Do you have artists asking to paint your photos?

<p>Anyone having artists asking to use your photos as the basis

for their paintings?

</p>

<p>So far I have had two painters ask if they could paint my

panorama photos.

After the initial shock and honor of being asked, I decided to say

no thank

you. The way I see it is that painters can dream up any scene,

composition and

color palette that they wish and are only limited by their

imagination. While

art photographers are extremely limited by the real world. This

is not to say

that photographers don't have imagination, quite on the

contrary. I think photographers

need to have incredible imagination to come up with unique

scenes in an ordinary

and everyday world.</p>

<p>Plus, I worked my tail off hiking and scouting these scenes,

waiting on the

light, then going home when it didn't pan out. Then doing it all

over again

till ya' get it. All they have to do is to sit on the comfy chairs in

their

air conditioned studio's and paint other peoples photos and

make a profit from

it. Sure you need talent to paint good, but if you're that good at

painting

then why would you want to replicate another artists work? It

makes no sense

to me.</p>

<p>What do you think? What have you said to painters that have

wanted to paint

your images?</p>

Yes - as I sometimes photograph rare animals or try to catch them in interesting poses. I have nothing against it - they could do it without asking and without giving you a credit for your work. Fact that they asked shows how honest they are. Many researchers spend the whole life working to help the humanity without getting nothing back just satisfaction - how can you compare that to a hiking trip? Best regards, Mark

This summer I have an oil painter who sits in her studio/gallery all day long painting from a portfolio of my images that she requested. Her 30"x40" canvases sell for $3200. I get 15%.

 

After laboring with feelings of being Gerald Moore, and thinking at some length about the role that an accompanist plays to the soloist s/he accompanies, I decided I'd take the money.

 

But I still am sorry that I can't get that sort of money for a print of the same image from which she paints.

 

After all, it's my vision, but then it's her oil painting technique. And, as I always say about myself, I can't draw a crooked line on purpose!

I find this a really interesting notion - afterall, how often do we see people in art-galleries photographing paintings, or even photographers here on photo.net submitting photos containing parts of other people's artwork?

 

I think this is all fine and I would have been flattered. My reply would have been "sure - but do something interesting and take liberties with your own interpretation of it!"

BTW. I just read your comment about hiking and doing the hard work. Hey - that just means you get the experience of having the opportunity to do that and they're missing out by only interpreting the result...

 

The profit bit is another issue. For that I imagine you'd want to start talking royalties and appropriate credit...

I have had one painter ask.........and it was the rudest, condenscending "ask" I have ever heard. I ignored him. I have been to art fairs, mostly paintings, in Philly and when I asked if there were any photography exhibits she knew of, I got a "photography isnt art, what would it be doing here?"

 

No, I would never let a painter use my images.........unless I got that $3200 mentioned above ;o)

Ross, I've been meaning to come by and see your gallery for a while now. I'm right down the road in Sisters. Love your stuff.

 

If the painter is going to sell the work, I'd ask for a share in the profits. I'm just an enthusiastic amateur, and one of the (many) reasons my portfolio doesn't touch your work is that it's too difficult for me to get up at 3am so I can hike into that scenery for perfect light. Besides, I'm scared of cougars. Or falling into a hole. It's time consuming, tiring, and mildly dangerous. It is also expensive (not just time invested, but equipment, gas, etc.) You should be compensated if it leads to profits for someone else.

 

One thought I had. If you really like the painter's work, how about suggesting a package sale of both products? I'm not a fine art collector, but to me it would be interesting to display both works in a home. Especially if the painted interpretation were quite different. Wouldn't work if it were a near copy just done in oils.

 

Hope it pans out for you (pun intended).

 

Mac

Also, if they get cute, ask if you can photograph their paintings for no charge and then sell the results as postcards around town.

 

Mac

Hi Ross, I have also been asked that question by a couple of artists, one of whom is

my spouse. She generally uses the images as reference, i.e. extracting a cloud

formation or shadow pattern as part of a larger composition or doing a fairly abstract

painting of a scene which could only be captured on film due to the transient lighting.

I don't have any issues with the reference use [i may be biased in this case, though;)]

 

The other artist is an aquaintance who paints in a realistic style. She wanted to do

some "enlargements" of some of my slides. We negotiated a contract that recognized

her effort to do the painting and my effort to get the shot in the first place. It worked

out as 50:50 and credit in any exhibitions, publications etc. that the painting was

based on a photo by me. Haven't seen any sales yet, but what can one expect of

paintings based on amatuer photos?

 

Overall, find out what the painter intends to do and treat it just like any other

request to use your great photos...get it in writing.

 

Happy hiking,

Shaughn

I been asked by a mural painter to use my photos and I agreed to supply him with some outdoor shots. I regard this as a compliment, plus I get a monitary return.

I'm a former painter, turned full time fine art photographer. I consider both painting and photography to be equally legitimate fine art mediums. I personally prefer photography over painting. While some painters have a strong appreciation of photography, other painters have very little understanding of that medium and therefore consider painting to be more legitimate than photography. This prejudiced attitude and lack of appreciation for another medium is due primarily to a lack of knowledge. I strongly feel that if a painter uses a photographer's work as a basis for their painting, the photographer should expect some kind of compensation.

Interesting thread, I've had people copy images that I've sold as greetings

cards, post cards and calendars before and yes, it is annoying because the

images were my vision, my interpretation of what I saw and it often took a lot

of effort to get those images. Despite what some people seem to think, there is

a lot more to taking a good photograph than just having a good camera or

getting out your car and pressing a button or two.

 

It is mainly amateur artists that tend to copy images in this way, but I have had

a professional artist, buy a few of my images which he then painted and sold

without any reference to myself as being the creative force behind his

paintings which were entirely based on my work. In the UK there is still a

perception amongst many people that a painting has more artistic merit than a

photograph; which is a great shame really.

 

I saw a painting based on one of my images in an exhibition in my local town,

the "artist" couldn't even tell me where the location was when I asked him

about it. Luckily it wasn't that good, the original photograph was much better;

athough I could be biased!

 

I am not too bothered about amateur artists copying my work on a non-

commercial basis, but when people start making money out of so called

original paintings which are straight copies of my own work, then that is a

different story. The issue is how can you enforce your copyright, when you

probably will never see the paintings copied from your own images and the

people who copy photographs will very rarely ever ask you for permission or

even consider paying you, it is a problematic area. Any image that you post

on the web, could be copied by somebody in any part of the world, again how

do you stop this happening? There are no easy answers really.

http://www.currys.com/books/prodinfo.asp?prodID=8139&SubcatID=6001

 

I can't find it but I'm 100% certain they sell various slides also. I always thought the idea was to use the photo for ideas not to copy. If they're just copying then they're just human photo copiers-)

I don't really consider copying entire scenes to be "painting." There are painters who are professional "copyists," that is, they copy other paintings exactly. There is no original work or creativity involved, but certainly there is technique that often takes many years to learn and master. I consider painters of this type more "illustrators" and ... well ... "copyists."

 

I am also a painter (and photog) and I really don't understand why a creative person would want to copy a photograph exactly unless its to practice technique. Creating the compositions and the act of drawing it out is one of the most fun not to mention creatively satisfying parts of of the painting process (for me).

 

I ask photographers all the time if I can look at their images for reference, and have copied three or four birds outright (gave 'em away as gifts), but never whole photos, not even my own. I couldn't sleep well at night and it would be hard to be proud of the piece.<div></div>

<p>Thanks for your comments, keep them coming!</p>

<p>I think I'm leaning towards Emily's model, royalty fee's for

usage rights.

I guess it also depends on how much the painting ends up

looking like my work.

At first, I didn't think of this as a possible revenue stream, but

how easy

our minds can be swayed when dollars are flashed.</p>

<p>Allan, we are of like minds. So if we can't stop them from

doing it, lets at

least get compensated by the ones who have the ethics

enough to step up and

ask for permission. I guess I need to be more open to these

ethical artists

because they have taken the time to seek me out and ask

permission. </p>

<p>Mac, cute second post! Very funny. I'll keep that in my back

pocket if the

negotiations go sower. On a different topic, Did you do the long

all mountains

poster with the names of the mountains on it? Great idea if you

did. I am swarmed

with requests for it in Bend. You gotta find an outlet for that

image in downtown

Bend so I can direct the tourists to it. Don't worry, I wont

"copy"

that idea. It was a good one though. Seeing that I have been in

your gallery

two times now, i think it's high time you make the

"long" trip to

Bend and say hi :-). Each time I'm at your place the lady says

you're out shooting,

and rightly so. Keep up the good work.</p>

<p>Thanks all for your posts and insight.</p>

Ross...not me! I'm just a total amateur hack. Only been shooting for a bit over a year after a 15 year break from cameras all together. That said, I do spend a ton of time off in the woods looking for opportunities, so I think I can appreciate the work you put in for your images.

 

I know the gallery you are talking about, but forget the photographers name.

 

My greatest accomplishment so far has been a snapshot out my kitchen window that made this week's Nugget News. Trees and smoke. Bad as they get :)

 

Hope my thoughts were of help. But they were pure amateur rambling.

 

Mac

<p>Mac,</p>

<p>Sorry for the confusion! I thought for sure you where the

photo artist in Sisters.

But, then again, there are a TON of good artists in that town.

Yeah, I forgot

the artist name too, so I assumed he was you, your name

sounds VERY familiar.

That's why I put two and two together and came up with the

wrong info. You're

more than welcome to come on down to Bend and hang out in

the gallery. Right

now Jefferson Park is going off, so if you want wildflowers then

that's the

place to be. But, it's a good 4.5 mile hike in... feel the burn!</p>

Ross I just visited your website and looked at all your nature photos. Now I have to correct myself and say that I *can* understand why an artist would want to copy an image exactly. Really beautiful work ....

I've faced this a few times. My perspective has been that if the purpose of the painting is in any way commercial then I should charge a fee. If I'm reasonably convinced after a web search that the "artist" is amateur I'll agree which does run the risk of being deceived. Like others though, I really can't see the joy in simply copying someone else's creation.

Ross, you're very welcome to post here, but please cut out the self promotional signature line, complete with image and links. It looks great, but smacks a little of advertising, which is prohibited here.

 

Thanks.

<p>Bob,<br>

As you well know, self promotion/marketing has become just

as important as the

images that we take. I wanted an easy way for people to go

directly to my gallery

and see my work without going to photo.net bio page. Your site

takes a long

time to load so I wanted an easier and faster way for people to

see my work.

The links that where under my image greatly increased the

probability of click-through

and seeing my work. I don't see anything wrong with it. But

seeing you are the

moderator your word is final.<br>

<br>

But, hold on, lets take a look at your name "Bob Atkins

(www.bobatkins.com)"

doesn't that smack of self promotion/advertising? Should your

also remove that?

If you think about it, all I did was take what you did one step

further, by

making it easier for people to view my work.<br>

<br>

I highly suggest creating a link in our signature so people can

go directly

to our sites. We all have spent thousands of dollars creating

our websites and

the content that is on them. If we can't self promote then how

will people know

we exist?</p>

<p>Also the links to our sites help to verify the validity of our

thread posts.

If someone says something then i like to see their work to back

up their post.

I just made it easy for people to see that I know what I'm talking

about.</p>

<p>Regarding your legal text, I was not selling products or

services. I was just

giving people an easy way to see my work and to give validityto

my posts. Sure

I was promoting my name, but isn't that half the job as a fine

artist photographer.

So, if you consider my name a product then yep, you got me

dead to rights.</p>

<p>Just trying to stand out in a sea of similarity.</p>

<p>Back to conformity for me, bad Ross, don't think out of the

box again, bad

<a

href="http://www.rosswordhouse.com">www.rosswordhouse.co

m</a> <br>

Not to change the direction of this thread, but I've noticed quite a few people here that have the same type of link to their site (most are usually excellent sites) at the bottom of their post, or as their signature. I actually like it, when I admire the info given, it has prompted me to be able to look at someones site when I sometimes might not take the time to type in the web address. It's far more likely that someone would view my site with a link, rather than having to type www.whitemountainphoto.com every time. I've been considering adding a link to my own web site also when I post, but haven't had the time to figure out how to do it yet with the current software I have.

 

Bob, is this really unacceptable here? If so, are all the current members who have such a link, going to be asked to remove them?

Ross, nice site and images by the way. I've admired it previously due to your link.

Thanks Dana on the complement regarding my site and work!

Here is how you put a URL at the end of your post:

 

Type your responce in the answer box then after you're all done

paste this bit of code:

 

<a

href="http://www.rosswordhouse.com">www.rosswordhouse.co

m</a>

 

You will have to change out my link with your's. Keep it in a text

file so all you have to do next time is copy and paste.

 

Then post as HTML. The next page will display your link so you

can test it out. If it looks good then post. If not then go back and

adjust it.

 

I have posted this as text so the link would not be generated.

 

Thanks

 

ross

Ross, thanks for the help. I'll make sure to do that when I get to my other computer. Hopefully the elves won't mind.