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Thomas Hawk asks “Should Fair Use Apply to Your Family Portraits?“

I don’t want a wall sized family portrait because this is not how I consume photography these days. These days the majority of my photography is consumed on a 43″ plasma in my living room through my Media Center PC. Would I be interested in seeing my family shots on my plasma as they rotate through my digital photography collection, like all my other photography? Sure. Do I want a big wall sized print of my family on the living room wall? Not so much.

So I explain to the photographer about how I consume photography these days, on how it is of much more value to me to see my work as part of my Media Center PC than on a wall on a $1,000 print and ask if there is a way instead of buying prints, that I can just purchase the images digitally. I’d even happily pay the $2,000 for digital versions of my 5×7s rather than get prints which I don’t really want to hang in my home anyways.

And here she tells me no. Which is her prerogative I suppose, but when I mention that I could always just scan the 5×7s and watch them anyways she goes off into a little speech about how her images are copyrighted and I can’t do that, etc.

Aaah, the old portrait photographer ransom. What a clever scheme this is. Thing is the photographer in question is well within her rights. Consumers continue to pay the prices without demanding digital files and Photographers continue to charge them without offering them.

There are many photographers now who do offer (voluntarily) digital files. Surprisingly many wedding Photographers see this as the bargain end of their offering with the more expensive leather-bound-large-print service being the premium. Geek as I am, I see it the other way round with the RAW/PSD/TIFF/JPG images the more desirable providing the digital files are high resolution.

Seems quite similar to the music/film industry DRM dilemma. Clearly consumers do not want it but the copyright holders are willing to do anything to enforce these unpopular restrictions. We don’t like the MPAA for it. There is a lesson right there. But Photographers do need to make a living and that is as important as the customer getting a disc with pictures on.

The only answer to this disagreement is some calm discussion of the issue. For future reference though there are two solutions

1. Discuss beforehand your requirements (both Photographer and client)
2. Provide the option of work-for-hire rather than traditional portrait shoot

For photographers you need to either consider providing files as an option or have a very good answer to the question. Our last family portrait session I simply asked and was given a CD, no quibble, no additional fee. You do not need to particularly go that far, maybe having a price on your menu for an archive CD/DVD but it is worth considering the negative affect point blank refusal will do to your reputation and repeat custom …

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