Licensing 101

All images created by a photographer are copyrighted. In order to legally share images with another party these images need to have a license issued by the creator ( Photographer).There are two ways to legally license a photograph for 3rd party usage. The most common way is to commission a commercial photographer to create images for the client. After the project is complete the photographer will then issue a license that contains the agreement of what the client can and can not do with the images. The second way is to purchase images from a Photography Stock Agency.

25  Terms you will find in a Photography License:

1. Who are you giving rights to.

2. What Specific rights are being granted

3. Print/Social Media usage

4. How long the client can use the images for

5. Will the rights be exclusive

6. In what market/Industry can the images be used for

7. What Countries are allowed

8. Flat Fee or Royalties paid for each time an image is used

9. When payment is due

10. Photo credit

11. Copyright Notice

12. Will client be able to alter images and what alterations are allowed

13. Work for Hire or Commission

14. Usage of images not allowed until payment has been made.

15. The License Fee is the amount charged by the licensor( Photographer) to the licensee ( Client) in exchange for rights to use copyrighted images.

16. The Creative Fee: covers the photographer’s time, travel, all overhead related to the project, Assistants fees, modeling fees, equipment rental for the project, post-production, digital storage. This is a fixed cost

17. Non-exclusive license: allows the photographer (licensor) to sell images from a project to multiple users.

18. An exclusive license: limits the clients use of the licensed images as well as the ability of the

photographer to license the created work to other parties.

19. Named Images: Clients are not allowed to keep and use unselected images.

20.  Usage Rights: Are the terms of the lease.

21. Constraints: Once time period ends the clients needs to repurchase a license in order to continue to legally continue to use the images.

22. It is important to remember that the client paying for the license does not have the right to use licensed images beyond the scope of the agreement.

23.  Stock Photography: The second way to legally obtain a copyrighted images is through stock photography. These are images already created and available for purchase. The Stock agencies license the photos they own through work for hire agreements they have created with their photographers.

24. Work For Hire: Is commonly used for newspaper/magazine photographers and stock photographers. The photographer is hired by the company as an employee and the company retains the copyright to the images not the photographer who created the images. Many companies will try to use Work for Hire to get around paying for licensing and copyrights.

25. One Time use Rights. A licensee may purchase a photograph to be used for one time use only. The licensee will not be able to use the image for any extended amount of time.

Images for license falls into 3 distinct categories:

Commercial: images are used to promote products and or services. Examples: websites, pr, ads, brochures, annual reports, product packaging, Business to Business.

Editorial: images used for journals or educational. Examples include: magazines, newspapers,online news sources.

Retail: Photography purchased for personal usage. Examples: weddings, family portraits.