A discussion of concert photography and copyright. Keeping control over your images, rights-grabs, contracts, and who owns what.
Hi Todd,
I am a fan and a frequent visitor to your site. My question is about owner’s rights.
Does the house venue have rights to all or some of your photos, and is the legal arrangement more or less restrictive than shooting for a publication? Do bands claim any rights to your work? I am wondering how much of the pie is left for the photographer after everyone else claims their pieces.
From what is left, do the band members or publicists try to control what shots are published? I am interested in this line of work and want to know what to expect.
Thank you for taking time to answer my questions.
Michael LaFleur
www.lafleurphoto.com
Great question, Michael. The issue of copyright and ownership is a big one, especially as artists, management, and photographers all begin to seize on this persistent aspect of concert photography.
On the topic of copyright, one essential thing to remember is that, as the creator of a work, copyright is an automatic entitlement that remains yours until you transfer or forfeit those rights. Transferring or forfeiting rights is most commonly done through a contract, which may be agreed to before or after the images are made.
Let’s break down your question and look at some of these issues.
Who Owns What?
When shooting for a venue, does the house have rights to all or some of your photos, and is the legal arrangement more or less restrictive than shooting for a publication?
Photographing on behalf of a venue as a house photographer does not forfeit your rights to the images unless the agreement you’ve made with them states so. The best practice is to license the images to the venue on a pre-determined basis, with specific clauses outlining appropriate use and use that is prohibited.
As for shooting for a publication, again, the rights the photographer maintains over the images depend on the working contract. Many publications way require an exclusivity period, in which they are the sole outlet for images one delivers for a specific period of time, but this is not the same as transferal of rights.
In each case, whether shooting for a venue or for a publication, the only rights you lose are the ones you sign away. Until that point, you maintain the whole of the ownership over your work.
The Rights Grab, and Other Contracts
Do bands claim any rights to your work?
Insofar as the images are not libelous or used for commercial purposes, bands do not have claim to the images you make unless, as above, you’ve signed a contract that states otherwise.
This is where the issue of prohibitive photo releases comes up. These contracts, at their worst, state a transfer of rights from the photographer to another party with the intent of maintaining control over the image of an artist. Such extreme agreements are often referred to as “rights-grab” contracts.
Less drastic contracts may ask the photographer to agree to any number of other things, such as not using the images for commercial purposes or simply stating that they will photograph a performance for a specific number of songs.
While some bands and their representatives may make claims to a photographer’s images after the fact, they have no legal right to demand anything unless a contract was signed beforehand.
The Whole Pie
I am wondering how much of the pie is left for the photographer after everyone else claims their pieces.
Basically, you get first dibs on the whole pie until you start giving away slices. As the author of any given unique work, photographers are entitled to the entirety of the rights to an image within the realm of editorial and fine art usage.
Control of Images
From what is left, do the band members or publicists try to control what shots are published?
Some contracts or requests from publicists and artist management may contain clauses requesting final approval of images for publication. In addition, some of these photo releases, which may be required in exchange permission to shoot, may specify a finite period during which the images may be published, or that the images may only be used for a singular publication.
It’s worth noting that the act of granting one permission to photograph is a level of control exercised by publicists and band managers. So, by one’s portfolio or publication, a decision is being made before the show about photography and the potential images.
End Notes:
The moral of the story is that the photographer is the owner to an image’s rights until legally binding agreements state otherwise. If you’re interested in maintaining a maximum of rights possible, it’s in your best interest to scrutinize all contracts, whether these are photo releases required by a band or contracts between you and a publication or venue.
Thanks for your question, Michael!
Disclaimer: While I am a concert photographer, gummy bear aficionado, avid tea drinker, and many other things, I am not a lawyer. I would compel you to seek the council of a legal professional for all important matters of copyright law.
This entry was posted on Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 7:31 pm and is filed under Letters, Photography Tutorials and tagged with concert photography, contract, libel, license, ownership, photo release, photography, rights grab. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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Q&A: Concert photography and copyright. Keeping control of your images, rights grabs, and who owns what. http://is.gd/l2CA
hey todd, what do you think makes a live shot truely incredible? what do you look for in your photos?
on a different note, how did you get your start in the concert photography industry?
Michelle, thanks for the questions.
Great article, serious stuff. I can understand how important this can be in the long run. You never know 10-20 years from now someone will want your work, and you still want to be the owner of your work. Like that Madonna photo recently auctioned, for example. Appreciate your answers.
Hey John, glad you found this post interesting. It’s definitely a big topic for many photographers, especially those who are shooting artists with rights grabs contracts. Thanks for the comment.
Q&A: Concert photography and copyright. Keeping control of your images, rights grabs, and who owns what. http://is.gd/l2CA
Let’s say I’d like to organise an exhibition with the concert pictures I took. How is that treated?
Dan, good question. As I understand it, so far as you have not agreed to a contract barring it, you’re free to sell the images in a fine art context.
Just one note: The rights you have absolutely depend on the country you live in.
For example, in Germany, no matter what contract you sign, you always have the owners right since you were the person who created this piece of work. Even if you sign a contract forcing you not to publish the pictures on any other media or not to use them in a commercial way, you remain the owner of the pictures.
Because of that, most photo contracts of the top class bands, forcing you to pass on all the rights you have on a photo (including these owner rights) are not legit in Germany. Most of the circumstances (no contract copy for the photographer for example) are highly doubtable from the view of the German law.
Hey Andreas, great point here about international laws. Contract law and copyright issues will vary from country to country, as you point out. I wishes that we in the US were as lucky in regard to the law siding with the author.
What do you think about photography and copyright law? Have your say! http://is.gd/l2CA
What about a release that claims to own the rights, but stipulates they cannot use the photos without the photographers permission, or transfer the rights to a third party. Also, it does not require the photographer to send the photos to them.
Hi Tasha, good question.
Again, I have to state that I’m not a lawyer. But my understanding of these issues is that contracts like the one describe are basically safeguarding the artist – and their management company – from potential abuse of the images. By having the photographer agree to sign over the copyright, they guarantee a legal basis for protecting their interests against libelous or inappropriate use. So far as I know, they do not have to be in possession of the images in any form to claim copyright.
In terms of not using the images without the photographer’s permission, to me, this is an assurance that they’re not going to exploit the work. Likewise, the statement not to transfer the rights is basically there to make the photographer feel better.
Really well written piece. I’m in the process of writing my dissertation on photographers copyright, the big problem for photographers isn’t so much the law as it is management companies attitude towards photographers. There’s no way I can see to change the law to stop management companies from going for right grabs, its only going to happen if all photographers say no to signing the contracts. That said the law is outdated in the sense that it doesnt take into account the growth of the internet and social networking. In the UK the process of changing the law is under way with review papers in the last three years and a Issues Paper put out by the IPO in Decmember.
Hey Tom,
Thanks for the comment. You’re right, a flat-out boycott of rights grabs would be fantastic. I believe that some press associations in Scandinavia have adopted this stance. In the US, it seems that there are simply too many people who are happy to sign away their rights just for the opportunity, though maybe this attitude could change, too.
Hopefully we’ll see some meaningful changes in the future that will benefit photographers, though I’m not too optimistic on that front, unfortunately. Thanks again for your thoughts.
Primer on Copyright and Concert Photography http://tinyurl.com/b7u7ar
RT @KLFLegal Primer on Copyright and Concert Photography http://tinyurl.com/b7u7ar
Great and timely article for me considering I just turned down to shoot Morrissey based on the fact that he has a photo release form now. I’d rather not go to a show then fork over my rights to a musician or band’s management. Especially if i’m not getting paid for the gig, what’s in it for me besides taking pictures that someone in management and/or the band could take from me in the future. And I have to remove the photos within a year; even if I didn’t I would want to play around with something so legally binding.
I just wish publications and websites would organize a stance on this stuff and choose not to cover the bands that have photo release. Let’s see how quickly the bands go away after no one covers them anymore. but of course that will never happen since everyone, like you guys said, are happy to sign a waiver just to get a chance to shoot a bigger named artists. I think i’ll stick with the smaller bands and enjoy that experience more. phew, long comment. haha.
Hi Bryan,
It’s a real issue. Luckily one of the publications that I shoot for has taken a stand on these contracts in the past. I’m happy to say that they’ve boycotted the show, or at least images directly of the performer, due to the photo policy mandated by management. We’ll see how it goes for Morrissey. I shot him two years ago and Moz is a fantastic performer, I would hate to miss him this go around.
The most important item to remember when dealing with joint commercial copyright is after you have shot “the band” you are not legally authorized to sell ANY images of that band for profit.
When I shot Metallica, I was amazed they did not make use sign any kind of a release.
But just because a band does not make you sign a release does not mean you are free to do whatever you want with those images.
Yes – just because one owns the copyright doesn’t mean that there are zero limits on the use of the images. Commercial applications require permission, and of course instances of libel would not come without repercussions.
Todd,
It’s good to know what my rights are, so I can respond to these situations in a professional manner without being taken advantage of. Thanks for sharing your personal experience in this area.
Hi Michael,
Thanks for the great question, I hope this post answered it for you.
Aha~~~ really great, Todd. Thank you so much for sharing these questions and taking time to answer them. Nifty stuff.
Hey Amy,
I’m really happy to answer these questions. Please feel free to submit your own, too. I think we can all learn from each other.
[...] live photography but for his incredibly useful insights and it just so happens he has done a post on copyright. For photographers wanting to know there rights (in particular in the United States) [...]
Hello Todd,
I have a question on taking photos of free concerts or maybe Epcot in Disney. My question is can they do anything to me as far as selling photos of the bands from there if there is no contracts or been warned not to take them do I have to right to sell them?
Thanks again,
Matt
I recently shot a Japanese band, actually one you shot a few years ago ;), that stipulated that the only way I would be allowed to shoot was if I gave away all the rights to them. They would be able to use the photos in whatever form they wanted from editorial to commercial & I could use them for promotional use only. But closer to the show it changed from the above to only 6 images chosen by the editor who set it up. No contract has been drawn or signed by any party. What rights do I have?
thanks so much, this article was very helpful as I’ve got concert to write about this Saturday and was worried about the ownership of the photos I’m going to be taking.
Thanks again,
Aldo
Todd, thanks for the info. I am currently dealing with my first rights grab request from a management company.
When you have been faced with that situation in the past, have you been able to successfully negotiate that clause away? Or, do you find that labels and management companies take a hard line?
Right now, my attitude is, under these circumstances, it’s better to shoot with my G10 in the front row than with my D7000 in the pit.
Hi Jay,
It really depends on the management. But you’ll never know unless you try to negotiate.
Absolutely. I’m working on that now. I’ll keep you posted on the outcome.
I would like to copy/paste your post in its entirety into a new page on my photography blog. I will link directly back to this page of course. The info is pertinent and I often have to sign my entire rights away to shoot the larger name bands, or they wont let me in to do so.. if more photographers knew their rights (and the fact that without US there would be no online or in print PR for the artists or the record labels or ticket promoters) perhaps we would not be required to sign such stringent waivers
If you’d like to link to this article, that is fine, but I request that you not copy and paste the entire article. Thanks for the interest.
Bless you for your in put I needed that!
Kruzin Kenny
http://ishootshows.com/2009/02/26/copyright-and-concert-photography/ Interesting read…
Copyright and Concert Photography | ishootshows.com http://bit.ly/n5bAmZ
Todd, Thanks for the great article. I’ve learned a lot from you and admire your work.
My question is can I use images of an artist in my online portfolio if a rights grab release was signed? When I shot Musikfest last year some artists like Stone Temple Pilots, Maroon 5 and Miranda Cosgrove required photographers to sign a contract to shoot the shows.