Pop Warner and High School Sport Photography

[bill_burke1]

<p>I'm toying with the idea of providing sport photography of local Pop Warner football and High School Sports. Basically, covering the event and providing players, families and fans with links to my smugmug where they can order whatever they want. My question is - Assuming I'd need some sort of release, how in the world do you get the player's/team member's release? Is there a way to get a broadbrush mass team release from the school or the organization? Or to muddy the waters, I'm guessing parent's signatures given they're minors. I know this is done elsewhere but I can't imagine how the release issue is handled.</p>

[Spearhead]

<p>What do you need releases for?</p>

[daverhaas]

<p>Bill -</p>

<p>Generally for the type of photography you're talking about releases are not required.</p>

<p>What is required (or recommended) is a working agreement with the league to get sideline access. (Usually in return for comped photos or a percentage of the sales.) Leagues realize that they have a marketing opportunity and usually aren't willing to pass that up.</p>

<p>The other thing you may have to deal with are parents that don't want photos of their kid online for any reason. I've shot leagues / sports for 5 + years and I've had a few parents approach me over that time and say - no photos of my kid. (I believe all of them were custody related) I honored their request and didn't shoot any of their kids. Pretty easy to do most of the time.</p>

<p>Dave</p>

 

[craig_shearman1]

<p>You don't need a release to sell pictures of kids to their own parents. As for the issue of parents who don't want their kids online, that's not as easy as it sounds. You can't decide as you're shooting not to shoot a specific kid because the action is simply happening too fast. Secondly, you're not going to be able to remember what each kid looks like, so even after that fact it's not easy to delete a specific kid from what you upload. Third, even if you have the kid's jersey number, what if he's right in the middle of a fantastic shot of other kids that the other kid's parents will want to buy -- should they have to forego that photo and you give up the sales? I'm not a lawyer, but I think that once you have a deal with the league, the approach has to be that the kid is playing a public game in a public place. If the game were being covered by the local newspaper, they would certainly not agree not to shoot a certain kid and run it in the paper if it's a great shot.</p>

[bill_burke1]

<p>As I understand it, a release isn't required for editorial purposes (i.e. submitting to the local paper or just posting online for viewing), but is required for commercial use ( i.e. selling the photo's or using them for promotion). ?</p>

[craig_shearman1]

<p>I'm not a lawyer, but commercial use in the sense you are talking about is along the lines of advertising, or selling a poster of kids playing football or putting it on the cover of a book on how to play football, etc. I'm sure there are others. But when you're selling the photo to the person it's a photo of (or their parents in this case) it's no different than a portrait job or a wedding.</p>

[danmarchant]

<p>Selling an image is not considered "commercial use" - it is considered to part of an artists right to benefit from their work, thus it is artistic exploitation of the image not commercial. Commercial exploitation is the usage of the image for the purpose of promoting, advertising or marketing a company, product or service. You only need a release when the image is being used for commercial purposes, so selling the images from your smugmug site is fine.</p>

[bill_burke1]

<p>Thank you!</p>

[williamlewisphotography]

<p>All right on advice. And to ad, if you can't see the face, then it could be anyone's child in a uniform.</p>