Quote:
Originally Posted by stickyfingerz
So are you saying that playboy doesnt have the right to retouch and use photos that they paid their photographer to take? lol Whole different deal there bubba. If I pay a contractor to build me a house do I have to get his permission when I decide to redecorate?
Its the other way around if I pay a photographer to take pictures FOR me then the only way he has explicit rights is if I sign a photo release giving him those rights.
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I'm assuming we're talking about USA laws. Playboy own the images because the photographer is an employee, and reassignment would be mentioned in his contract. For an individual photographer, they own the copyright by default unless they
explicitly transfer it. When you pay a guy to take photos at your wedding he is not an employee... you're a client.
http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-fairuse.html
"
In the case of photographs, it is sometimes difficult to determine who owns the copyright and there may be little or no information about the owner on individual copies. Ownership of a ?copy? of a photograph ? the tangible embodiment of the ?work? ? is distinct from the ?work? itself ? the intangible intellectual property. The owner of the ?work? is generally the photographer or, in certain situations, the employer of the photographer. Even if a person hires a photographer to take pictures of a wedding, for example, the photographer will own the copyright in the photographs unless the copyright in the photographs is transferred, in writing and signed by the copyright owner, to another person. The subject of the photograph generally has nothing to do with the ownership of the copyright in the photograph. If the photographer is no longer living, the rights in the photograph are determined by the photographer?s will or passed as personal property by the applicable laws of intestate succession."