PhotoShop Practice 3

pathfinder · August 30, 2007

John, is this YOUR image you are editing, or did you steal it off the web somewhere? "Found it random surfing" makes me think it is not yours.

If it is not your property, do you have permission to edit it? If you do not have permission, I strongly suggest you take it down before I have to.

It is considered courteous to ask permission to edit someone else's creative work.

dmmattix · August 31, 2007

That brings up a question

pathfinder wrote:

If it is not your property, do you have permission to edit it? If you do not have permission, I strongly suggest you take it down before I have to.

It is considered courteous to ask permission to edit someone else's creative work.

I have a photo of Sapulpa, OK in 1896. It was sent to the library in Sapulpa where my wife works by a woman in Missouri who found it in her attic after she moved into a house. I have scanned it and attempted to restore it. The literal interpretation of your statement is that I would have to get the permission of the creator of the image (probably long since dead) or his/her descendants to post the picture in my gallery particularly when the image creator is unknown. Is that correct? No problem but I just want to be clear on this subject. Since as you posted in another post to John " Dgrinners take intellectual property rights very seriously here".

Regards,

Mike

mwgrice · August 31, 2007

Although I am not a lawyer and you shouln't take this as legal advice, etc., etc., the copyright for a photo taken in 1896 has probably long since expired.

For instance, see the wikipedia article on copyright. "In the United States, all books and other works published before 1923 have expired copyrights and are in the public domain."

The heirs of whoever took that photo may still go after you, but they probably don't have much of a case.

zacker · August 31, 2007

I dont think the owner of that piece will come knocking on Dgrinns door asking for it to be taken down... and as long as you make it clear as to who, what ,where, when and why... you shouyld be fine.

pathfinder · August 31, 2007

dmmattix wrote:

I have a photo of Sapulpa, OK in 1896. It was sent to the library in Sapulpa where my wife works by a woman in Missouri who found it in her attic after she moved into a house. I have scanned it and attempted to restore it. The literal interpretation of your statement is that I would have to get the permission of the creator of the image (probably long since dead) or his/her descendants to post the picture in my gallery particularly when the image creator is unknown. Is that correct? No problem but I just want to be clear on this subject. Since as you posted in another post to John " Dgrinners take intellectual property rights very seriously here".

Regards,

Mike

Mike, I am not an intellectual property rights attorney so anything I say here is probably only vaugely correct.

Technically, you are probably corrrect that if you wish to sell that image for commercial use, you should have a legal means of demonstating ownership with a release by the family owners still alive. Obviously this is not usually possible to do.

If you wish to edit images like that here, I don't think anyone will raise a fuss, but if you download images from someone's current website and then begin editing them here, that will not be well received. Most old images like you describe from the turn of the previous century, are frequently assumed to belong to the possessor, unless there is reason to think otherwise. But to sell images like that, you would need to be more careful.

I am not trying to inhibit creativity here - if you edit an image in the privacy of your own computer, that is entirely between you and your creator. Here on dgrin, we prefer that you own images that you edit, unless you are invited to edit by the owners, as frequently occurs here or the WHipping Post etc.

For instance, I do not scan images or photo from published books that I own, and then bring them here to display editing techniques. I prefer to use my own images as the rights clearly belong to me and I cannot be faulted for displaying and altering them.

As a website devoted to artists and their creative works - digital photographs - Dgrin feels especially sensitive to anyone's usurping intellectual property rights pertaining to digital images.

dmmattix · August 31, 2007

No problem, it will not go up.
Just attempting to be clear.

Mike

PhotoShop Practice 3

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