P3D Re: Computer Graphics, artistry and photography

[Gerald Belton <gbelton@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>was a court case a few years ago where a photographer was selling
>pictures of a famous tree which also happened to be the trademark
>of some company (I forget the details). The court ruling on this
>was since it was a "public" tree, the photographer could sell his
>images and the company didn't have exclusive rights to the trees
>image. 

On the other hand, a photographer recently lost a case involving images of
the Rock and Roll
Hall of Fame in Cleveland.  The photographers images are considered
"derivative works" and the
buildings owners rights were given precedence.  

Someone posted on this list recently about stereo images made from images
in the movie "Titanic."  
This is an example of a derivative work.  The creator of the stereo images
owns the copyright to those 
stereo images.  However, in using those images he must be careful to
protect the copyright of the film's 
makers.  If he were to sell those images, he would probably hear from the
film company's lawyers.  

In a derivative work, there are actually TWO copyright owners; the creator
of the original work, and the 
creator of the derivative work.  Owning the copyright to the derivative
work is useless unless you have
a license from the owner of the original work.  

Another example: There have been numerous cases where commercial
photographs in advertisements 
have included a globe as a prop.  The makers of the globes file lawsuits
and win, because the photograph
violates their copyrights.  

If you want to include a copyrighted image in your photograph, you must
have the permission of the 
owner of the copyright.

Noto bene:  I am not a lawyer.  I am a professional photographer, and I
work in the TV industry.  Many 
of my own photographs are derivative works, and they are used in a very
public way.  So I try to keep
up with this aspect of the law.

Gerald Belton
gbelton@xxxxxxxxxxxxx





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