know of a restriction, tell us before the day so we can plan around it.

Force majeure

Neither party is liable for failure to perform caused by events outside its reasonable control, including severe weather, natural disaster, fire, flood, act of government, public health order or restriction, civil disturbance, venue closure, utility or power failure, or the shutdown of transport. Where such an event prevents the celebration or our attendance, we will work with you to move the booking to a new date, on the rescheduling terms in the previous section, rather than treating it as a cancellation.

Illness, Emergency and the Substitute Shooter

People get sick. Cars break. Family emergencies do not check the calendar. This section says exactly what happens, so that nobody has to negotiate it on a bad morning.

If the assigned shooter cannot attend through illness, injury, accident, family emergency, or any other cause, RecFocus Moments will make every reasonable effort to send a qualified substitute of comparable experience, working to the same brief, the same shot priorities, and the same edit style. You will be told as early as we know, not on the day if it can possibly be avoided.

The finished film is edited by the studio regardless of who held the camera, which is what keeps the result consistent.

If no qualified substitute can be secured for your date, the booking is canceled and every sum you have paid, including the retainer, is returned to you in full. That refund is the limit of our liability in that circumstance.

Equipment

We carry backup camera bodies, backup lenses, backup audio recorders, spare batteries, and spare media, and we record to dual cards wherever the camera supports it. Cards are offloaded and duplicated the same day. If a failure nonetheless causes a loss of material, our liability is limited as set out in the liability section below.

Aerial Coverage and Drone Operations

Aerial coverage is flown with a DJI Mavic 3 Pro. Where it is possible, it is one of the most striking things in a celebration film. It is also the single element most often taken away by circumstances on the day, so it is worth being precise about.

Certification

Flights are conducted under FAA Part 107 by a certificated remote pilot, within the operating limits of that rule: daylight or civil twilight with anti collision lighting, within visual line of sight, below 400 feet above ground level, and clear of manned aircraft operations.

Airspace

Much of the Washington region sits inside controlled or restricted airspace, and this materially affects what can be flown.

• Flight in controlled airspace requires prior authorization, usually through LAANC or, where that is not available, a manual FAA waiver. Authorization is requested in advance, and the FAA may decline it or grant it at a reduced altitude.
• The Washington DC Special Flight Rules Area and the Flight Restricted Zone inside it prohibit or heavily restrict drone flight. No flight will be attempted there without the specific authorization the rule requires.
• Temporary Flight Restrictions appear at short notice around public events, dignitary movements, and emergencies. One can close an area on the morning of your celebration with no warning.
• National parks, many state and county parks, and a number of municipalities prohibit launch and landing on their land regardless of airspace.

Permission on the ground

Airspace authorization is not the same as permission to be there. We also need the agreement of the venue or property owner for launch, landing, and operation. Some venues prohibit drones outright, some allow them only before guests arrive, and some require a certificate of insurance in advance. Securing that permission is a shared job: you or your planner will usually be the one who can ask, and we will tell you exactly what to ask for.

Safety limits

Sustained wind, precipitation, low visibility, low temperature, dense tree cover, and proximity to people, roads, or structures all constrain a flight. We do not fly over people who are not directly participating in the operation. That single rule removes many of the shots people imagine, including a hover above a seated ceremony.

Guests, Likeness and Consent

Your celebration has guests, and guests appear in the footage. Documenting a room means documenting the people in it. That is the nature of the work and it is why you hired us.

Telling your guests

You are responsible for letting your guests know that the event is being filmed and photographed. A line on the invitation, a note on your wedding website, a sentence from the host or the officiant, or a card at the entrance is enough. Some venues require a posted notice, and where they do we will follow it.

A guest who asks not to be filmed

If a guest tells us directly, or you tell us on their behalf, we will honor it. In practice that means we avoid them in coverage, we do not make them the subject of a shot, and we do not select frames of them for the edit.

What we will not do is promise something we cannot deliver. Wide room coverage, dance floor footage, and a crowd watching a first dance cannot always exclude one person entirely. We will say so at the time rather than agree to something impossible.

After delivery

If someone asks after the fact to be removed from a delivered film or gallery, tell us. Where it can be done without rebuilding the film, we will do it. Where it cannot, we will explain plainly why rather than leaving the request unanswered. Removal from our own marketing use is always possible and is covered further below.

Children who appear in event footage are addressed in the privacy notice.

By booking, you confirm that you have the authority to permit filming and photography at your event and at the location, and to grant the marketing permission described below.

Delivery, Revisions and Approval

Timelines

• A short preview, usually a handful of photographs or a teaser, is sent within the window stated in your agreement, typically 7 to 14 days.
• Full delivery of the film and the gallery follows the window in your agreement, typically 8 to 12 weeks, and longer at the height of the season.
• Delivery windows are counted from the day after the event, in business days, and they assume we have whatever we need from you. A delay in your feedback, your music note, or your name spellings moves the window by the same amount.
• Delivery is by private online gallery with download, and final files are released after full payment.

Revisions

One round of revisions on the film is included unless your agreement says otherwise. A revision is a refinement: a name spelling, a moment you would like added or taken out, a trim, a note about a piece of music, a correction to a title card.

A revision is not a re edit to a different structure, a different score, a different length, or a different tone. Color, grade, pacing, sequence, and edit structure are creative decisions and they belong to the studio. You chose this studio from work that shows how it makes those decisions.

Additional rounds are invoiced at the rate in your agreement.

What is not delivered

Unless separately agreed in writing, the following stay with the studio and are not part of any package:

• Raw footage and unedited camera files
• Project files, timelines, and edit sessions
• Color grades, LUTs, and presets
• Motion design assets, title templates, and compositions

Raw footage can sometimes be licensed separately by written agreement. Ask, and we will tell you whether it is possible for your event.

Approval

If no revision request reaches us within 30 days of delivery, the film is considered accepted and the revision round is closed.

Archiving and Keeping Your Own Copy

Delivered files are kept on studio storage for 12 months after delivery. This is a courtesy, not a guarantee, and it is emphatically not a backup service. After that period, files may be removed without further notice.

Re delivery within the archive window may carry a retrieval fee, stated at the time. After the window has passed, we may not be able to re deliver at all.

Raw footage is not archived long term and is generally cleared once a project is delivered and accepted.

Music and Licensed Scores

Every film is scored with music licensed for that purpose from a commercial licensing library. The license is real, it is paid for, and it is bought specifically for your film.

The license covers the film as delivered, for the personal use described in the next section. It does not travel to you as a general right to use that track. The music is licensed into the film, not licensed to you.

What this means in practice

• Do not extract the audio, re upload the score on its own, or use the track in another project, another film, or a business page.
• Social platforms run automated content identification. A film posted to a platform may be muted, blocked in some countries, or claimed by that platform's system even where the license is completely valid. That is the platform's automation, not a defect in the film.
• Where a license certificate exists for your film, we will supply it on request so that you can file a dispute with the platform. The outcome of that dispute is the platform's decision and is outside our control.
• Re uploading the film elsewhere on the assumption that the license follows it is the most common way clients run into a claim. It does not follow it.

Music you supply

A commercial recording, a first dance track, or a favorite song by a known artist cannot be licensed by us for a film, and no wedding videographer can lawfully license one for you at ordinary prices. Where a client asks for a commercial track anyway, the film carrying that track is supplied for private viewing only and must not be posted publicly. That is the client's decision to make, and its consequences, including any platform claim or takedown, are the client's to carry.

Intellectual Property and Your License

Copyright in all footage, photographs, edits, and stills remains with RecFocus Moments as the author of the work. This is the standard arrangement in this industry, and it is what allows a studio to keep a portfolio and to keep improving.

Upon full payment, you receive a perpetual, worldwide, non exclusive, non transferable, royalty free license to use the delivered films and photographs for personal, non commercial purposes. That license is deliberately generous, and it includes:

• Viewing, downloading, and keeping copies for as long as you like
• Sharing with family, friends, and guests, privately or publicly
• Posting on your own personal social accounts
• Printing photographs for yourself, for family, and as gifts
• Making a keepsake, an album, or a screening for your own occasion

What the license does not include

• Selling, licensing, or sub licensing the work to anyone else, including a publication or a vendor
• Commercial or promotional use by any business, including a venue, planner, florist, band, bakery, or brand
• Entering the work into a competition as your own
• Altering the edit, re grading, re cropping beyond ordinary framing for a post, applying filters that materially change the grade, or removing a watermark or credit where one is present
• Using the work, in whole or in part, to train, fine tune, evaluate, or ground any artificial intelligence or machine learning model

A credit to RecFocus Moments when you post publicly is appreciated and never required.

Portfolio and Marketing Use, and How to Say No

RecFocus Moments may use footage and photographs from your celebration on this website, on Instagram, on YouTube, in a reel or a highlight, in a pitch to a future client, in an exhibition, or in printed material, unless you tell us not to.

Timing

Ask before the event where you can, so that nothing is planned or promised around it. A request made after delivery is honored just as readily: we will remove the material from our own website and our own social accounts within 30 days.

Two honest limits on a late request. Reposts by other people, coverage by a publication, and platform caches are outside our control, and material already printed cannot be recalled. We will do everything within our own reach and tell you plainly what falls outside it.

A partial no is completely fine

Most requests are not all or nothing, and none of these are unusual:

• No faces of children
• No images of one particular guest or family member
• No venue name, no date, no surname
• Film but not photographs, or photographs but not film
• Stills only, no moving footage of the ceremony

If your celebration involves sensitive circumstances, a private family matter, a public figure, or a professional obligation of confidentiality, tell us before production and it will be written into your booking agreement rather than left to this page.

Acceptable Use, Scraping and AI Training

All content on this website, including its design, layout, copy, photography, video, audio, illustration, source code, branding, and trade dress, is the exclusive property of RecFocus and is protected by United States and international copyright, trademark, and trade dress law.

You may not, without prior written permission from RecFocus, do any of the following:

• Use any automated system, software, bot, spider, crawler, scraper, headless browser, or similar technology to access, index, monitor, or extract content from this website.
• Copy, mirror, frame, republish, or redistribute any portion of this website, in whole or in part, on any other website, application, or platform.
• Use any content from this website, in whole or in part, to train, fine tune, evaluate, ground, or otherwise improve any artificial intelligence model, machine learning system, large language model, generative model, or dataset, whether for commercial or non commercial purposes.
• Bypass or attempt to bypass any technical measure used to restrict access, including rate limiting, bot detection, authentication, crawler exclusion directives, or HTTP request signatures.
• Harvest, collect, or compile email addresses, contact information, or any personally identifiable information from this website for any purpose.
• Use the website in any way that could damage, disable, overburden, or impair our servers or networks, or interfere with anyone else's use of the site.

The absence of a user agent from any access control list maintained by RecFocus does not constitute permission to crawl or scrape. Any access by an automated system not expressly permitted in writing is unauthorized.

Unauthorized scraping, mirroring, or ingestion of this website may constitute a breach of these terms and may also violate the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (18 U.S.C. § 1030), the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (17 U.S.C. § 1201), the Maryland Personal Information Protection Act, and applicable state and federal copyright statutes. RecFocus reserves the right to pursue all available legal and equitable remedies, including injunctive relief, statutory damages, attorney fees, and recovery of profits attributable to the unauthorized use.

If you are a researcher, a journalist, or a partner who needs structured access, write to moments@recfocus.com and ask. Legitimate uses are discussed case by case.

Confidentiality and Professional Conduct

What we keep to ourselves

Guest lists, home addresses, family circumstances, health information, surprise plans, financial arrangements, and anything else we learn in the course of the work stay private. We do not discuss the details of a private celebration publicly, and we do not identify guests. Beyond the imagery permitted under the marketing section, nothing about your event is ours to publish.

How we behave at your celebration

• We arrive early, dressed for the occasion.
• We work quietly and stay out of the way of the day itself.
• We follow the venue's rules and the officiant's instructions without argument.
• We do not drink alcohol while working.
• We do not post from your event before you have seen anything.

What we ask in return

Safe working conditions, somewhere to set down equipment, and civil treatment of the crew. RecFocus Moments reserves the right to pause or stop work where conditions become unsafe, where crew are subjected to harassment, abuse, or discrimination, or where continuing would break the law, a venue rule, or an aviation regulation. Where work is stopped for those reasons, fees already paid are not refunded.

Liability, Limitations and Indemnification

We carry professional equipment, redundant backups, and insurance, and we work carefully. Some things remain outside anyone's control.

• Our total liability for any claim, whatever its cause, is limited to the total amount you paid for the affected service.
• We are not liable for indirect, incidental, consequential, special, or punitive damages, or for loss of enjoyment, however arising.
• We are not liable for coverage lost to circumstances outside our control, including a venue restriction, an officiant's rules, a guest obstructing a shot, a power failure, a schedule that collapses, aerial coverage prohibited by airspace, weather, or venue rules, information that was never given to us, or a force majeure event.

You agree to indemnify and hold harmless RecFocus Moments, RecFocus, its team, and its contractors from claims, losses, or damages arising from:

• Use of the deliverables beyond the scope of your license
• Failure to secure required permits, permissions, or location access
• Failure to inform guests that the celebration was being filmed and photographed
• Breach of these terms or of your booking agreement
• Inaccurate or incomplete information supplied to us

Nothing in these terms limits or excludes liability where the law does not permit it to be limited or excluded.

Governing Law and Dispute Resolution

These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Maryland, without regard to its conflict of law rules.

If a dispute arises, both parties agree to first attempt to resolve it directly, in good faith, through plain conversation. Most disagreements about a celebration film are a misunderstanding about scope, and most of them dissolve in one honest phone call.

Where that fails, the dispute is settled exclusively in the appropriate courts of the State of Maryland, and by engaging RecFocus Moments you consent to the jurisdiction of those courts.

If any provision of these terms is found unenforceable, that provision is severed and the remainder stays in force.

Updates to These Terms

These terms are revised as the studio's practice, technology, and legal obligations change. The effective date at the top of this page always shows the version you are reading, and a revision replaces every earlier version for website use and for new bookings from the moment it is posted.