Appeals Court Confirms Photographer's Rights in Case

[Jeff Mottle]

While not specifically Arch Viz related, I thought the copyright content of the article applied and was interesting.

 

 

http://www.imaginginfo.com/web/online/News/Appeals-Court-Confirms-Photographers-Rights-in-Case/3$2646

[Ernest Burden III]

Thanks, Jeff.

 

There is a specific section of US copyright law devoted to 'collaborative works', and it sounds like K2 tried to pretend THEY were artists by creating a collaborative work. And then used their new status as 'creators' to try to deny someone else their rights under existing agreements.

 

Bastards.

 

There is no functional difference between a photograph and a CG rendering. So this does apply to us, at least in the United States.

 

Ah, but there is this:

 

K2, however, showed that the copyrights for most of the images had not been registered with the Copyright Office before the infringement, which limited the damages Jarvis could receive.

 

You see, copyright is inherent in the act of creation. Exposed but undeveloped film is NOT copyrighted, but negatives are. Why? Tangible images. You don't have to register your work to own the copyright, it just has to be in a tangible form. So a rendering, in the form of a standard image file, is automatically copyrighted as soon as it exists. BUT...

 

BUT

 

BUT!

 

You have to register your work with the US copyright office to be able to recover DAMAGES in court. Yes, you can fight a case and win to get a company to stop infringing on your work (for example a software company using your rendering to advertise their product without your permission) but that's it. And you'll be payin' all the lawyers out of your pocket. If you want to be able to get real damages, including having your legal costs, you must register your work BEFORE the infringement. BEFORE.

 

The US copyright office allows for bulk registrations. You send them a pile of prints, or slides, or maybe (I'm not sure of this one) just a CD with images, pay a small fee, and you're good. You could do it once a year. But you have to do it. Have I done it? No. Never. Why? Because I'm an idiot.

 

 

Jeff--I've always wanted to create a company, or service under a company or organization (like NYSR or CGarchitect.com or VisMasters) that helped artists register their work with their country's copyright office. In the US the Graphic Artist's Guild will do this, but only if you're smart enough to take advantage of the option. Maybe it's time to help the arch-vis community get smart in this area (for a small fee). There's a lot of money floating around this industry and our work is an important part of the process of getting architectural projects get realized.

[gfa2]

Good info...interesting read. thanks guys.