Urgent advice needed

[harris.k]

We live in Virginia, US and this is regarding my cousin who is high school. She is 17 years old and will become 18 by the end of May.

She went and got her yearbook photo done a few months ago but for some reason she wasn't comfortable with it, she told me a few weeks ago that she is extremely worried about her photo being published now and to be used commercially. I contacted the school but the the teacher who was incharge of all this yearbook matter says that it's already published in the 'people' section and the publisher had already print it. I contacted the publisher but he said that they have a contract with school.

I don't know about much law but I'm sure there must be some right since it is her own photo. There is no deadline mentioned by the school in which the students should contact them or any other information. They have not yet printed or published the entire yearbook so I hope there is still a chance. Please help us out with your detailed responses, she is really worried.
Thank you so much.

 

[Silverplum]

We live in Virginia, US and this is regarding my cousin who is high school. She is 17 years old and will become 18 by the end of May.

She went and got her yearbook photo done a few months ago but for some reason she wasn't comfortable with it, she told me a few weeks ago that she is extremely worried about her photo being published now and to be used commercially. I contacted the school but the the teacher who was incharge of all this yearbook matter says that it's already published in the 'people' section and the publisher had already print it. I contacted the publisher but he said that they have a contract with school.

I don't know about much law but I'm sure there must be some right since it is her own photo. There is no deadline mentioned by the school in which the students should contact them or any other information. They have not yet printed or published the entire yearbook so I hope there is still a chance. Please help us out with your detailed responses, she is really worried.
Thank you so much.

What's the problem? Really?

How long does it take to reprint? It would be at her cost, I presume; and it had better arrive before graduation.

Oh, neither of you considered any of this?


Teens.

 

[harris.k]

What's the problem? Really?

How long does it take to reprint? It would be at her cost, I presume; and it best arrive before graduation.

Teens.

They can't reprint because they have printed a lot of copies of it, at least that's what the incharge said to me. The yearbook however wont be published until they cover up the other upcoming events of the school so we still have some time.

 

[quincy]

We live in Virginia, US and this is regarding my cousin who is high school. She is 17 years old and will become 18 by the end of May.

She went and got her yearbook photo done a few months ago but for some reason she wasn't comfortable with it, she told me a few weeks ago that she is extremely worried about her photo being published now and to be used commercially. I contacted the school but the the teacher who was incharge of all this yearbook matter says that it's already published in the 'people' section and the publisher had already print it. I contacted the publisher but he said that they have a contract with school.

I don't know about much law but I'm sure there must be some right since it is her own photo. There is no deadline mentioned by the school in which the students should contact them or any other information. They have not yet printed or published the entire yearbook so I hope there is still a chance. Please help us out with your detailed responses, she is really worried.
Thank you so much.

The photographer who took your cousin's photo owns the copyrights in the photograph. Your cousin will probably discover that she provided the photographer with all rights to use the image in a commercial manner (for example, promoting his photography business and publishing the photograph in the yearbook) when she signed (or her parent signed) the contract with the photographer.

If the yearbook has already been published, I am afraid it is too late now for your cousin to have another photograph taken to replace the one she is not fond of.

If it helps any, yearbook photos always look awful when you look back on them years after graduation.

 

[harris.k]

The photographer who took her photo owns the copyrights in the photograph. Your cousin will probably discover that she provided the photographer with all rights to use the image in a commercial manner (for example, promoting his photography business and publishing the photograph in the yearbook) when she signed (or her parent signed) the contract with the photographer.

If the yearbook has already been published, I am afraid it is too late now for your cousin to have another photograph taken to replace the one she is not fond of.

If it helps any, yearbook photos always look awful when you look back on them years after graduation.

I asked her that, she has clearly mentioned that she never signed anything, I also asked the parents. None of them signed any form at all. Where do we stand?

 

[quincy]

I asked her that, she has clearly mentioned that she never signed anything, I also asked the parents. None of them signed any form at all. Where do we stand?

I don't know where you are standing but it really does not matter legally, because this is not your concern (except as a sympathetic cousin).

I am afraid I don't believe that nothing was signed, unless the photographer was not a professional photographer (for instance, an aunt, a brother, the neighbor).

But, even if the photographer was not a professional photographer, the photo copyrights belong to the photographer, not to your cousin. Your cousin has no copyrights in the photos unless these rights were specifically transferred to her in writing by the photographer.

I can also almost guarantee that the photo of your cousin was not submitted to the yearbook without your cousin's permission, either through a form filled out at the school or a form filled out at the photographers. That is just not how yearbooks work.

 

[harris.k]

I don't know where you are standing but it really does not matter legally, because this is not your concern (except as a sympathetic cousin).

I am afraid I don't believe that nothing was signed, unless the photographer was not a professional photographer (for instance, an aunt, a brother, the neighbor).

But, even if the photographer was not a professional photographer, the photo copyrights belong to the photographer, not to your cousin. Your cousin has no copyrights in the photos unless these rights were specifically transferred to her in writing by the photographer.

I can also almost guarantee that the photo of your cousin was not submitted to the yearbook without your cousin's permission, either through a form filled out at the school or a form filled out at the photographers. That is just not how yearbooks work.

I understand, I'm discussing everything with her right now as we speak. She says that she CLEARLY remember that she never filled a form or anything that was used to transfer her rights to the photographer or to the school. The only thing she signed was a blank paper used to call students for the schedule of their photo but does that count in law? I mean that the photographer and the school both of them were quite irresponsible in my opinion as they should have had the papers signed by every individuals. What do you think?

And thank you so much for helping, appreciated.

 

[quincy]

I understand, I'm discussing everything with her right now as we speak. She says that she CLEARLY remember that she never filled a form or anything that was used to transfer her rights to the photographer or to the school. The only thing she signed was a blank paper used to call students for the schedule of their photo but does that count in law? I mean that the photographer and the school both of them were quite irresponsible in my opinion as they should have had the papers signed by every individuals. What do you think?

And thank you so much for helping, appreciated.

I do not know your cousin's school or how they operate, or how the photographer operates, so I can't express an opinion on what anyone did or didn't do. But it is very likely (even if it was at the beginning of the school year and is no longer remembered) that some sort of paper was signed or some sort of form filled out by your cousin and/or her parents that addressed this.

If your cousin did not want her photograph taken, however, it seems to me that she could have skipped the "signing in" for a photo. Thinking back to my old yearbooks, there were always some students who had no photo appearing in a yearbook and they were just listed as being in the class.

If this was a photographer who came to the school to take all of the students photographs on scheduled days (instead of students hiring their own professional photographers to take their pictures, which is done with regularity for high schoolers' senior pictures), there are usually school "re-take" days. The photographer returns after students have had the opportunity to look at the original photographs. The original photos can be returned and exchanged for retaken photographs.

Again, I do not know what your cousin's situation is, or what sort of photographer is involved, but I do know that, unless expressly signed away, all rights to the photographs remain with the photographer who took the pictures. If the photographer had a contract with the school, the rights to publish the photos in the yearbook would be licensed to the school for this purpose.

If the yearbook has been published already or the photographs of students have already printed, there appears to be little your cousin can do to have the disliked photograph removed and/or replaced with another.

Sorry.