Photo rights - client usage.

There is a local photographer who posted a mini-rant on her Facebook page about clients using her photos on Instagram and other programs with filters and basically says it ruins her work and she doesn't want those images associated with her. She even complained about photos being cropped "poorly" One comment asked if that included photos a client paid for and she replied "My clients get their photographs as part of the service I provide. I maintain rights to my photos regardless of who commissioned me for the service."

If the client paid for the images they should be allowed to display them how they want should they not?

the flying moose wrote in post #17149188
If the client paid for the images they should be allowed to display them how they want should they not?

...not according to US copyright law.

As the photographer you licence your images any way you want. If you choose to licence your images in a way that allows your clients to display them how they want that is your right. But not every photographer chooses to do so and if they want to rant on their Facebook page let her rant. Worry about your own business, not anyone elses. There are valid reasons why some photographers don't want their work to be altered: just look at what happened to Patrick Cariou.

If a client chooses to edit my images it doesn't worry me at all. I've had people do the oddest things to my images. One girl turned herself purple and made it her facebook profile picture. But it comes down to what you as the photographer want to do.

banquetbear wrote in post #17149245
...not according to US copyright law.

As the photographer you licence your images any way you want. If you choose to licence your images in a way that allows your clients to display them how they want that is your right. But not every photographer chooses to do so and if they want to rant on their Facebook page let her rant. Worry about your own business, not anyone elses. There are valid reasons why some photographers don't want their work to be altered: just look at what happened to Patrick Cariou.

If a client chooses to edit my images it doesn't worry me at all. I've had people do the oddest things to my images. One girl turned herself purple and made it her facebook profile picture. But it comes down to what you as the photographer want to do.

I'm not worrying about her at all. I more just wanted to know if this was a common thing or if she was right or not. To me that's like a musician selling their music but saying you can only have it if you listen to it on high end sound system to make it sound exactly like how they wanted it to sound. Thanks for your reply btw.

I simply don't care. I've never seen a client image that had a terrible looking edit, then again, they rarely perform additional edits with their images. IMO, I think it's bad pr to be ranting on a business social platform, but to each their own.

A better music analogy would be purchasing music and then deciding to mix it with other media (eg other music, photos, videos, etc). Your purchased music is not licensed for any of that. It is to be played as is with no alterations.

Enforcement is difficult. She can put whatever she wants in writing, but unless she pushes back, people will continue to break the license.

As a practical matter, the internet means she can't control it. I watched a video company with a far more legit use issue with huddle dot com try everything and just fail. Music is in a similar place.

We are a about twenty years away from actual laws which apply to the web. A good place to start would be catfishing, money scams and phishing.

S.Horton wrote in post #17149314
We are a about twenty years away from actual laws which apply to the web. A good place to start would be catfishing, money scams and phishing.

Which is a good thing in my mind. I'd prefer politicians be as lazy and full of procrastination due to incompetence on this subject. As soon as the laws do catch up, what was once the wild west web will never be the same.

US Copyright Law is very clear that the owner of the photograph controls all publishing and editing of an image. However, it is obvious to the whole world that millions of photos are used without permission and edited every day.

As business owner, you have to make your own policies. When it comes to personal and family photos, your customers will be much happier if they have the flexibility to crop and edit and publish their photos on social media without worries. Most customers will not understand that they do not get all rights to use the photos and will likely be disappointing and frustrated by restrictions of use. If you want to have happy family and personal customers, then you need to be flexible.

I do expect a clear understanding of copyright and usage when it comes to commercial, media, and other professional clients. For these clients written license contracts are normal and expected, and restrictions on use and editing are normal.

-Scott

Here's a relevant fstoppers article that was just posted yesterday:
https://fstoppers.com …o-your-clients-know-34976


Unrelated to that article or this thread, just yesterday I had a brief facebook-internet-argument with a guy who still held the position that "fair use" let him do whatever he wanted with any photo posted on the internet. I got tired of arguing, and admitted that in actual practice, he can probably get away with whatever he wants - even if "fair use" laws don't agree with him. On one hand, it seems that he's right, if he re-posts a photo for the purposes of "education, comment, or critique," not for commercial purpose, and it's something I wasn't making money on anyway.

One other thing to keep in mind is Implied Licensing. In the absence of a written usage license, recent case law indicates that the photographer can imply a usage license through other conduct, such as emails or facebook messages.

Thanks for the replies all. This is in Canada so I guess I need to brush up copyright laws in Canada. I think one of the issues is that this photographer leaves their watermark on all photos she gives her clients so using in star am crops so much the watermark gets cut off. Going on Facebook and calling out clients is not the right way though.

the flying moose wrote in post #17150084
......Going on Facebook and calling out clients is not the right way though.

That's exactly right. It would seem that the best way to handle this is to make sure customers know exactly what their usage rights are going to be before a contract is ever signed or money changes hands.

the flying moose wrote in post #17150084
Thanks for the replies all. This is in Canada so I guess I need to brush up copyright laws in Canada. I think one of the issues is that this photographer leaves their watermark on all photos she gives her clients so using in star am crops so much the watermark gets cut off. Going on Facebook and calling out clients is not the right way though.

Its very likely she isn't doing a very good job of precounseling her clients about what the outcome of a session should be. The first thing I do with a potential client is to explain to them what to expect in terms of the shoot, how many images they are likely to get from the shoot, why its only a small portion of the total shots, what they can go with the images and the very few things expect of them. I make it clear that cropping is fine, in fact its necessary if you are surrendering printing rights, but color treatments or any other form of "awesominzing" is not permitted. I offer to do color treatments if they really want to go that route with a given image so that its done to my standard. I've yet to have anyone reject that contingency. I started doing that after one client altered some carefully crafted shots that where of her wearing a white outfit in the snow and ran a piss yellow I phone filter on them and told everyone I took the shots.

her clients are happy with her logo on photos they buy? I'd not pay a dime for that. And why is she stalking her clients, instead of looking for new ones? Odd.

If I'd hire a photographer for an event I'd do what ever I want with the images I paid for and I'd never hire a photographer that has some written clauses not allowing me to do so.

While I'd never do it (because I'd not buy it if I'd not like it as is), but if I bought a painting and felt a red crayon scribble would make it "better" I'd certainly add it. It's my painting now. I can cut it in half or paint over it. Same with anything else I buy.

juicedownload wrote in post #17149309
I simply don't care. I've never seen a client image that had a terrible looking edit, then again, they rarely perform additional edits with their images. IMO, I think it's bad pr to be ranting on a business social platform, but to each their own.

A better music analogy would be purchasing music and then deciding to mix it with other media (eg other music, photos, videos, etc). Your purchased music is not licensed for any of that. It is to be played as is with no alterations.

I don't know about that. Music licensed for personal use is just for that. If, in my personal use, I want to play it at the same time I am watching a slide show, I don't know of anything that stops me from doing that. Now, of course, I can't sell that slide show to a client, but for my personal use, it's fine.

phantelope wrote in post #17150482
her clients are happy with her logo on photos they buy? I'd not pay a dime for that. And why is she stalking her clients, instead of looking for new ones? Odd.

If I'd hire a photographer for an event I'd do what ever I want with the images I paid for and I'd never hire a photographer that has some written clauses not allowing me to do so.

While I'd never do it (because I'd not buy it if I'd not like it as is), but if I bought a painting and felt a red crayon scribble would make it "better" I'd certainly add it. It's my painting now. I can cut it in half or paint over it. Same with anything else I buy.

I agree with you. If I were to hire a photographer, it would be as a service to provide me with content that I can use as I see fit. I'm not here to be an advertisement for them by worrying about what other people think of the images I've had taken. Especially in this age of digital sharing and all. I would be sure to hire someone who didn't have an issue with that. If they are good at what they do, they should charge appropriately up front and not concern me with restrictions.

Bashing your client base for using your products in the way they want to use them really kind of sounds like a great way to not build relationships or gain much in the way of word of mouth about how great you are to work with.


If I hire a photographer to do personal photography for me then I'm expecting to pay them a fair value for their time, skill, and usage of equipment, and then I'm walking away with full rights to the selected photos and a fist full of their business cards. If they don't like my terms then they don't get the job, and it isn't really an issue for either of us.