Check the medium of the item
RTP describes simple and advanced searching across several media and curated collections. Its services page provides online noncommercial copy and licensing requests from content pages, plus a route for material not yet online.
Suppose a family researcher wants a television report about a local celebration. A search may also reveal radio coverage, photographs or a later retrospective. Read the medium, date and description first. Preserve the full item URL and title so the request concerns the intended recording rather than a related picture or audio account.
Explain the proposed use concretely
Write whether the task is consultation, a copy or permission for a stated use. RTP's published noncommercial route asks for registration when proceeding to a licensing request. Commercial enquiries follow a separate contact route.
For a worked brief, list the item reference, people or place of interest, relevant passage if known and the planned destination of the copy. A private family review, school exhibition and publicly posted film are different uses. Describing the actual project lets the publisher assess applicable terms instead of relying on the broad word noncommercial alone.
Leave an unseen candidate provisional
If the desired programme is not online, use the stated enquiry route with the clues available. Label uncertain titles or dates. A plausible catalogue description does not prove that a particular person appears, so frame that point as a question until the footage or archive confirms it.
RTP says supply follows licensing conditions and its current approved price table. Check the terms and actual response rather than inventing a free-copy entitlement from public searching. Keep the record reference and requested use together with any later supply.
For the local celebration, keep the event date and the candidate transmission date as separate clues. State whether the people sought are expected in a procession, interview or audience shot. That description can help assess a candidate without assuming the catalogue names everyone visible. If another medium supplies the answer, label the result accurately before closing the search.
Questions about this guide
Does an RTP Arquivos hit always mean video?
No. Read the medium because the archive covers several kinds of material.
Can an enquiry concern content not yet online?
RTP's services page describes a form for such requests.