General Discussion

I'm making a film to submit to sundance. There is one scene that takes place in a comic shop. I was wondering if there is any copyright troubles that I might run into while filming there due to the comics, toys and posters that would be in the background. There's one point where I want one of the characters to pick up a comic while a conversation is going on.

I don't know but I would suspect you might be fine. The comic production companies probably will only care if you're making money off of their work, and featuring a comic heavily might cause them problems if you don't get permission. As long as it's mostly stuff in the background and the person handling the comic doesn't let you get a good look at it on film then you'd be alright in my estimation. It probably wouldn't hurt to keep the comics on the shelf out of focus though...

If you're submitting to Sundance, you can't take any chances. If a character picks up a comic, try to make sure it's an indie one that you can email the creator and get the rights to use it from, hopefully for free. If they're only background, keeping the other ones out of focus should be fine I assume, but you never know. Corporations can be a real bitch about that kind of thing, even though it's basically giving them *more* exposure.

What about if a character talks about a book like in the script she says "I use to read the walking dead" this is in a zombie film

Am I allowed to do that?