Photographing People in Public

[valerostudio]

I am going through my 'People' folder and I see that a lot of these cropped images of people seem to be taken in public, with the person unknowing. Is this legal? Can you really take a picture of someone in public, cut it out, and then use it? Can that person sue you?

[Chris MacDonald]

It's a bit of a grey area, I think. Certainly it isn't illegal to go to a public place and photograph people; however I'm sure there is much ambiguity over whether or not you can use that person in an image without their permission.

This is UK specific, though I find it hard to believe that the US laws on the same thing would differ too greatly: http://www.urban75.org/photos/photog...-shooting.html

[Corey Beaulieu]

I read a few site because I was curious myself and I can sum it as this: Take pictures all you want in public, but you cannot use them for commercial purposes, which is to say advertising. And my impression of the industry is that it is, among a great many other things, advertising. This would not be legal without written consent.

http://www.bobatkins.com/photography...aw_rights.html

This site was the clearest.

[Scott Schroeder]

Unless those people signed consent forms. It's no different than reality shows that shoot in public locations. The non-blurred people have signed consent forms or have some form of consent, ie showing up to a place where filming is taking place. I would have to guess that if you got these people from a semi legit site that they have consent. I don't know, maybe not.

It's easier to shoot from behind so there is no face, then no one can come back to you.

[Eric Mehl]

I've seen some references that that add the stipulation that someone is "recognizable" before they have a legitimate complaint if you are using their image. That's pretty fuzzy though, I think a picture of myself would have to be very obscured before I wouldn't recognize it as me.

edit: saw Scott's post before I got mine finished, I've seen conflicting advice on the photographing but not including a face, I think some people have won cases where they were able to claim they were still recognizable from behind, but that's part of what I mean by fuzzy - there's no definite line.

But you can always try and get the subject to sign a model release if you are shooting your own photos. asmp.org, Getty Images and probably others have templates. There are a couple of apps in the Apple app store that look really handy, but I haven't tried any.

[george sandoval]

What are the odds that someone is going to recognize themselves in an architectural rendering??? Most figures are small and it's not like it's going to be displayed on the times square electronic billboard. And most people wouldn't care. And if someone did complain you can apologize and remove them.

[Steve Shaw]

I've seen some references that that add the stipulation that someone is "recognizable" before they have a legitimate complaint if you are using their image.

This is true. There was a case recently where a woman was recognizable from behind due to a unique tattoo. I believe she won.

[Scott Schroeder]

What are the odds that someone is going to recognize themselves in an architectural rendering??? Most figures are small and it's not like it's going to be displayed on the times square electronic billboard. And most people wouldn't care. And if someone did complain you can apologize and remove them.

In my many years in this industry I have learned a few things. One of them is that you never know who is going to see your image and where they are going to see it. Life has also taught me that most people are sue happy so you'll get a complaint from their lawyer.

[Adrien Binet]

I was at a bar/restaurant once when they were filming a bit for TV show on HGTV here in the U.S. I believe it was House Hunters. They did not ask anyone in the place if it was ok to have them on film, including myself.

Just a little personal experience. Probably irrelevant but thought I would share anyway.

[valerostudio]

As I look through my libraries of clip map people that I bought commercially, these people look like they were photographed while walking around. I find it hard to believe each one was asked to sign their rights away to their photo and they were ok with it. This is especially clear in my 'beach' collection where it looks like these people were shot with a telephoto lens and had no idea they were being photographed. I doubt that the company that sells these take any of the responsibility if someone saw their photo and sued you for using it in a rendering that ended up on a billboard or something like that.