Cheating Light wrote:
I wonder if it would work to register a number of images all in one image, sort of like the proof sheets we used to print where we would gang print all the negatives from one roll onto a sheet of paper. It seems like it would work if a portion of an image is copyrighted when registered making it illegal for someone to reproduce even a small portion of an image.

If that is true then you could create a large digital image which contained a thousand smaller different images.

It is sort of like the idea one can not steal portions of a song to include into another song without permission.

I'm no lawyer but it seems like I've heard of this idea before.

I don't think that will work and it might make a person more vulnerable.  I am going to use Richard asshat Prince as an example.  He takes an image and makes minimalistic changes and the appeals court considered those changes to be transformative.  Now, imagine that you have 90 images on a contact sheet and you represent it as one image.  A person can then pull one of the 90, make minor changes, (or maybe none at all), and call it transformative because it is only 1/90th of the original image, plus whatever the change is.  You argue that it is actually an image to itself and then you are charged with fraud for misrepresenting the copyright paper work.  Might be a stretch.  Might not be.

It is time to get our copyright laws more in line with the bern convention.  It seems that this rule change is a situation that may be intended to make it easier for people to appropriate other people's work at the disadvantage of the creator.

Hunter  GWPB wrote:

I don't think that will work and it might make a person more vulnerable.  I am going to use Richard asshat Prince as an example.  He takes an image and makes minimalistic changes and the appeals court considered those changes to be transformative.  Now, imagine that you have 90 images on a contact sheet and you represent it as one image.  A person can then pull one of the 90, make minor changes, (or maybe none at all), and call it transformative because it is only 1/90th of the original image, plus whatever the change is.  You argue that it is actually an image to itself and then you are charged with fraud for misrepresenting the copyright paper work.  Might be a stretch.  Might not be.

It is time to get our copyright laws more in line with the bern convention.  It seems that this rule change is a situation that may be intended to make it easier for people to appropriate other people's work at the disadvantage of the creator.

Eagle Rock Photographer wrote:
(750 images limit!?: some photogs hit that # in a single shoot!)

proimages wrote:
Like proof sheets, a video file could hold millions of images...

if you read the discussion and comments on the changes, they calculate that only a small percentage of photographers are affected by the changes. of course, doesn't help if you happen to be one of the few photographers. some of the reasons have to do with the descriptions or names of images that you need to include. with many images, matching the descriptors and names accurately can be a problem. the errors and the time it takes the examiners to deal with that is slowing the process down. maybe if they eventually get a ai based certification system - that's way in the future.

don't see that every single frame of an entire shoot or one concept needs protection; only the selected shots or even just the finals are good enough for me. a quick selection would suffice for most. also, videos and movies (and still images made into a movie stream) can be submitted as a single item. the case law on single frame usage does exist, so that shouldn't be a big issue.

Leonard Gee Photography wrote:
if you read the discussion and comments on the changes, they calculate that only a small percentage of photographers are affected by the changes.

THAT is largely due to the fact that only about 2% of us bother to register our work in the first place.

huremics wrote:
Do any of you register all your unedited images? I am thinking that it only makes for me to register my edited, published images, which is maybe 3,000 images. Far, far, far less than the total of unedited images.

Because unedited shots rarely ever leave one's hard drive, what's the reason register them for copyright?

Not a huge reason other than the fact that someday an unedited image may become an edited image.

Leonard Gee Photography wrote:
don't see that every single frame of an entire shoot or one concept needs protection; only the selected shots or even just the finals are good enough for me. a quick selection would suffice for most.

THIS.

Shot By Adam wrote:
Not a huge reason other than the fact that someday an unedited image may become an edited image.

Then include it in your next registration when that one is edited/published. Easy. :-)

Cheating Light wrote:
I wonder if it would work to register a number of images all in one image, sort of like the proof sheets we used to print where we would gang print all the negatives from one roll onto a sheet of paper. It seems like it would work if a portion of an image is copyrighted when registered making it illegal for someone to reproduce even a small portion of an image.

If that is true then you could create a large digital image which contained a thousand smaller different images.

It is sort of like the idea one can not steal portions of a song to include into another song without permission.

I'm no lawyer but it seems like I've heard of this idea before.

interesting concept. i'd be curious to know the opinion of the copyright office. or infringer's lawyer.

Leonard Gee Photography wrote:
don't see that every single frame of an entire shoot or one concept needs protection; only the selected shots or even just the finals are good enough for me. a quick selection would suffice for most.

Second Glance wrote:
THIS.

There are other reasons to register large volumes of photos than you might think. Many times people only see a situation through a very small filter without understanding the bigger scope of the issue...this is one of those cases.

While many not see the value of registering huge volumes of images because all they shoot are models from time to time, there are many of us who this new law impacts greatly.

Case in point. Take a look at these three photos and tell me the difference between them:







The answer is, short of the flicker from the LED screen in the background, there isn't much of a difference (one of the joys of shooting 12fps through my D5), but they are most certainly three different images. Every year I'm hired by a bodybuilding magazine from Greece to shoot the Mr. Olympia competition held here in Las Vegas. As with many sporting applications, they require exclusive use of any photos they will use for publication and ask for first right of refusal on anything I shoot. However, this year I was hired by a bodybuilding blog who also wanted some photos and was willing to pay me well for just one or two of the images that the first client didn't want. Two months later, another publication was doing a story on Phil Heath (the man in the photo) and asked if I had any unused photos I could license them. Three different clients, three different photos, all of which look virtually identical but aren't, so all three got different photos that all look virtually the same. Furthermore, the third client asked if I had any unused photos of Phil and one other competitor (who came in 2nd) that I had shot through the weekend and I did, so they paid for those too. [On a side note, any photographers uneducated as to the value of licensing, take note of that story.]

In that weekend, I shot around 4,000 photos. Events like this require you blast away constantly because the competitors are only on stage for a few seconds, there are many of them, and you never know who is going to win. So whoever does win you want photos of them competing and doing things before they get the trophy. When I'm shooting an event like this, I don't know what photos are important or not important in the days, weeks, or months to follow. If I only registered the handful of photos that I thought were important, I'd be missing out on licensing possibilities on photos that might become important later on, and don't kid yourself, this is a very common scenario of event shooters. So with the old scenario, I could register all 4,000 photos in one big bulk along with all my other images and that wouldn't be a problem. Now, I have to ask if I should register all of them and pay $300 for this shoot, where I used to only pay $50 for that shoot plus thousands of other photos? It's either a gamble or it's expensive.

Here's another situation that's happened to me before...I shoot a corporate event for a high profile client. I deliver 2,000 photos to them of their 3 day conference and they post a few of the photos on social media. Someone comes along and steals the photo and is using it for some unauthorized application. If I didn't register all 2000 photos, I don't have the legal teeth to go after them punitively. I now have to explain to the client for large shoots, that if they want me to register the images, it's going to cost them extra, whereas before those 2000 photos would get lumped in with the Mr Olympia photos and the photos I shot of some corporate headshots, and the photos I shot of a model wearing a snake for a billboard and the photos I shot of a tour of a company that manufactures aircraft tires. See the issue here?

This new change not only makes this very annoying for those of us who shoot events regularly but also extremely expensive as well.

Shot By Adam wrote:
Case in point. Take a look at these three photos and tell me the difference between them:

The fists are in slightly different positions.

ALLtheFACES wrote:
Are not these images OURs and copyrighted whether registered or not?

Especially if we can prove they are ours with the paper trail of invoices, model releases, etc.

Depends on your country. In the United States, a photographer owns the copyright once the photo is taken but should the image be stolen, the photographer is limited in the amount of damages they can sue for. Once those images are registered with the United States Copyright Office, then you can sue for punitive damages.

Hunter  GWPB wrote:

I don't think that will work and it might make a person more vulnerable.  I am going to use Richard asshat Prince as an example.  He takes an image and makes minimalistic changes and the appeals court considered those changes to be transformative.  Now, imagine that you have 90 images on a contact sheet and you represent it as one image.  A person can then pull one of the 90, make minor changes, (or maybe none at all), and call it transformative because it is only 1/90th of the original image, plus whatever the change is.  You argue that it is actually an image to itself and then you are charged with fraud for misrepresenting the copyright paper work.  Might be a stretch.  Might not be.

It is time to get our copyright laws more in line with the bern convention.  It seems that this rule change is a situation that may be intended to make it easier for people to appropriate other people's work at the disadvantage of the creator.

His work is not legal because of the minimal changes it's legal because it's social commentary.

Cheating Light wrote:
I wonder if it would work to register a number of images all in one image, sort of like the proof sheets we used to print where we would gang print all the negatives from one roll onto a sheet of paper. It seems like it would work if a portion of an image is copyrighted when registered making it illegal for someone to reproduce even a small portion of an image.

If that is true then you could create a large digital image which contained a thousand smaller different images.

It is sort of like the idea one can not steal portions of a song to include into another song without permission.

I'm no lawyer but it seems like I've heard of this idea before.

It has to. You'd basically be claiming a stolen image is a crop of the group image.

If someone cropped a single photo, from head and shoulders to just the face, that wouldn't make it legal to use.

Shot By Adam wrote:

Depends on your country. In the United States, a photographer owns the copyright once the photo is taken but should the image be stolen, the photographer is limited in the amount of damages they can sue for. Once those images are registered with the United States Copyright Office, then you can sue for punitive damages.

No. You can sue for any amount of damages you want at any time. You have to justify why they are legitimate though.

Suppose your camera cost $5k and was destroyed due to someone's negligence. If you sued, you don't get to sue for $6k, you sue for the actual damages. If you had to rent a camera for a job while you waited for your replacement you could add the cost of the rental to the $5k.

You could sue for punitive damages if there was a reason.


With copyright registration you're able to sue for statutory damages.

The thing is, thanks to stock agencies, there's always going to be a clear way to define the actual damages, so there will be no reason for a court to rely on the statutory numbers. Statutory damages are not a form of punishment. They are a predefined amount for when there's no basis to set a value for the actual damages.

Mikey McMichaels wrote:
With  TIMELY copyright registration you're able to sue for statutory damages.

The thing is, thanks to stock agencies, there's always going to be a clear way to define the actual damages, so there will be no reason for a court to rely on the statutory numbers. WRONG  

Statutory damages ... are a predefined amount for when there's no basis to set a value for the actual damages. WRONG

Assuming images are timely registered, plaintiff has a CHOICE of seeking statutory damages OR 'actual damages.

my comments/corrections are in boldface.

Eagle Rock Photographer wrote:
(750 images limit!?: some photogs hit that # in a single shoot!)

Yes, and most of those shots will get binned - there will be 5 or 10 shots that matter, if that. Do you actually understand what copyright is? It's a way of protecting valuable images that you make public - you don't lose anything by not copyrighting the 99% of cull shots. Have you honestly been sending every shot you take to the copyright office? If so, I'm surprised the legislation doesn't include a ban on you by name.

Shot By Adam wrote:

Not a huge reason other than the fact that someday an unedited image may become an edited image.

That's not a reason. If the image isn't going to leave the hard drive until it is edited, what's the benefit of swamping the copyright office with hundreds or thousands of images per shoot that aren't worth copyrighting? People have to be grown-up enough to understand that a system swamped with junk images won't work. People have to adults and worry only copyrighting those few images they take with a commercial value. That's if they ever take any such images, which most people here won't.

thiswayup wrote:
That's not a reason.

It's an exceptionally important reason. Read my other post above.

Shot By Adam wrote:
It's an exceptionally important reason. Read my other post above.

I did: I already answered it. That you don't understand the answer isn't really important to me, but if you try to make an intelligent argued response rather than just "No" then I'll try to explain anyway. But dumbed down all the way, if images are kept where no one but the photographer is going to see them, then overloading the copyright office with them is pointless, yes?

thiswayup wrote:
I did: I already answered it. That you don't understand the answer isn't really important to me,

I understood your answer. I just think you're very much wrong in it.

Shot By Adam wrote:

Depends on your country. In the United States, a photographer owns the copyright once the photo is taken but should the image be stolen, the photographer is limited in the amount of damages they can sue for. Once those images are registered with the United States Copyright Office, then you can sue for punitive damages.

not 'punitive'; they are 'statutory damages.'

Shot By Adam wrote:
I understood your answer. I just think you're very much wrong in it.

Yes, but you can't or won't explain why, so why bother posting??? It's not really that hard: if you have hundreds of images from a shoot that you keep completely private, why overload the copyright office with them? Saying "Because I might one day make one of them private" isn't really an intelligent answer - you register the image then. It's not hard, surely?

Eagle Rock Photographer wrote:

not 'punitive'; they are 'statutory damages.'

Correct. My bad on that.

thiswayup wrote:

Yes, but you can't or won't explain why, so why bother posting??? It's not really that hard: if you have hundreds of images from a shoot that you keep completely private, why overload the copyright office with them? Saying "Because I might one day make one of them private" isn't really an intelligent answer - you register the image then. It's not hard, surely?

SMH

Or they can just take all the images I send them like I've been doing for years. And yes, because one day I might want to publish them (which is what I think you meant to say) is an intelligent answer. It's just way over your head as to why. I can't help you with that.

Lubin Photography wrote:
Question: if you register your top images and the ones culled were very similar to the one submitted and no one else was shooting what you were shooting. Couldn't you still sue based on fact that even though an unregistered image was stolen you can prove that it was from the same shoot that you registered some of the images. Why does it have to be all images from a shoot? If you are the only one with the raw files and the other party only has a jpeg copy, ownership should be easy to prove.

It's really been a long time since I looked up copyright laws for here in Canada and for the US, so I forget. In Canada, suing for damages isn't very easy nor worthwhile in the long run, in my opinion. The legal fees would likely eat up most of what was awarded. Even suing for injuries in Canada doesn't get you much. I've only had a couple instances to sue and I didn't get as much as I had hoped and the time invested in these cases didn't make the award from the case seem worthwhile.

I think when someone is profiting from your image is a good time to sue more than simply copying it and putting it on their blog as an example. I haven't had some resell my image, but I'd be curious to find out what I can get out that kind of lawsuit.

You are not even ALLOWED to sue unless the image at issue is REGISTERED. And without TIMELY registration you are denied statutory damages and attorney fees. ownership is seldom an issue, and no, you CANNOT sue over a 'similar' image to the infringed image.

Eagle Rock Photographer wrote:
...and no, you CANNOT sue over a 'similar' image to the infringed image.

Can you please inform the courts about this?
https://www.pixsy.com/10-cases-that-sho … really-is/

#1 Copyright can also protect the look and feel of a photo.
Fred Mannion garnett photoFred Mannion v Coors

Summary:
Jonathon Mannion photographed an iconic image of basketball player Kevin Garnett for SLAM magazine. The beer brand Coors recreated the photo for an LA billboard advertisement.

Outcome:
The court found that the (1) rendition, (2) timing, and (3) creation of the subject can influence the copyrightability of a photograph, and ruled in favour of the photographer.

His victory was very significant. Copyright cases like these value the look and feel of a photo, and as Mannion said in a 2013 interview, photographers now have a foot to stand on when others change their images for commercial gain.

We highly recommend reading Steve Ayr’s article, which explains the principles of originality, rendition and subject creation outlined by this case.