You can use AV Store templates on paid and client projects unless the product licence says otherwise. Fonts have licences of their own. Fonts from Adobe Fonts are licensed for commercial use, including video for broadcast and for online platforms such as YouTube. With Adobe Fonts, your client doesn’t need a font licence to use finished files where the text is rasterised or embedded, such as a video, a PNG or a PDF. They do need their own licence if they want to edit the design with the fonts.
What the AV Store allows
The FAQ on the AV Store says its assets can be used in personal and commercial projects unless the product licence states otherwise. It points you to the licence information included with your purchase. So for each product you buy:
- Read the licence that came with it before you use it on paid work.
- Save a copy of the licence with the project files.
- If you want to do something the licence doesn’t mention, ask before you do it.
Handing a client the template file itself is a separate question. The FAQ doesn’t cover giving a client the editable PSD, so check the product licence or ask us before you send one.
Fonts have their own licences
A title template and the fonts in it can come under different licences. Before a project starts, check which fonts each text layer uses (the Character panel in Photoshop shows this) and where each font came from. If you open a template and Photoshop shows a Missing Fonts message, the design relies on fonts you don’t have yet.
Adobe Fonts
Adobe’s font licensing FAQ covers the fonts you add through your Adobe account. It says:
- All fonts on Adobe Fonts are licensed for personal and commercial use as part of a Creative Cloud subscription.
- You can use them on commercial projects and client work, including files such as PDFs, JPEGs and PNGs.
- You can use them to produce film or video content for in-house, commercial exhibition or broadcast use, with tools such as Premiere or After Effects.
- You can use them in video distributed online through services such as YouTube or Vimeo.
- You don’t have to credit Adobe for the fonts.
The same FAQ explains what happens if you cancel Creative Cloud. Files that embed the font data, such as PDFs and images, keep displaying correctly, as does text that has been rasterised or converted to outlines. Documents that use live, editable fonts will show a missing fonts warning and fall back to a default font. Exporting finished titles as images or video means a cancelled subscription won’t affect them.
Fonts from anywhere else
Adobe’s FAQ notes that fonts installed in your computer’s Fonts folder are licensed under their own end-user agreements, and its answers don’t apply to them. For those, check the licence that came with the font, or contact the foundry.
Free fonts need the same check. Some are free for personal use only, so you can’t use them on paid client work.
When the client wants the files
Adobe’s FAQ answers the client question directly. Your client doesn’t need a separate font licence if you give them graphics or documents containing rasterised or properly embedded font data, such as PDFs, JPEGs or PNGs. If the client needs to edit the design and use the fonts directly, they need their own licence, either through a Creative Cloud subscription or by buying a desktop font licence.
For a video editor, that usually works out like this:
- Finished video, thumbnails and stills. The text is rendered into the picture, much like the rasterised images Adobe describes, so your client can use them as delivered.
- Editable files (a PSD, a Premiere Pro project or an After Effects project). If the client will change the text, they need their own licence for the fonts. The template’s licence also has to allow you to pass the file on.
Those answers cover Adobe Fonts only. For a font from anywhere else, check what its own licence says about client files.
If a client asks for the editable files late in a project, check both licences before you send anything.
Keep a record for each project
A short note in the project folder saves time if a client asks about licences later. Include:
- the templates you used, where you bought them and their licence files
- each font, where it came from and the licence it’s under
- what you delivered, and whether that included editable files
If the video is a paid partnership, there are separate rules about labelling it. See Paid partnerships and #ad: UK rules for Christian creators and brands.
Refunds and file problems
The AV Store sells digital downloads. Because of that, refunds generally can’t be offered once files have been downloaded. If a file has a technical problem, contact Aligned Vision and we’ll do our best to help.
For working with the files, see How to edit a PSD title template in Photoshop, and for what to put on the card, Music video title cards: what to include and where to place them.
