Getting a release

Years ago I was very religious about getting releases from subjects in my photos. Now when I shoot 'in a public place' and I am not going to sell the work I don't bother with a release.
So the question is. . . . If I am going to exhibit some of these in a public forum, ie the internet or photography contest etc, is this a problem???

Anyone with good experience or advise here?

Thanks!

Look .. I did not search this site for past posts on this topic .. but .. I can vaguely see a post that reminded us to get that release ! So I am sure that it is necesary.

The below is based on threads from other forums and discussions with people who have read the wording of laws and only applies within the US and the state of Virginia (California and Arizona specifically have special privacy laws (read movie star image protection laws).

The most important thing to remember is no matter what you do you can still be sued, however, paperwork will minimize your losses.

If nobody is recognizable you should also be okay. recognizable is defined as as somebody else being able to recognize them, not themselves by their rememberance of presence.

- First if you don't plan on making any money whatsoever from the images you should be okay as far as winning any law suits.

- Posting on the internet for your own portfolio use technically is okay. Posting for news worthiness is luckily still fully protected. (except in Arizona and California). Posting for advertising the image or a product with the image needs a model release.

- Entering a contest would probably depend on what they intend to do with the wining photos. If they intend to publish for advertising purposes you probably will need a model release. If all they do is show and announce the winner, you will probably be okay.

Note on Arizona and California: Both of these states apparently have "privacy" laws that protect people from photos taken when there is a reasonable expectation of privacy. The intention was to cover people using 600mm lenses from 3 miles away sitting on a hill and catching people in their backyard. In practice several movie stars (Striesand comes to mind) are abusing it to keep unwanted images out of the publics hands. Examples of bad use of law include some aerial photos taken of Malibu being used primarily for environmental and public access issues. Home owners do not own the beach in California and must allow access to the public which the movie stars obviously don't want just anybody visiting the beach, so naturally they object to people seeing if they have blocked public access to the beach. All this is currently in the US court system.

Sorry, personal pet peave injected above.

End summary,
If you are not making any money you should be okay, but someone could cause problems for you and that is when the paperwork helps to show intention of use.

Or so I have been told. Hope that helps.

Thanks Tim!
Your reply was very informative (tho not legally binding, lol!)

I am most concerned about candid shots I take in public venues. ie a ballgame, concert, fireworks display etc. I post some of these on my website as sort of an amateur's attempt at 'picture storying'.

I would make the case that these are 'news' shots.

I absolutely agree that any identifiable person in a shot made for advertising is deserving of compensation (or the election of opting out totally.

Thanks again!
Jerry

I would think that if you have some kind of caption explaining the picture and it's relevance as news you should definately be covered.

If I were doing it, and I plan to in the near future, I would put the picture, date, and some text explaining what is happening in the picture in context.

My example (not ready for posting) is I took some pictures of Grand Funk Railroad at the local 4th July celebration and I plan to have a caption reading something like
"Grand Funk Railroad playing at the 4th of July celebration in Newport News"

Adding in the pictures of fireworks in a package set should cover me as news style coverage without the model release from the band or so I at least believe. If it doesn't I am at least willing to challenge in court under the 1st as it should be covered.

Not that I think they would have a problem with it anyway since it promotes them with no loss of funds.

I say go for it at least as far as the web posting is concerned. The contests you are thinking of I would have to read the rules.

Just my opinions,