Photographer Out Of Business --- No Album Yet

Help!

 

Our wedding photographer went out of business and never sent us any prints

which we payed thousands for up front. However we did receive the proofs in CD

format. We cant print any images from this CD as they are encripted (or somehow

protected from copying) It has been over two years since our wedding and we are

desperate for some prints to put in an album and give to Grandma. (She has been

asking for a long time now). What can we do? Can we contact the CD manufacturer

to unblock the images to be printed?

 

Thanks in advance for any assistance in the matter!

Thats gotta be so frustrating. Can you locate him somehow, even though he's out of business? Perhaps call some local studios and see if he is free lancing or call some of the local professional labs. Best of luck.

There is not enough information provided here to answer the question accurately. It makes a difference if the business was incorporated in a way to shield the photographers personal assets such as an LLC. Maybe he or she peirced the corpoate veil nullifying such a protection, if there is one. There is no mention of a purposeful intent which may help bring criminal charges and its attendent potential for restitution or other victim accountability.

 

There is no mention if you even know where the phtographer is. Indeed, it is unclear if you are considering seeking relief from the photographer at all so lets move on.

 

Asking a CD manufacturer to "unblock" images? Hmm. Even if it can be done, you may be asking them to violate or aiding in the violation of federal law. The images are almost certainly copyrighted (Yes, even though the business is defunct and you got screwed.) You may be able to go to court and seek ownership for yourself. Some of the issues in the paragraph above would need to be addressed in that event.

 

Your question is either an effort to seek legal advice or amounts to that. This is the wrong forum to obtain such information. Consult with an attorney if you want the answers to your questions to be accurate. The responses here about remedies will be unreliable and for often wrong even if the poster seems knowledgable and confident.

Another thought... you report that over two years have passed. The statute of limitations in most states is over two years for contract violations. Who knows what it is in your area. Bankruptcy? If there have been bankruptcy proceedings for the business or the photographer and you were not making a claim? Not good. Get expert legal help.

Yes, contact a lawyer. And possibly the BBB?

I'm not sure what you have on the CD.....can you burn a copy of the CD? Getting access to the images will likely depend on the encoding software and the CD manufacturer will be of no help there. If it's a pdf file it might be password protected. You've got the name of the photographer I would guess....you might be able to call some of the photo labs in your area and they might be able to help track down the photographer. If you locate him personally I think you might stand a good chance of getting some help. If you'd like, and if you can burn a copy of the CD, shoot me an email and I'll send you my address and I'll take a look at what you have.

 

Unfortunately with all the "churn & burn" here today and gone tomorrow photographers that are popping up all over, this situation is likely to keep getting more and more common. All the more reason to only go with established pros that have been around for awhile.

It's likely that you CAN access the images; the permissions just probably need to be

unlocked, which is usually a relatively simple (though maybe time-consuming) task. Contact

a local photographer with a good reputation. You should be able to find someone who would

be willing to look at the disc and try to help you. A hardware repair and maintenance firm

would likely be able to do the same thing.

This might be better asked in a forum for lawyers?

If you can view the images, you can print the images. I'm assuming that the entire CD is encrypted and you can't even see the files, or view them?

Stephanie - can you locate and contact your photographer? Just because someone is 'no longer in business' doesn't, IMHO, mean that they can just ignore their contractual obligations. Try to find where they are and call them or send a letter via certified mail with your request that they fulfill their promises.

 

I'm not a lawyer - the above isn't legal advice, just common sense.

Not a lawyer (or professional photographer), just a computer nerd by profession and enthusiastic photo amateur - to date any and all "copy protection systems" have been technically defeatable.

 

However, the legality of doing so depends on the country you're in. In the US there is in effect the "Digital Millenium Copyright Act" which makes deliberately circumventing these controls illegal, punishable with fines and/or jail time. Other countries might have similar laws.

 

You might be able to find someone who will do it for you, but again, depending on where you are a lot of people might be hesitant to do so in the event that "word gets around" and they get into trouble.

Glenn, if all copy protection systems are defeatable, could I send you a pdf with several images that is password protected and could you access the files in a manner that could produce prints? I hear people talking about how accessable the data is but I haven't had anyone show me that it could be done. I'd also like to see if the files burned to a DVD slideshow could be accessed as well....I've had people claim that it can be done but to date haven't seen it.

David, you're welcome to email one to me and I'll see what I can do ... I like a challenge!

David, the PDF password protection can possibly be circumvented - search for "xpdf" (possibly with a patch) or "pdftk". The tools may not be easy to use, may not run on Windows, and may in fact require recompilation to do that (the xpdf patch in particular). I never said it was easy, just that it's possible :)

 

I'd love to help out personally, but as mentioned, I'm not inclined to get myself in trouble at this point - a combination of the Canadian gov't rumblings about our own version of the DMCA and the "long arm" of the US gov't as it relates to cross-border relations.

Wow! I am actually very impressed by the amount of responses recieved on this post. Thanks

 

The photographer in question is (was) a reputable one that had been in business for 20+ years. His health is rapidly failing and he has turned over a lot of his records and data to another photographer in the area. This surrogate company has been dealing with the photographer to get his archives but they somehow can not find ours. I am way past dealing with this in court; its just too stressful. My prefered route is to get the pics off of the CD, even though they may be low res. I will try to zip the files into a compact email and send them to the kind people who have replied to this post. I hope you can find a way get these off of CD and into print media. Thanks again, I'll be sending email out next week sometime.

I'm not sure broadcasting your intentions to the entire world online was a wise act considering the the many comments above. On the bright side, the people involved may not be very interested in asserting their intellectual property rights considering the overall circumstances.

I would contact the new photographer and take the CD to them to try to get the files off the CD. This would be the best way to make sure that you are doing everything in the correct legal manner. I would also explain to the new photographer that took over his business that you need reprints and enlargements. This might encourage him/her more because then they will be making some money for thier time and effort.

 

You might also want to refer back to your contract. You may have only been contracted for a proof cd for a certain amount of money. If that is the case and it has been two years of trying to get this done then it may be that your original photographer deleted your files all together because you only had a certain amount of time to order from. Check your contract and see what you paid for. If you paid for prints then the new photographer will try to make sure you get what was in your contract. I would just contact them and make sure that you make a copy of this cd before you take it and just leave it since it is the only one you have.

Can you save the images off the cd onto your computer or can you just view them as a DVD format to where it plays as soon as you put the CD in. That could be another problem. I would also go ahead and talk to an attorney to see what you can do to get some prints. Just incase have you checked with family members that were there to try to gather images from them to compile an albumn yourself? I know the pictures are not the same and with all the detail, but if this photographer has been sick and his health is going down hill then you might not have a big option. Especially since it has been two years. I wish you luck and I hope you are able to get some of your wedding photos off this CD or from your family. Good Luck.

John---I?m not sure what you meant by your last posting. How can a photographer who has broken his contract and left us out thousands of dollars with nothing to show for it still have any legal say in how I try to rectify the situation? Am I the bad person here? I feel like I am being reprimanded for using the tools that this forum has provided to give victims like us a light at the end of the tunnel

Stephanie, can you make a copy of the cd? how much space did the pictures take on the cd? can you see the pictures on that cd? can you even open the cd on your computer? does it as for a password and username? are the images zipped and its asking password to extract?

 

Please answer those questions to me on my email tossik@gmail.com and i might just be able to help you out here.

 

Thanks.