Photos taken for fun used by manufacturer without permission, what to do?

Steeps

Steeps

Steeps

Soldato
Joined
8 Nov 2003
Posts
5,612
Location
Bedfordshire
I am a member of a car forum which is quite new to the scene but has a few experienced members, as an owner and I enjoy karting I quite often go to organized meets. Car photography isn't something I've really done before so I took a few shots to post on the forum. All images were watermarked with my name. A few members asked if they could upload the photos to social media which I didn't have a problem with as long as the watermark stayed and no commercial use.

A few days later I get a message from the event organizer saying that the manufacturer of the car wants to publish a blog on the event and use my photos (without watermarks) for a credit, no cash available. I go to the blog to see what formats they want to find the blog is already published, 7 of the 8 photos are mine, all with 1/6th of the bottom of the image cropped to remove my watermark, with a small credit under the one photo I didn't take. The same images have been re-tweeted, facebooked etc by other people doing PR for the car manufacturer.

While it's nice to have work out there, the event was organized by volunteers and supported/prizes given by sponsors and suppliers who were very generous. The manufacturer was asked if they wanted to be involved but we were basically blanked by them. As the event was a success, suddenly the PR has taken off and they're almost claiming it as their own.

100's of photos were taken at the event and posted online, if I start getting shirty they could just pull my images and use others, but 7 out of 8 were from my shots (the 8th was a group shot which I was in, no tripod with timer so I didn't take one)

In this situation what would be best? I didn't go to the event with an intention of making money, I went to support the group and to show photos of their cars as that was what the meet was about. The manufacturer gave nothing to the group unlike other suppliers and is running it through their own marketing channels with photos they edited and didn't have permission to use. They did talk about possibly supporting future events but as they never responded to the original requests and are dragging their heels with the next one, I don't know if I should chance invoicing them (if I get paid, the money would be going back into the group as prizes/support for a future meet.)
 
seek legal advice immediately , take screenshots as evidence, and take them to court, its wrong of them to do this, its like me stealing a Picasso painting, then cutting off his name and saying i drew/painted it, best bet is to have some sort of legal person investigate this
 
Ask yourself what do you want to get out of this, what's your best case scenario?

If its money, contact them and explain they have knowingly infringed your copyright (the removal of your watermark demonstrates this) and they have two choices. Remove the offending photos or ask for their accounts contact so you can invoice them for licensing your work.

If you just want credit do the above but the latter option would be restore your original work including watermark with a link to your website / contact details. Or supply new images which include these details.

Seeking redress through the courts or a solicitor would likely cost your far more than you'll actually gain so an unlikely option.
 
I presume this is an official blog? If so take some screenshots (for your own reference) and then send them an invoice for use of your photos. Unauthorised use is normally charged at double/triple the "going" rate. It's a manufacturer, not a charity or non profit making organisation.

For the amount on the invoice you will have to ask others, however I don't think something like £100 a photo (after the unauthorised use is take into account) would be unrealistic, especially if they are being used as promotional material elsewhere. The fact they cropped the watermark off is pretty damning in itself...

You don't need to get in contact with the manufacturer beforehand. Remember, if they had hired a professional to take the photos they would have spent hundreds...
 
Amp34 said:
I presume this is an official blog? If so take some screenshots (for your own reference) and then send them an invoice for use of your photos. Unauthorised use is normally charged at double/triple the "going" rate. It's a manufacturer, not a charity or non profit making organisation.

For the amount on the invoice you will have to ask others, however I don't think something like £100 a photo (after the unauthorised use is take into account) would be unrealistic, especially if they are being used as promotional material elsewhere. The fact they cropped the watermark off is pretty damning in itself...

You don't need to get in contact with the manufacturer beforehand. Remember, if they had hired a professional to take the photos they would have spent hundreds...
Click to expand...

What he said. If they won't pay up then there is a fairly well established small claims court procedure for exactly this sort of situation, but you need to have made reasonable attempts to resolve the situation yourself first - https://www.moneyclaim.gov.uk/web/mcol/welcome

A good real-life example of the process is here - http://www.wildlifephotography.tv/copyright-infringement-small-claims/

And there's in depth legal advice and template letters for formal correspondence here - http://www.epuk.org/Opinion/994/stolen-photographs-what-to-do?pg=7
 
Last edited:
I have taken screenshots of all the content, all the T+C's on the site, exif data of photos on the site... it's a shame I didn't host the pictures on my other server because it would have even shown what time they were taken too.

The person who runs the blog is a freelance photojournalist who works for the manufacturer 3 days a week. I have all communication from between the event organizer and the blogger, he was seeking permission in exchange for credit but posted the blog before getting it. I probably would have given it in exchange for a bit of group support but cropping my images is what's annoyed me more than anything.

As he's freelance, he could quite easily have discussed this with the manufacturer and covered the event for them while being paid his usual day rate, so ideally this is the amount I need to work out to invoice. I know my company would happily invoice at £450 for a standard full day + mileage, but as I've never worked for myself and didn't really want to register as self employed this could cause complications.

All I really want is for the manufacturer to be supportive of the group, offer events, trackdays, prizes for karting, pretty much what all the other suppliers and sponsors do for the group. More than happy to provide them with photos and coverage for their media if they helped support the event, which in this case they did not.
 
Don't think screenshots would be legally accepted as any kind of evidence, it's trivial to fabricate screenshots of any web page by altering the html code or manipulating them in Photoshop.
 
Contact them and ask for a fee per photo as they haven't asked permission. If they say no, send them an invoice. If they don't pay it, then contact a solicitor and add that cost to the invoice.

Or

Contact them and demand they either remove the images or add full credit to the imaged with links to any site you have, or just your name.

It all depends what you want out of it. I had this happen to me recently with a music event. They claimed they had no money as it was a charity event but it turned out it was an event that had a charity event amongst their grounds. They basically took my photos and used them to promote the event without asking my mate that they took them from (his bands page) who obviously wouldn't have given permission as they were my photos. As the band were playing free for charity I decided to ask for a credit, which they said they'd do. My mate told me they'd done it and after the event all they'd done is written my name in a post under a comment section on facebook, not linked to anything at all and no one could see it.

These days I'd be inclined to go straight for an invoice as I'm done with people taking the p***.
 
I am very tempted to go straight to invoice, the manufacturer were a complete pain when I was buying the car so to "get one back" so to speak would feel great.

I'm struggling how I can prove it without the screenshot logs of the site, links to social media etc as they could quite easily go through and remove the content and deny it. The only proof I would have then is from the car club site where links to the blog are, re-tweets by members and in-site messages discussing the use of images between myself and the event organizer.

In terms of cost, it would be reasonable to assume they would have paid someone at least half a day (+ traveling expenses) to cover the event to select from a choice of photos, then I should add a cost for commercial rights for site and social media use (basically the unauthorized cost) added on top.

Will look into going down the self employed route as if I am going to bill them I better have everything else sorted. I don't even have a proper site as there was never any intention to do this for money.

Thanks for the advice so far :)
 
Well invoicing really does work (so far). Just had an email to say they will be paying the quoted amount. I wasn't too extreme with the figure like some other photographers had suggested, but it was still high enough to make anyone think twice about doing it again. Think they're a bit sour about it though because the blog post has disappeared.
 
What apparently is the done thing is to send an invoice, I think the standard press amount is £40 per photo last time I checked. Then you add triple that as a post-permission admin fee. You send the invoice, and if it's not payed, you go to the small claims court and send in the Sheriffs to get their goods or money owed.
 
Quite surprised how quickly it was settled. My side is happy, not sure how they feel about it as communication doesn't seem to be a strong point for a social media outlet.

These were some of the images from the event, so some of these may or may not have been used. I wasn't quite "with it" when taking the photos due to illness so I was happy with what I had taken when looking through the next day.

gt09_001.jpg


gt09_002.jpg


gt09_008.jpg


gt09_004.jpg


gt09_026.jpg


gt09_010.jpg


gt09_017.jpg
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom