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Pricing to reproduce photo into painting.
cdonovan
Registered Users Posts: 724 Major grins
Hi All,
Have been asked, and have always denied permission to painters when they have asked to reproduce my pictures through painting. Different reasons for the denial, with some, it is based on the quality of work they produce, others, it has been the particular picture they are asking to reproduce.
I have found some photos online that were done without permission and the painter has claimed ignorance, they didn't realize that it was my photo, etc, a number of different excuses. I haven't had a policy or pricing in place, mainly because I'm really not interested in having them reproduced, however, I'm thinking differently about it now. I think that if I had pricing in place, that it would deter them altogether, and then also allow me to collect easier when I do find a violation.
My mindset is telling me that I should have a basic license fee, one that allows them to paint it, and then should also have a percentage of the final sale, if they do sell the piece.
Is this fair? Do you have something in place already? What do you find works?
Thanks in Advance.:D
Have been asked, and have always denied permission to painters when they have asked to reproduce my pictures through painting. Different reasons for the denial, with some, it is based on the quality of work they produce, others, it has been the particular picture they are asking to reproduce.
I have found some photos online that were done without permission and the painter has claimed ignorance, they didn't realize that it was my photo, etc, a number of different excuses. I haven't had a policy or pricing in place, mainly because I'm really not interested in having them reproduced, however, I'm thinking differently about it now. I think that if I had pricing in place, that it would deter them altogether, and then also allow me to collect easier when I do find a violation.
My mindset is telling me that I should have a basic license fee, one that allows them to paint it, and then should also have a percentage of the final sale, if they do sell the piece.
Is this fair? Do you have something in place already? What do you find works?
Thanks in Advance.:D
0
Comments
How will know when they sell a piece and how much they sold it for?
Website
In all honesty, I hope the pricing does nothing but discourage the question altogether!!
Really the only way a contract will help is if they are LOCAL and you can keep up with their inventory.....I would offer a 1 time use non exclusive license fee for them to paint and sell the image......of $1 or 2K....make it high enough that they have to sell really high also....but you still need to see if they are painting more than 1 and selling many copies....so to discourage them place the fee up at around 4 or 5K........you can always use photoshop and plug ins to make great looking inkjet paintings (Giclee )
Good Luck
Is it something unique that there has never been a pic or another painting anything like it ever before?
I have had a couple of painters want to use my pics for inspiration and always been quite flattered to be asked and I have always given permission for happily. I didn't know who any of them were but one guy was quite famous for his work in art circles and must have insisted that I be given credit for the original because every story and article I saw on it had my name as well.
Personaly I think it would be pretty selfish and self important to deny a fellow artist permission. There isn't a shooter alive, especially those that do weddings, that haven't looked at someone elses work at some stage and tried to emulate it. Brides bring in cutouts from magazines and say to shooters "this is what I want" and they do their best to re-create it.
How is that any different to a painter using a pic for inspiration?
With painting a pic, exactly how do you determine that the pic is a rip off of your photo in the first place ( unless it's admitted) especially if it is of a landscape, an animal, a building or anything else that is all around us and can look the same from one to the other. Of course then you have the painters own interpretation going into it which is going to add creative differences to the painting anyway.
Protecting ones work is all well and good but I think there is a very definate line between that and just being too uptight and full of ones self for one's own good. To me a painting is another persons work and I find it hard to see how a shooter could get a pic that couldn't be envisoned in a painters mind anyway or there isn't 100 other pics around that could be seen as the basis for inspiration for a painting anyway.
And of course, if you going to try and get money from a painter from what you saw, whats to say the owner of the thing you photograhed in the first place isn't due their cut of your work?
Going by this, every time we shoot the scenic wharf and rowboat by the lake the owner will want a cut if we use the pic in the gallery on our website, If we shoot fireworks at a celebration the person putting them on and the people that made the fire works will have their hand out.... and so it goes.
I think as artists we are better off helping one another than trying to screw one another over for every last penny.
Anyone wants to paint one of my pics, go ahead!
I'm honoured.
I'd just like to see the end result to see what you did with it and so I can say someone thought enough of this that they were inspired enough to recreate it with thier own vision.
We will either sell them the print or receive a painting for payment and either way we are always happy. The painters that we have dealt with are not making exact copies and definitely are not competing with us for our clients.
Website
A painter friend of mine and I are collaborating on a project similar to this.
He has described a kind of scene and mood that he would like to paint, and my job is to capture that scene and mood in a photograph. I'm free to do this however I like, but he gets to decide when I've gotten the "right" picture or set of pictures that capture what he has in his mind, and would like to paint.
We agreed ahead of time that we would sell the painting(s) and photograph(s) as a set, and split the money evenly.
It's kind of a fun, experimental art project-who knows if we will ever complete it and/or sell anything, but it's food for thought.
I should mention, he is a professional painter who has sold many of his artworks and often is commissioned to do specific kinds of paintings. I am an amateur photographer and I have never (yet!) sold anything, or tried to. Given the difference in our artistic careers, I feel that splitting the money evenly is more than generous. I guess that's an advantage of doing business with a good friend.
Typically, it has been a one time deal, paint it once and move onto the next. The typical price point that they go for is no where near those prices, so I will adjust them... slightly, but that is exactly my thought about the ps rendering. This is a local artist, in a small community so it doesn't take long for info to trickle in, should numerous copies be sold, & or at different price points.
Thank you for the input!
I imagine you have your reasons. If you don't want them to paint your photos just tell them no.
There are a zillion photos on the internet they could be painting instead.
The ones that contact you to ask permission are being very responsible about it.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/21695902@N06/
http://500px.com/Shockey
alloutdoor.smugmug.com
http://aoboudoirboise.smugmug.com/
I have to say, this is what initally struck me. I was surprised they even bothered to ask!
Seeing the end result and with no insult to the painters work, their interpretation looked like it could have been inspired by a million other pics and I could have looked at the work all day and never dawned it was inspired by one of my pics.
A painting is a very different thing to a Photograph.
To me , It woud just be mean spirited, petty and egotistical not to say yes to someone who took the time to ask and chances are, you'd never know what the original inspiration was anyway.
Putting the shoe on the other foot, if I was blessed witht he talent to be able to paint anything other than a Picket fence half decently and some shooter came at me bellyaching about using copying their pic, I'd tell them to take a long walk off a short plank.
Wether their pic was the inspiration for the idea and the transaltion I came up with as a painter which was the end product, I'd deny it and let them try and do something about it. Anyone that would whine and whinge about their copyright being infringed or whatever because someone supposedly painted one of their pics, really has missed the point anyway and is focusing thier time and efforts on unproductive things.
A good point already mentioned is that the painters aren't competeing with our market or taking money from our pockets so good luck to them I say.
Of course in the end, I think I have furthered my own adgenda's and reputation a lot further by allowing the painters to do their thing and be thought of as a good guy than being seen as a tight butted, self important pratt.
I have recieved a couple of referals from painters whom used my pics ( supposedly :0) ) and had clients come to them for something similar. the painters thought that Photographs would be better for what the client wanted and refered them to me whom both booked and traveled from interstate for me to shoot them.
Might have only been 2 jobs, but it was 2 well paying jobs I would have never done had I not allowed the painters to use my pics for inspiration.
self important
too uptight
too full of ones self for one's own good.
mean spirited
petty
egotistical
tight butted
self important pratt.
Really Feeling the Love, :saurora
You've outdone yourself. :encore
as an aside, moderators, why don't we have an avatar warning not to feed the trolls? I can find Harry feeding his birds, but nothing for the trolls.