Who owns the copyright to wedding pictures & video?

[djintense]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? NJ

I was part of a company (Biz-A) who offered DJ, photo & video. I left the company and continued to use the materials from Biz-A to promote my new company (Biz-B). The materials I’m using were from clients that I booked for Biz-A and are pictures and video me entertaining those clients. If the client in the videos & photos from Biz-A agree to allow me to use their videos & photos to promote my company Biz-B, can I be liable for copyright infringement? Does the company who took the photos/ video own the copyright or does the client who paid for their services. In the contract the client signed, it does not state anything about the company owning the pictures.

Thank you!

 

[quincy]

Without some sort of agreement (license, contract, whatever) granting the clients the copyrights in the photos and videos, Business A retains all copyrights.

Generally with wedding photos and videos, the client purchases prints or a video and, if they want to have additional copies of either, they need to purchase them through the original business they contracted with. This is how the business makes money.

If either you or your clients use the photos or videos in a commercial manner, or make copies of the photos or videos for whatever reason, and there was no agreement made with Business A allowing you the rights to do this, you could be sued for infringement.

 

[djintense]

Thanks,

Not the answer i wanted to hear tho,

But once again thank you!

 

[djintense]

Ok, I have another question that was brought to my attention...

Does Biz-A have to register the work as copyrighted material?

I was informed by another company that in order for the photos or videos to be copyrights he has to legally put a copyright on them. Just because he shoots them doesn't automatically mean he has the copyright to them. To be honest, this doesn't sound plausible, but I'm just trying to find a way out of this situation

 

[Some Random Guy]

Registering copyrights will give you slightly more protection than unregistered copyrights, even though it is completely optional. Generally, the registration just makes it easier to prove in court that you are the copyright holder and that the other party is infringing on your copyright.

 

[quincy]

A work is automatically copyrighted as soon as it is fixed in a tangible form. Having a notice of copyright affixed to the work is not necessary, nor is registration of the copyright, although both will afford the copyright holder additional protection.

And registration of a copyrighted work is required before an infringement suit can be filed (with an exception made for some non-U.S. works).

If a work is registered before it is infringed, or within 3 months of infringement, the copyright owner may collect statutory damages plus attorney fees. In any infringement action, the registered owner is presumed to be the actual owner of the work, and it is up to any defendant to prove otherwise.

Damages collectable in an infringement action can be actual damages, which consist of the actual loss in dollars to the copyright owner as a result of the infringement, and profits, which consist of all dollars made by the infringer as a result of the infringement.

Statutory damages may be from $750 to $30,000 per work infringed, or as much as $150,000 per work infringed if the infringement was intentional.

I think that Business B would be wise not to infringe on the works belonging to Business A, or Business B is apt to have a very short business life.

 

[travistee]

The photographer who made the images owns the copyright, unless there is an agreement that says it is a "work for hire" for the company.
So the company that the photographer may have worked for does not automatically own the images or the copyright.

 

[quincy]

Ttravistee, if you read the original post carefully you will see that the original poster (djintense) asked: "Does the company who took the photos/video own the copyright or the client who paid for their services?"

That question was answered. The company that took the photos/video holds the copyrights in the photos/video unless there was an agreement made that gave the rights in the photos/video to the client.

If the photographer worked as an employee for the company, and the work was created by the photographer within the scope of his employment, the company would own the rights to the photos/video under the work made for hire concept. If the company commissioned the photographer specifically to take the wedding photos/video for the company's client, the company would own the rights to the photos/video under the work made for hire rule.

The copyright of a work made for hire belongs either to the party who commissioned it or to the employer, but not to the party who created it.

Only if the company did not have an employment-type relationship with the photographer (where they commissioned (paid) the photographer to take the photos or where the photo-taking was part of the scope of the photographer's employment) would the photographer retain the rights to the photos he took, absent any agreement to the contrary. So, if Company A merely gave the photographer the name of their client and let him take the photos on his own and not for the company, then the photographer would have the rights to sell the photos/video to the client.

But, because the above scenario would not be the best way to run a wedding photo/video business, I think we can safely assume that Company A owns the rights to the photos and videos.

 

[travistee]

When he said he was part of a CO A I wasn't sure if he was employed by them or if he owned part of the company.

I once did work for a company that hired me to take still photos of their video shoot. I was not an employee. The work was done under their direction. In court on a matter related to this photoshoot, the judge said I had the copyrights not them because there was no specific agreement written that said it was work for hire.

 

[quincy]

There are several factors that a court looks at to determine if an employment relationship exists, some of which include the way taxes are treated and the method of payment, who decides how long the person assigned to the task will work and how - in other words, who has the control over the way in which the work is created and if the work is created to serve the party who commissioned the work.

Unless there is an agreement to the contrary, however, anything created outside the scope of employment is not a work made for hire, even if the work is created on the employer's behalf. For the employer to obtain rights to the work, there must be an assignment of the rights from the creator of the work to the employer.

So, anything created within the scope of employment would be a work made for hire and the employer would own the rights, and anything outside the scope of employment would require either an assignment of the rights or a work made for hire agreement (if it falls within one of the U.S. Code categories as such).

The judge determined you owned the copyright to the photos you took probably because the company that employed you failed to have you assign the rights in the photos to them when they contracted you to do the work, or they intended only to purchase a few of your shots outright along with a license to use those few shots. As a non-employee, however, and absent any agreement to the contrary, your photos would not be considered a work made for hire, and you would retain the copyrights to the photos.

But, whatever the relationship you happened to have with the party that commissioned the still shots from you, the same relationship does not seem to apply in the situation described here, unless the wedding photo/video business was so inept as to hire an outside photographer to take the wedding photos and video and then not have an agreement with the photographer that assigned all rights to all photos and videos to the company. The company would make no money on the photos and videos in that case. . . .or, unless the company offered photos and videos to their clients as a service only, and the photo and video sales were not their main business and source of income.

Possible, of course. But not probable - judging from what was posted here by djintense.