film that has been shot
"they had stock footage of lightning, tornados, and hurricanes"
"he edited the news footage"
a rate of charging by the linear foot of work done
"The contractor charged us extra because they measured the cost of painting in footage rather than by the room or square meter."
An amount of film or tape that has been used to record something.
"The editor spent hours reviewing the raw footage from last night's concert before selecting the best clips."
In plain English: Footage is video that has been recorded and stored for later viewing.
"The new movie looks great in 4K footage."
Usage: In modern English, footage refers specifically to the duration of recorded video rather than physical length in feet. Use this term when discussing how long a clip lasts instead of measuring its literal size on a reel.
The word footage combines the unit of measurement "foot" with the suffix "-age." It originally referred to a quantity measured by feet and entered English as a straightforward compound describing linear distance or volume in those units.