Copyright with Film and Digital images

Frost

Now, there is no difference between the copyright of film still pictures and digital still pictures to the owner. Once you click the shutter and capture the image it is a "creative" element, and whether it has any value, is only up to it's "owner" and marketing.

As I understand from looking at some other threads about "copyright" on this forum during a search, it is the property of the owner of the original image, and his say or lack thereof. Unlike trademarks, which can more readily be defended, a copyright is not defended until it has incurred potential loss to the owner. Example: I take a picture of a "Prairie Dog" (which I did) and post it on the web, and someone right clicks and copies it to their desktop to use as a background or to show to someone who likes Prairie Dogs, the actually loss of revenue is not something the courts would find "substantiating". I may NOT want others to use it on their desktop, but it is up to me to ask that this not happen. It is up to me to sue anyone who violates my wishes. But in suing, there is always the basis of value, and not vengeance, so courts look dimly at someone just suing another just to be vindictive with no visible monetary loss involved.

However, I post the picture on the web and a post card company copies it to their hard drive, and mass produce thousands of post cards and start selling them throughout America to anyone that likes this picture of the Prairie Dog, even to add text to it to 'appeal' to others. Now this is a clear copyright infringement, and since there was mass marketing and selling there was also money lost to the owner of the copyright, so courts would strongly favor the owner in this case.

Now for the title of my "reply". With my film cameras I have the original negative, whether it is 35mm or 4" X 5" or the 6cm X 7cm negative, it is always here in my possession. If I ever went to court to sue someone over using one of my film images without permission and with monetary loss to me, I would have the original negative to help the court decide WHO was the original owner of the image. Digital is different. Because it is an image embedded with info, that info can be erased and changed by knowledgeable computer users. HOW does one manage to safeguard and prove, in the future, that the image you took was really YOUR image and you were the original creator of that image in the digital world?

I hope this is a good place to post this, if not feel free to move to another area.:):

wxwax

Just make sure the prairie dog signs a release, before you sell that image.

Sam

I can't answer all your questons, with regard to what EXIF data can, and can not be changed, but since I shoot in RAW 99% of the time, I have the digital negitive which can not be altered, and the copyright infringer would not have.

Sam

Nikolai

Shoot RAW

Sam wrote:

I can't answer all your questons, with regard to what EXIF data can, and can not be changed, but since I shoot in RAW 99% of the time, I have the digital negitive which can not be altered, and the copyright infringer would not have.

Sam

A Sam said, once you get RAW, it's pretty much your negative. I'm not saying it's impossible to fake, but it's a darn hard task to go over one shot of a prairie dog.. You'll pay way more to a hacker/programmer to hack the RAW of this picture than you pay to Marc Muench to take a much better picture for you and grant you all the necessary rights And since RAW files never hit the 'net, you're pretty much safe from the physical copying stand point.
If you want to go really serious about it (again, hopefully not over this particular picture) - some manufacturers (Canon, to name one) sell "data verification kits" that can essentially prove in the court of law that a particular image did (or did not) come from a particular camera.

Frost

Copyright become the biggest issue when someone uses it against your wishes when you wish to gain money from it. No one is too interested in pictures posted of your "Uncle Joe" aside from their artistic or for critique purposes. The prairie dog picture used on someones desktop as wall paper is of no concern. What is concern is if I am thinking of promoting this picture to a card company or to a print shop for sale and someone grabs it and floods the market or make money off my endeavors and talents. It is flattery that one would think highly enough of your work to copy and run with it, but flattery don't bring in too much revenue .

With Negatives, even digital negatives, as you have pointed out, there is some fall back. I think in a court of law physical negatives of the original would weigh a lot more than digital negatives. Even if you have the digital negative of this Prairie Dog how could you prove that YOU are the originator and not the person making money (stealing) the image? He could claim that the subject (this case the Prairie Dog) frequently was seen on this log and he stood in similar proximity and snapped the picture. Prove to court he didn't!

One tidbit of advice on protection, and I think this would go a long way if you ever had to PROVE in a court that you are the rightful owner or "copyright" holder of a picture.... take several pics. I did and even though I only selected one picture I kept the other. I could have easily deleted them in favor of just keeping the best. However, if ever needed I can print not only the one in question (which you see here) but several others of the same Prairie Dog and similar and dis-similar angle and exposures. Almost like a fingerprint, all things will "match up"

Nikolai

Vern,
With photoshop (or a similarly powerful image editing software) anyone can take your picture of the prarie dog (or Uncle Joe, or Madonna, etc.) that you posted here (or anywhere else) and mangle it in a way that even you would not be able to say that it was yours in the first place.
As an example, this is what you get after only 5 lazy/lame minutes in CS2:



No copyright, the rodent is lower and leaner... I could easily replace the backroung, but was not going to waste too much time on it...

However, since you only post low res, I highly doubt anyone will be seriosly thinking even of making the post cards out of it.. Stamps, maybe..

In any case - RAW can play the same role as the film negative.
However, once you post a picture on a public forum, there is no way you can guarantee that someone would not "steal it and run with it"...

C'est la vie..

Angelo

Sam wrote:

I can't answer all your questons, with regard to what EXIF data can, and can not be changed, but since I shoot in RAW 99% of the time, I have the digital negitive which can not be altered, and the copyright infringer would not have.

Sam

and this has been covered before.

only one person can have a RAW file and that's the original photographer.

has anyone advised about the quality of the images you post. They should be of the lowest pixel count to deter anyone from wanting to waste time trying to enhance them in PS and most of all why aren't you engaging right-click protection on your images?

Frost

Dates and time
Well, one nice thing about posting to a forum like this, is there is a permanent record as to Date and Time. The Date I posted is clearly on the first post including the imgage. Anyone grabbing the image and even manipulating it in Photoshop (or other) and then selling same will leave behind a paper trail of date and time. So, in once sense, a low resolution of the picture is kind of a benefit.

Many thanks for all the input!

Nikolai

Oh, Vern, come on...

Frost wrote:

Well, one nice thing about posting to a forum like this, is there is a permanent record as to Date and Time. The Date I posted is clearly on the first post including the imgage. Anyone grabbing the image and even manipulating it in Photoshop (or other) and then selling same will leave behind a paper trail of date and time.

If I can mangle the image, I can sure as hell adjust all the timestamps, both on file AND in the EXIF...:):

PS. Did I say I like your avatar?

Frost

Nikolai wrote:

If I can mangle the image, I can sure as hell adjust all the timestamps, both on file AND in the EXIF...:):

PS. Did I say I like your avatar?

Thanks! (avatar)

I know you can change the exif info, pretty easy with even stuff like Opanda editor and others. What I was referring to is something you cannot change so easily. Take a look at the very first posting, where I posted the picture originally. July 1, 2006 at 04:54 P.M. Change that.

Lets just say today you right clicked and copied the picture and did away with the exif and copyright info. You contact a "nature" postcard company and they really like "your" prairie dog picture, and print it out on several cards. 2 months from now I see the card in a shop. I call the company, and explain they bought it from you. So I sue both you and them. What is my best course of action? How can I prove first ownership? What about the date and time stamp of this forum thread? What if I "print screened" the date and time part and printed it for the judge. And, along with all the other images I have of the aforementioned prairie dog, I might have some swing with evidence.

That was the date/time I was referring to. Even those that posted just after me could email me with written affirmations that I posted it at this time and date.

Nikolai

Vern,

Frost wrote:

I know you can change the exif info, pretty easy with even stuff like Opanda editor and others. What I was referring to is something you cannot change so easily. Take a look at the very first posting, where I posted the picture originally. July 1, 2006 at 04:54 P.M. Change that.

Why would I? "My" prarie dog (which I heartlessly stolen and ruthlessly and heavily edited:-) is so different from yours that no one will be able to recognize the origin...

Frost wrote:

Lets just say today you right clicked and copied the picture and did away with the exif and copyright info. You contact a "nature" postcard company and they really like "your" prairie dog picture, and print it out on several cards. 2 months from now I see the card in a shop. I call the company, and explain they bought it from you. So I sue both you and them. What is my best course of action? How can I prove first ownership? What about the date and time stamp of this forum thread? What if I "print screened" the date and time part and printed it for the judge. And, along with all the other images I have of the aforementioned prairie dog, I might have some swing with evidence.

That was the date/time I was referring to. Even those that posted just after me could email me with written affirmations that I posted it at this time and date.

Yes, this *may* work only if the thief was stupid enough and did not edit your image. However, my point is that it's extremely easy to modify any image to a degree even its original author (you, in this case) would not be honestly tell it was taken by him. No alerts, no worries, no lawsuites.. And even if there are - well, if the pictures are quite different no judge will take the case, especially over a postcard...

I guess my only other point is "do not put the images on the publicly accessible sites if you don't want them to be stolen".

Cheers!

Frost

Nikolai wrote:

I guess my only other point is "do not put the images on the publicly accessible sites if you don't want them to be stolen".

Cheers!

Good point! Touché

Angelica Jackson

Copyright registration
I'm not a lawyer, but here is what I have found out about copyright: You can register your copyright on visual images, whether they are digital or film source, through the U.S. Copyright Office. What a lot of people miss out on is that you don't need to register each image singly (at $45 each)--- you can register as a "Collected Works."
I have done this twice, always with a physical deposit. What I do if they are digital source is print them out as indexes on photo paper, and if they are film source I scan the index provided by the lab so that I can print it out slightly larger. Keep in mind that the images you submit only need to be identifiable/provable, not something that is gallery-quality.
I also include a Table of Contents that identifies the date, place, and any other important details for each roll of film or group of photos. The Table of Contents is included so that it will be easy for the copyright office to find an individual image if it ever becomes necessary. Since each of my deposits has at least 1200 images, this seems to be a good compromise on the time it takes to prepare.
Last year I had gotten a letter from the copyright office saying they had lost my deposit and I would need to send another but luckily they did find it.

cambler

The last response is the key. Register your works. It not only proves ownership, but it is a requirement for automatic statutory damages.

This is not legal advice, and I am not Denny Crane - as much as I'd like to be.