Printing & Posting other photographer's work

[Nikkorray]

I have an ethical/legal issue that I'm not too sure about. I have a friend whose father past away a long time ago. Her father was a photographer for the military in World War II. She's not much into photography but she knows that I'm into it. Anyway, she showed me some of his work & said that she doesn't mind if I borrow the negatives & print them.

The military photos that she showed me were wonderful & she's pretty sure that they have been declassified. Some photos show a mushroom cloud after an atomic bomb test in Bikini Island, life on the naval ships, etc.

My question is, would I be stepping over any ethical/legal issues if I print them & show them online. I absolutely plan on giving him full credit for his work by mentioning his name on each photo. I just feel that his work should be shared & his name recognized. Is this okay? I plan on posting them on flickr & I could also post them here if it doesn't violate the TOS.

 

[waynecrider]

In all things relates to life, attitudes, viewpoints and friendships change over time. Your best bet is to get a letter of permission from her stating her ownership and what you can do with the pictures, files etc that you produce. If you should chance to be able to sell an image make sure you have an agreement concerning the topic. Outside of that, I don't see a problem, but I'm not an attorney. Being that your not out to take advantage of her as a friend you should be ok and a signed letter of permission will back that up.

 

[MikeSeb]

I'm no lawyer, but I see no problem with publishing them. She owns them, she gave you permission, and you intend to credit him for the work.

Seems unlikely to me that any of the stuff could still be classified, and since they were taken on the government's dime, I'm pretty sure they are in the public domain anyway.

I say go for it--I'd love to see them. Someone gives you a problem, then worry about what to do. Your intentions seem pure enough.

 

[bdial]

It's hard to know whether anything has been declassified, and you probably don't want to ask the question to someone in an official capacity. It sort of begs the question of were the the photos in your friends possession were ever classified? If they were, that puts things into a different realm.

My, now deceased, father-in-law was present at the Bikini tests as were hundreds of other civilian and military scientists. We have some photographs he took, though I've not seen any such as you describe. It's a safe bet that there are thousands of images of every aspect of those tests sitting around in family scrapbooks.

I agree with Wayne and Michael that as long as you have permission, etc. there should be no problem in publishing them. The only caveat I'd add is whether he made them in some sort of official capacity that made them subject to being classified. Once material is classified, it's subject to those rules of disclosure until the classification is officially removed. It really doesn't matter how much similar material is freely available from other sources, or, generally speaking, how old the material is.
I am not a lawyer either, but if your friends photographs fall into that realm of having been classififed, it wouldn't hurt consulting one who is knowledgeable of such things.

 

[Nikkorray]

If you should chance to be able to sell an image make sure you have an agreement concerning the topic.

Well, I'm not really interested in selling the image - I just want to show them to others. If the owner wants to I can print them out & she can sell them if she wants. I'll ask her if she can write up somekind of permission but she'll just probably roll her eyes at me.

 

[Maris]

I believe a photograph of a photograph is still a photograph. If I photograph a negative (on film -base) using a photographic emulsion coated on paper then I have made a photograph.

In times past when I have used another person's (black and white) negatives as a starting point the final work is labelled:
"Gelatin-silver photograph by Maris from a negative by "X". So far, no complaints.

 

[nexus]

I think you should ask your friend first before you post them online and tell her that it has his credit and what you want to show and where.

Better yet, perhaps you should talk with your friend about holding an exhibition of his photos.