Young Photopreneur

Intro to copyrights and trademarks

This is just a brief introduction to copyrights and trademarks. It can get very detailed and complicated, however, I’d like to give you an insight on how it works.

This type of information in entirely too much to pack into one article, for instance, one copyright infringement suit could ruin a freelancer! Yikes! Now that’s a whole other topic all together!

Most people assume that content on the web is free to the public domain, however, in actuality, on common themes such as the numeric system and the alphabet are accepted under that umbrella. Common images are also apart of public domain, which would include circles, triangles and basic shapes.

These types of themes and images can be used freely. As far as anything else being public domain, the creator would have to specify in writing, i.e. attached to the work, that she/he was intentionally forfeiting all rights and claims to the work.

Assume an image is copy written

If this notice is not attached to the work, it’s best to assume that an image is protected by copyright and cannot be used without permission. However, according to the U.S. Copyright laws, for purposes such as research, criticism, comment, teaching, news reporting or scholarship, the fair use of a very limited portion of a copyrighted work is not an infringement of copyright.

You’ll want to educated yourself on trademark law, especially if your art includes residential and historic property, because it has become common for these structures to be trademarked by the owners. Also, privacy law doesn’t pertain to animals or inanimate objects.

To put it simply, trademark protection of a building prevents the competition from creating an identical structure in order to confuse the public. With that said, it doesn’t stop a citizen from making or selling a photograph or painting of the building from a public vantage point.

Case Study

For a great read on a case study that gives a great example of these laws is the landmark case on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum Inc. v. Charles Gentile and Gentile Prods. This is a landmark case and a landmark win for photographers, artists and tourists everywhere. Check it out!:)

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