Free stock photography… but is it at a cost.

Recently I quoted some images for a real estate com­pany for use on an adver­tis­ing project and when fol­low­ing up the enquiry with a phone call they said they loved my work but decided to go with another pho­tog­ra­pher due to their bud­get. I asked a few ques­tions as it is always good to know how you lost busi­ness and I was told they got an image from a pho­tog­ra­pher they found on Flickr and the pho­tog­ra­pher was happy to give the image for free and just have their name on the flyer so it cost the Real Estate agent nothing.

I must say smart move on the agents behalf as some of the work on web­sites like flickr, deviantArt, Red­bub­ble  are excel­lent and no lesser qual­ity to those that do it suc­cess­fully full time, hell most of us that do it full time have Flickr and dA accounts for get­ting your work out there. What wor­ries me about these kind of sites is they are full of pho­tog­ra­phers who maybe due to in expe­ri­ence in the indus­try or just happy to see their work in print with their name on it as it’s not their main source of income so they don’t see the need to charge for their image, when they should be charg­ing some­thing for the use, not for finan­cial reward but for protection.

How is see it is, if money has been exchanged it becomes a finan­cial trans­ac­tion and with that comes a level of pro­tec­tion. If your not a busi­ness and you are wor­ried about charg­ing for an image due to tax impli­ca­tions, you can issue a receipt stat­ing that you are a sole trader and don’t have an ABN or Busi­ness name, this is so the com­pany you sold the image too can claim it as a busi­ness expense come tax time. (I did this when I first started out). Check out the ATO or your states small busi­ness web­site, I think there is some­thing on it about issu­ing receipts when your not a business.

One of the main points I feel needs to be addresses and could be over­looked is if you have given the image for free or made them pay for it you need to get them to sign an image use agree­ment out­lin­ing how the image can be used and where, print run num­bers as who knows where else your image might end up or where it might be used. So if you gave your image for free and there is no writ­ten terms of how the image can be used. Your ver­bal agree­ment wont mean any­thing if you wish to take action on an image use breach.

I have heard from some hor­ror sto­ries on how real estate agents espe­cially use peo­ples images when they thought it was just for a sin­gle use. This is why I per­son­ally wont license images from my main mattlauder.com.au site to main stream real estate agents.

Ear­lier this year I licensed one of my main mattlauder.com.au web­site images to an Aus­tralia wide hotel chain for use on a post­card to send out to cus­tomers. I sup­plied the image only in the size they needed. There is no need to give a 300MB file for a post­card job. Image use license was signed and returned. The final job came out great. About a month later I got a call from a dif­fer­ent per­son who licensed the image won­der­ing if they can print off a pho­to­graphic image to give to their CEO who was leav­ing. Of course this is a breach and sec­ondly the image I sup­plied wouldn’t print as big as they wanted. The scary thing was is they were all set up ready to have it printed and realised that it was going to cost more to have it printed and framed by them­selves than it was for me to get it done and they also had an ele­ment of doubt if they could use the image for this. After this expe­ri­ence I tight­ened up my license agree­ment. But the main thing is I had a license for them to refer to and they could see what they were doing was a breach and that was the end of the conversation.

So for those new to the biz or who have flickr accounts who’s images are being requested by busi­nesses here are a few things I think you should keep in mind.

1. Only give an image size that is needed for the job.
(If a client wants a file to print A4 why give then an A0 sized file)

2. Make sure you charge them for the use. $1 buck, $5 bucks, $20 bucks or $100… what­ever but not free.
(Totally up to you but per­son­ally if money has exchanged hands then there is a level of pro­tec­tion given to you. If you want to give it away for free you must get an image use agree­ment signed)

3. Make them sign an image use agree­ment which out­lines what they can and cant use the image for.
(This is essen­tial no agree­ment means that they can dic­tate the terms to you and it’s your word against theres, espe­cially if you have given it for free.)

4. Issue an invoice of some descrip­tion.
(Finan­cial record that a trans­ac­tion has taken place. If you dont have a busi­ness name or ABN they will either deposit the money into your account or via cheque and there you have proof of pur­chase of your image.)

5. Ask how your image/s is going to be used, print num­bers, manip­u­la­tion, print size, what web­site it will be on etc.
(Who’s to say that your image might not end up in a book or on a post­card later that the com­pany later sells, thus mak­ing money off your image. Or your image ends up on a prod­uct or sup­port­ing an organ­i­sa­tion that you would never have approved.)

6. Don’t be daz­zled by offers of your name some­where on the printed prod­uct in return for free or dis­counted prices. Ask your­self if this is some­thing you want or need to do with this image. From expe­ri­ence your name in tiny writ­ing under the image on a flyer / post­card yields noth­ing. If they pay for it and they still put your name on it hey that’s a bonus. Or if they pay for it you can make a con­di­tion they need to state your name on it some­where, espe­cially if you are giv­ing your image for a great price. Remem­ber it’s your image and your terms of use.
(This is really a per­sonal choice and it depends on what their offer is. Last year in 2009 I licensed about $1000 worth of images to a Syd­ney com­mu­nity mag­a­zine in exchange for my name under each image and also a 1/4 page ad (Worth $550) adver­tis­ing my photo courses and local images. From this I got “Zero” return for my invest­ment… this year I got con­tacted by the com­pany again want­ing to do it all again as they said it was a rag­ing suc­cess and they got heaps of great com­ments. I politely declined out­lin­ing that I didnt see any change in my sales or web traf­fic and said all images would have to be paid for this year at a dis­counted rate. I never got a reply back, which makes you feel kind of used but just re enforces why you should charge for your images. Put it this way… If you mowed some­ones lawn for free and they didn’t say thanks… you would be pissed off… if you charged them $30 bucks… would you be pissed off… nope.)

7. Also make it a con­di­tion that if it is a printed prod­uct that you are given a copy or copies of it for your own record and ref­er­ence. Handy to have fur­ther down the track and will also let you see and learn how your work is being re pro­duced.
(This is some­thing new that I have added to my license. Obvi­ously it is totally depen­dent on what the image is being used for but if it is on a web­site I want to have that web address, if a post­card or card is printed, book­let, flyer etc I want a copy for my own records and reference.)

8. Also out­line to the client that they are licens­ing the image off you and any pay­ment doesn’t not mean they own the image. This has come up quite a few times, hence it is now part of the image use license.

Doing these things is by no means going to stop your image from being miss used but for up front com­pa­nies it will give them guide­lines and for those who decide to push the friend­ship with the license it gives you pro­tec­tion. Also I am no lawyer so if in doubt always seek pro­fes­sional legal advice.

Matt Lauder is the edi­tor of the Rub­bing Pix­els web­site and is a full time land­scape pho­tog­ra­pher based on the Cen­tral Coast of NSW. To view Matt’s full pro­file and the range of video he has con­tributed to the site please click here.

Tags: flickr stock images, stock image conditions, stock image licensing