I have hours(18gigs) of video footage I obtained while incarcerated in a california state mental institution and I would like to know my rights

You could run into several issues with using your video footage. The first one is the right of publicity of the person(s) shown in the video. Everyone has a right to keep their image/voice from being used for commercial purposes without their permission. You would need a release from everyone shown in the video to use their images/voices or risk violating this right. The right of publicity varies from state to state so you need to make sure you get permission to use the video in all states you plan on showing the video. The next issue is copyright. You must make sure that your video does not violate someone else's copyright. That could happen, for example, by showing works (such as paintings, photographs) that are themselves protected by copyright. You would need a release to show those images in the video. Additionally, you should consider trademark. While showing someone else's trademark is not necessarily infringement, there are many companies that are very protective of their trademarks and they could seek to prevent you from showing their trademarks even if they may not be legally correct. Finally, you should register the copyright in your video to prevent other people from copyright your footage.