Toronto’s First Light reports a jump in business thanks in part to stock footage giant Getty Images’ recent closings of its Canadian offices. While Getty has made the move to consolidate its various satellite facilities into its Seattle headquarters, the result amounts to another plus in the local market for the likes of First Light.

‘The Canadian film industry can take advantage of tax credits for purchases made in Canada, and producers were looking for alternatives once Getty exited,’ says First Light president Pierre Guevremont.

First Light built its reputation producing and distributing still photography for the domestic ad community, and it began distributing stock footage nine months ago in addition to its photo and Flash imagery offerings. It handles rights-protected material and also reps international royalty-free companies including ImageState, Pixtal, BananaStock and StockByte. The company sells single royalty-free clips as well as packages that can be delivered, for NTSC usage, on CD, digiBeta or Beta SP.

First Light is particularly high on its Corbis Motion Collection. Corbis Motion, a Seattle-based company backed by Microsoft’s Bill Gates, recently wholly acquired stock footage company Sekani. The Corbis Motion series include Hot Shots, Action Sports Adventure and Film Bank.

First Light says it is aggressively focused on building its list of independent footage sources through 2003.

-www.firstlight.ca

ITN Archive expands in North America

U.K.-based stock shop ITN Archive is increasing its presence in North America, opening an office in Los Angeles to accompany its New York facility. The move will alleviate time zone issues that have cropped up in the past when dealing with customers on the West Coast.

ITN Archive reps the TV library of Reuters, which is a 20% shareholder in ITN Archive parent company Independent Television News. The L.A. office will open up greater access to material originated by Reuters’ local bureau, with emphasis on showbiz and celebrity-related footage.

Through its relationship with Reuters, ITN Archive has also recently acquired an extensive news collection from Africa covering history, politics, the environment and culture. The collection offers a wealth of material for Canadian producers seeking to explore African topics in depth, and includes rare Apartheid-era material depicting township violence and ‘one man, one vote’ marches, the Mozambique floods, the Rwandan Genocide and conflicts in Lesotho and Sierra Leone. The collection also includes large quantities of wildlife footage.

Seeing as how the U.K. is Canada’s biggest copro partner, ITN Archive’s homegrown material should be of interest to Canucks. ITN Archive signed on this year to handle clip sales for U.K. broadcaster Channel 4 and its doc, entertainment, drama and youth programming. (Parent company ITN has produced Channel 4 News since the channel’s inception 20 years ago.) The Channel 4 Archive also includes programs produced for Channel E4 and theatrical features produced by Film Four such as Trainspotting, Life Is Sweet, Shallow Grave, Naked and The Croupier.

ITN Archive’s 250,000 hours of footage extend back to the coronation of Russian Tsar Nicholas II in 1896. The library also includes ITN’s own output since 1955 and newsreels from British Paramount News, Empire News Bulletin, Universal News, the Pathe collection in the U.K., Gaumont Graphic and Gaumont British.

Footage at ITN Archive’s London facility can be delivered to North America via satellite or fiber optics, or on tape formats including digiBeta, Beta SP and DVCPRO. Material can be prepped for NTSC or PAL usage.

-www.itnarchive.com