Event photography customer wants copyright.

<p>I am the regular photographer for a conference event. The customer is the event organizing company. They are happy customers, and recently they asked me whether they can obtain the copyright from me, so that they are certain no other parties would be able to use the photos w/o their permission, and that they can pass on the photos to their customers and contacts (e.g. companies that attend the conference) if needed.</p>

<p>I have always sold my work charging an hourly rate, and then made the photos available via the Internet. What I basically give them is a first right to use the photos. I'm fine with them passing on the photos to their customers as I already got paid by the hour, but I would like to retain the possibility to use the photos for my own promotion in the future.</p>

<p>What's best for me to do? Sell the complete copyright with a clause stating that I am able to use the photos formy own promotion? How much would one charge for that? Or just sell exclusive usage rights, with the clause that they are free to let others use the photos? Or perhaps something more elaborate, that involves me being credited if the photos are passed on to a third party.</p>

<p>Thoughts / experiences?</p>

<p> Paul</p>

<p>I would just decide how much I wanted to earn from the shoot only, charge that and give away the copyright.<br>

If you don't give them what they want they will probably find someone who will.<br>

I think the business model of retaining copyright and just selling usage rights is going to have to change especially for things like product shots for companies. These are usually images which are of no real further use to the photographer anyway.</p>

<p>The thing is that I already sent my invoice so it will have to be an additional charge. In the future I'd like to have this all in one contract of course. And in this case the images are of use for my own promotion, so I need something more elaborate than what you suggest, Steve.</p>

<p>Your customer is probably confusing copyright with an exclusive licence. </p>

<p>There will be those that disagree, but I doubt the real value of photographs taken in such environments and whilst I might firstly suggest a licence to allow use by you, if it became an issue for some reason then I'd probably end up agreeing to sign over the copyright. As I say.others would rather die than hand over copyright. It looks like from what you say you don't get any downstream revenue , that you're happy with the rate you get for taking the pictures, and so I wouldn't be expecting to make a large amount of money from granting the licence (if thats the way you go)</p>

<p>Its good that you've invoiced them already since that actually makes it easier to send another following their request- unless that is there's a veiled promise to pay your existing invoice subject to your handing over copyright here without further charge?</p>

<p>You could build in the requirement for you to be credited as photographer and/or copyright holder into whatever contract you propose, so long of course as you plan to be the copyright holder. Do you assert the right to be credited now? </p>

<p>From the sound of things - they (event group) feels that copyright is the same as a usage license and not actual ownership of the images. </p>

<p>That aside - I'd give them a price that they can live with and send them the images - I'd get it in writing that I can use the images for publicity purposes. </p>

<p>Dave</p>

 

<p>I agree with David,</p>

<p>While most clients do not understand the difference of owning the copyright Vs. Exclusive use; I would attempt to educate them in that a '"Transfer of copyright" agreement is far more expensive than the rights they require.</p>

<p>(i.e) "Transferring my copyright will cost you (x) dollars. Exclusive 5 year license for (X) number of media types will cost you far less."</p>

<p>If you truly feel your image has zero future earning potential, then I suppose you could comply to such a demand. The problem in determining zero earning potential is that none of us has a crystal ball with such accuracy; so personally I find that idea dangerous thinking.</p>

<p>Would I transfer my copyright? Sure; if the price was right. ;)</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Your question is a mute point if I understand your relationship with the customer correctly. If you have contracted (even verbally) to shoot the photographs and be paid an hourly rate, you are making photographs for hire. When you are “hired” to produce the images, the customer owns the rights to the photographs. If this is the case you don’t have any right to use the images yourself. I would strongly suggest you hire a good media lawyer to sort this out for you and develop a good contract for you to use in the future.<br>

Ken Fretz</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p> If you have contracted (even verbally) to shoot the photographs and be paid an hourly rate, you are making photographs for hire. When you are “hired” to produce the images, the customer owns the rights to the photographs.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>What does charging an hourly rate have to do with whether it is work for hire or not? Many event photographers including myself charge an hourly rate, and I have always retained the copyrights on my work.</p>

<p>It doesn’t matter if you are paid by the hour, month or project, when you are selling a service the output of the service belongs to the person or company paying for the service. With over forty years of both selling and buying media services, I have always been careful to have a contract spelling out these questions. If you have not formally received rights to the photographs from the organization paying for the images, you don’t own the photographs.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>It doesn’t matter if you are paid by the hour, month or project, when you are selling a service the output of the service belongs to the person or company paying for the service.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>The "output of the service" is a <em>license</em> to use the photographs, <em>not</em> the copyright on the images themselves, unless it is explicitly a work for hire situation. </p>

<blockquote>

<p>If you have not formally received rights to the photographs from the organization paying for the images, you don’t own the photographs.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>The photographer owns the copyright to the images at the moment the image is captured; this is the default case, you are claiming the reverse. Unless the photographer was an employee of the buyer at the time the photos were captured, then the buyer certainly does not automatically "own" the photographs.</p>

 

<p>"When you are “hired” to produce the images, the customer owns the rights to the photographs."</p>

<p>Only if a written contract exists that spells out the above. If, in the United States at least, you show up with a camera and are paid to do photography (i.e., a retirement ceremony, a wedding, a church reunion,) the customer may buy what they wish. But to own the rights to the photographs -- no, not really. Copyright goes to the camera-toting photograher; use of the photos generally requires a release by the person(s) in the images if for other-than-editorial use. The *customer* would have to provide income tax withholding, insurance, and equipment for the photographer to be a "work-for-hire" individual, as well as the *wages* for the photographer's work at the customer's site....and <strong>in this instance</strong>, the photography would belong to the customer.</p>

<p> </p>

Kenneth Fretz, this is not the first thread in which you've stated that the buyer owns the copyright and it's

not the first time you've been corrected. Would you please go brush up on copyright law and the definition

of 'work for hire' as it applies to copyright law before you answer more of these questions incorrectly and

confuse people. It is really important for photographers to understand this and it is very unhelpful when

people spread false information.

<p>Mark –</p>

<p> I believe that you have misunderstood me. Early in my career I was the victim of some unscrupulous people who took advantage of me on work I did for them. I quickly learned to establish the relationship in writing from the very beginning. </p>

<p> In his original question Paul stated “I have always sold my work charging an hourly rate”. This left me with the feeling that the organization he was working with did not view him as a licensor of images but as an operator of a camera. This opens the very murky area of just what is an employee. It sounds to me that Paul is doing this on a routine enough schedule, e.g., “I am the regular photographer for a conference event.” for this to be a problem.</p>

<p> The Copyright Office’s attempt to define this is <a href="http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ09.pdf">Circular 9, Work-Made-For-Hire Under the 1976 Copyright Act</a>. I would also recommend Chapter 6 of Bert Krages’ <a href="http://www.krages.com/lhp.htm">Legal Handbook for Photographers</a>.</p>

<p> Ken</p>

 

Kenneth, I understand that, but it's not murky in this case. It's not murky in most cases with freelance

photographers.

 

The work for hire section in the copyright law has two scenarios where work for hire exists:

1. You are an employee and producing the content is part of your job.

2. You sign a work for hire agreement.

 

It's quite hard to accidentally fall into one of these scenarios and not know it. Whether the organization

views him as a licensor or a camera operator is irrelevant.

 

I'm at a loss to see how I misunderstood you. This is what you said:

 

" If you have contracted (even verbally) to shoot the photographs and be paid an hourly rate, you are

making photographs for hire."

 

So please help me understand where you see in the work-for-hire link you posted that being paid an hourly

rate is a test to determine work-for-hire status. All sorts of contractors are paid hourly rates—this does not

make them employees. If it did then I'd be on the hook to withhold taxes and provide benefits to my

plumber.

<p>You have a couple of routes to follow, you can turn over to the all rights to the images, doing so leaves nothing for you so your rate for the job should take that into account or you can issue them an unlimited license which allows you to retain ownership of the images and allows them to use the images as they wish.<br>

The question only you can answer is which deal works best for you, are these images something you can resell outside of your existing clients needs, if so then licensing makes sense, now on the other side if the value of these images is limited primarily to your client then transferring the right makes sense.<br>

Wayne </p>

<p>Thanks for all your responses, this has been very helpful so far in clearing up some matters. To shed some further light on all this from my side, to be honest my contract has probably not been explicit enough. In the commission contract I state that the customer "will receive high res images for use" which I shall make available shortly after post-processing. All of my costs are built into an hourly rate, plus expenses, for which I sent a bill. I am not employed, but operate on a freelance basis. I would say that in this case I do retain the copyright by default.</p>

<p>My guess is that the customer is worried I may sell the photos to a competitor or that they would show up elsewhere first (as the pictures have a certain newsworthy value). This is certainly not my intention and I would like to retain the best relationship possible with my customer, but I would like to be able to keep using some images for later promotion.</p>

<p>I would be willing to sell the copyright, with a retainer that I shall be allowed to use the photos for my own portfolio in the future. However then the question is what is a reasonable price to ask for the copyright and should this be a fee per commission or per photo, or something else?</p>

 

<p>Paul -</p>

<p>I'd price it depending on the number of images for which they actually want to "buy" the copyright . <br>

If it's one or two - then per image - if it's all 300 -400-500 images from an event - then I'd give them a package deal. <br>

Dave</p>

<p>I've come up with the following, which I want to suggest to the customer. Let me know what you think.</p>

 

<hr />

<p><strong>Standard usage license (currently implied): </strong><br>

Customer is handed over copies of the photos resulting from the assignment, as soon as these are ready. Customer is allowed to use the photos for editorial purposes. Use should fall within the scope of the assignment. Customer is not allowed to let third parties make use of the photos without permission of the Copyright Holder (Photographer). Any use that is not editorial or outside the scope of the assignment needs to be approved by the Copyright Holder and may be subject to another license.<br>

Copyright Holder is free to sell or provide photos to third parties.</p>

<ul>

<li><em> fee is implied in hourly rate.</em></li>

</ul>

<p><strong>Limited exclusive usage license:</strong><br>

Customer is the only party allowed to make editorial use of the photos resulting from the assignment. Use should fall within the scope of the assignment. Customer is not allowed to let third parties make use of the photos without permission of the Copyright Holder. Any use that is not editorial or outside the scope of the assignment needs to be approved by the Copyright Holder and may be subject to another license. <br>

Copyright Holder is allowed to use these for his own promotion, but not allowed to sell or provide to third parties.</p>

<ul>

<li><em> fee per photo: €12.50</em></li>

<li><em> package deal: 25% of total assignment cost.</em></li>

</ul>

<p><strong>Unlimited exclusive usage license:</strong><br>

The same as the Limited exclusive usage license, but Customer is allowed to let third parties make use of the photos, as long as this remains for editorial purposes and within the scope of the assignment, and as long as no fee is charged to the third party.<br>

Copyright Holder is allowed to use these for his own promotion, but not allowed to sell or provide to third parties.</p>

 

<ul>

<li><em> fee per photo: €25 </em></li>

<li><em> package deal: 50% of total assignment cost.</em></li>

</ul>

<p><strong>Full copyright:</strong><br>

Selected photos become property of Customer. There is no limitation whatsoever and Photographer waives all rights.</p>

<ul>

<li><em> fee per photo: €50 </em></li>

<li><em> package deal: 100% of total assignment cost.</em></li>

</ul>

 

<hr />

<p>The amount of photos in these assignments is usually around 250, and what they end up using exclusively and wanting to send onto their customers is around 20-30 I estimate.</p>