Worries about posting images

spijker · Apr 26, 2018

@paulbarden, the OP was talking about amateurs so having read your post #21, I don't think this applies to you. On the other hand, will your photos hold any monetary value if nobody can see them?

Wrt the amateurs, I would not be surprised if some of them are just armchair photographers that have nothing to show besides brick wall photos taken with their expensive gear. For those of you that understand Dutch, something like this:

hoffy · Apr 26, 2018

Meh, what ever gets you through the night.

Many years ago, I decided that I would use the Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs Creative Commons Licence on Flickr - that is still my default, regardless of where I post images. As long as no-one is altering my work and calling it their own, or they are directly making money from it, I really don't care. I have had car owners use my images on their facebook profiles. The same with musicians. The way I figure it, they gave me something (a nice car to look at, or maybe a good gig), then its not biggy. OF course, if someone wanted to use it as the artwork for a music album, yeah, I might be a bit more pissed off.

If others wish to lock up their stuff in a vault, that is their choice. If they wish to pursue anything that is stolen or re-purposed, enjoy the hunt. It might be fun.

NedL · Apr 26, 2018

blockend said:
Another way is to scan or re-photograph a print, rather than a data heavy negative scan. That gives a genuine viewer a good idea of the photographer's intentions, but is too lo-res for thieves to do anything with.

+ my scans and photo reproductions are so crummy that nobody would want to steal or try to print from them anyway
I bought a pair of studio lights w/ 5500K "daylight" bulbs and I still can't get the colors or textures to look even similar to the prints.
I guess the silver lining is that I don't care much about the digital copies, but I do get it: I'd be unhappy if someone took credit for a print I'd spent a lot of time and effort on.

Bill Burk · Apr 26, 2018

I occasionally like to make the claim that a particular photo I am showing has never been seen before.

Drives me nuts when someone says "Oh I've seen that".

removed account4 · Apr 26, 2018

paulbarden said:
Having your photos appropriated is NOT flattery.

hi paul

i couldn't agree more
and i am sorry to hear that your work was used without consent ..
i hope you didn't think i was suggesting that it is OK for people to steal images, couldn't be more of the opposite !

i had a client steal my work years ago, after they hired me to do 300+ hours worth of work
they "bought all of them" and had me send the CD and bill .. i was allegedly "staff"
well, like a lot of these stories, i was naive ... and once the CD was in their hands
and they got the bill, they claimed they didn't know me and
the work was "on spec" and they owned the images to publish at will .. not too much fun ..

as said i think there are a lot of reasons why people don't publish their images online in the gallery, i should have added
"lack of time to chase people who steal them" as one of them ...
i haven't had people steal my work in a while, but they stole my website splash page ..

im always amazed at how lazy people are that they can't do anything for themselves
and have to just take what they want and seem to think they deserve ..
on a side note, i documented a giant facotry building here in new england with a TON
( actually many tons ) of copper .. people were breaking in to steal since the building day and nite
claiming the buildng wasn't being "used" ... people actually repaired BROKEN hydrolic lifts to steal stuff ..
seems they would have made more $$ puting their talent to good use than stealing copper.. but what do i know

Bill Burk · Apr 26, 2018

Yow. Never had anyone claim I was doing work for hire though I know some times that’s exactly what the deal was. I kept the negs. Well I did turn over the negs of a wedding I shot but I am sure my portfolio is none the worse for it.

removed account4 · Apr 26, 2018

Bill Burk said:
Yow

yeah .. they were not nice people ...

Theo Sulphate · Apr 27, 2018

spijker said:
@paulbarden ...armchair photographers that have nothing to show besides brick wall photos taken with their expensive gear ...

{\Off_on_a_tangent. {\comment

On DPREVIEW there was a thread where people all over the world posted their brick wall photos. It was not only entertaining, the varieties of brick walls and the discussion of their construction was very educational.

} }

blockend · Apr 27, 2018

The discussion has moved to other people stealing their "art". A lot of photography has no pretences to art, but is a record or document of people and places that are no longer around. That somebody cared enough to invest time and money in recording them has a financial value like any other activity. The uniqueness of the image attracts a value in the same way artistic provenance does.

To that extent on-line sharing is a mixed blessing. Whereas once someone invested money in a book of photographs of their local town or whatever, those images are now freely available. That freedom is held to represent co-ownership in a way that is very difficult to reverse. It a world that is sadly not based on the free exchange of products and ideas, photographers have got a poor deal in a visually hungry society.

removed account4 · Apr 27, 2018

blockend said:
The discussion has moved to other people stealing their "art". A lot of photography has no pretences to art, but is a record or document of people and places that are no longer around. That somebody cared enough to invest time and money in recording them has a financial value like any other activity. The uniqueness of the image attracts a value in the same way artistic provenance does.

don't many people believe their photography is .. their art.
whether it is commercial in nature or decorative or anything else ..
its their hard work ( hard work = art / craft ) ...

blockend · Apr 27, 2018

jnanian said:
don't many people believe their photography is .. their art.
whether it is commercial in nature or decorative or anything else ..
its their hard work ( hard work = art / craft ) ...

Art is anything a gallery thinks they can sell. Very few photographers considered their work art, Bill Brandt said he never took a photo he wasn't paid for in his life. The question is whether a photograph has a value to someone. That value may only be to a bride and groom, a dog owner, someone tracking down the vanished house they were born in, or AA's sunset at Yosemite.

A photograph has less value in the last fifteen years than it has ever had, which considering the media has a greater hunger for visual images than ever, is strange. It means photographers pressing the shutter do not consider what they're doing is of any worth, or they're not careful enough who sees it. The issue is not one of art, but one of commerce and monetisation.

removed account4 · Apr 27, 2018

hi blockend
i understand what you are saying .. but it really has nothing to do with what i am suggesting.
if it is true what you suggest ... why are there so man endless threads
here on photrio about aesthetics, composition &c and the craft of phtoography ( i that expression )
if people here don't think their work has any artistic or craft merit.
what i was saying has nothing to do with the world ar large and how
photography is worthless and film based photography even more so, or famous people...
but people on this website and why they might feel uncomfortable / not interested
in posting their photographs here. not talking about bill brandt or ansel adam
but johann(na) q. photrio and why he/she might not want to post their photography...
artistic merit, hard work, &c .. and people grabbing/stealing photography for personal use
whether it is for commercial gain, or as wallpaper screensaver image on their phone &c...
seems to be a reason why more than one person might be hesitant in posting images into the gallery &c..

faberryman · Apr 27, 2018

blockend said:
A photograph has less value in the last fifteen years than it has ever had, which considering the media has a greater hunger for visual images than ever, is strange. It means photographers pressing the shutter do not consider what they're doing is of any worth, or they're not careful enough who sees it. The issue is not one of art, but one of commerce and monetisation.

In two recent forum posts we have seen prints by acknowledged master John Sexton priced at $700 ignored, and another where a photographer offering his images for $50-$200 at an art fair go home without a sale. No wonder photographers feel their photographs are worthless (to anyone but themselves).

BradS · Apr 27, 2018

blockend said:
.....A photograph has less value in the last fifteen years than it has ever had.....

I think this effect is easily explained by simple supply and demand. Since the mid to late 1990's or so, supply has increased by several orders of magnitude while demand has, perhaps only increased by one order of magnitude at most.

Eric Rose · Apr 27, 2018

I've always found that the most opinionated photographers are the ones least likely to share their images. That's not meant as a slight, just an observation. No one is compelled to share their images, it's only one small part of this forum. Photrio is mainly a gear head/technical hangout so those with lots of wisdom in those areas contribute in a meaningful way, even without their images.

I would love to find a forum where it is the other way around. Mainly images and the discussion of said images. Technical details are ok but a bit of a deeper dive would be more satisfying to me at least.

removedacct1 · Apr 27, 2018

Lets make the assumption that having ones photo(s) appropriated from the Web is a form of flattery: your image was discovered in a search effort and deemed to be the best of its type to illustrate an object or concept. And so, the searcher took a copy to apply to their own needs. So, in making the decision that the photo in question was the best for the person's use case scenario, that person has applied a meaningful value to the image that could, in theory, be assigned a dollar value. So is it not offensive when someone assigns value to your work above most other pieces viewed, and yet appropriates it for their own needs without acknowledging the creator/owner, nor offering compensation?

@jnanian sorry to hear you had such a bad experience with a client. I’ve had similar things happen to friends “back in the day”, but in the end, that client’s reputation became well known and photographers would avoid working for them. That, I suppose, is a kind of justice.

Trail Images · Apr 27, 2018

Eric Rose said:
I would love to find a forum where it is the other way around. Mainly images and the discussion of said images. Technical details are ok but a bit of a deeper dive would be more satisfying to me at least.

I've belonged to a site for numerous years that has exactly that agenda . Albeit not as active as it once was. I found it invaluable to helping improve post processing abilities that were extremely lacking when I first started. At one time the site had decent forums as well including regional ones too. However, those have slowed to a crawl these days. The image posting, commenting, and pass and review aspect still seems to work on a limited basis.

removed account4 · Apr 27, 2018

paulbarden said:
@jnanian sorry to hear you had such a bad experience with a client. I’ve had similar things happen to friends “back in the day”, but in the end, that client’s reputation became well known and photographers would avoid working for them. That, I suppose, is a kind of justice.

yeah the RE developer that screwed tens if not hundreds of us locals over eventually left town and went back to baltimore
not sure if they filed for bankruptcy or whatever, but they had a HUGE project they got out of before they bolted.
yeah it is a form of poetic justice... nowadays i get paid in ful and up front before exchaning anything ... business is business i guess

Eric Rose · Apr 27, 2018

There are all kinds of ripoffs going on. I once had a collector buy one of my 16x20 images. I shipped it to him in a very well constructed box but when it arrived he claimed it was damaged. He hadn't made mention to this when he received the package but about a week later. He requested I send a replacement piece at my cost. I told him I would under one condition, he tear off the corner of the print that had my signature on it. Well you would have thought I stomped on is little toe! Eventually he agreed to my terms and he received his replacement print. I was pretty convinced he was just trying to scam another print out me to sell. I have shipped scores of prints and never had a damage claim before.

My opinion is a 3 inch image uploaded to Photrio isn't worth anyones time and effort to uprez and try and sell. If they want to steal it and put it on their own website have at it. Eventually karma will get them. Chances are they aren't in the same market I am so their impact on my reputation and sales will be non-existent.

blockend · Apr 27, 2018

BradS said:
I think this effect is easily explained by simple supply and demand. Since the mid to late 1990's or so, supply has increased by several orders of magnitude while demand has, perhaps only increased by one order of magnitude at most.

Yes it's partly that and also the fact sharing images is only a click away - no dark room alchemy and print wizardry before someone can see your shot. The situation for moving images is even more marked, news sequences that would have attracted a bidding war given away for nothing.

Eric Rose said:
I've always found that the most opinionated photographers are the ones least likely to share their images.

I used to be more enthusiastic about image sharing, but found shots that got lots of likes were clearly not my best work. You really need confidence in the opinion offered, someone who likes landscapes may not be the best judge of a street photograph, and vice versa. Talk may be cheap but clicking a heart is even less demanding. I once had a Flickr page where every third photograph was In Explore, but if you look at Explore it tells you nothing about image quality or style. 50 likes from people you respect is worth 10k from people who'll never look at your Photostream again. Of the 50 half are people trading Likes. Some of the photographers whose books or prints I collect and admire I've heard described as talentless on forums such as this, so expecting appreciation of ones own work would be somewhat thankless. The attention span of the average Joe is about 3 seconds for the finest photographs ever taken. Most people just don't have a visual appreciation or the vocabulary to discuss work.

adelorenzo · Apr 27, 2018

I decided long ago that policing my images is not something I care to do. I put a Creative Commons license on everything I put online and people are free to use for any purpose, commercial or not. They are required to provide attribution by the terms of the license but that can be hit or miss. My images have been used a fair bit on websites, articles, books and publications.Quite often people e-mail me to ask for permission even though they are free to use as they wish.

As far as I am concerned my real photography work is my handmande prints. I don't even have many of those online as I don't have a good setup to photograph them (working on it) but if I did I wouldn't be worried about the digital images.

I did delete my Flickr account however because a lot of my images being used from that site were crappy ones that I'd rather not be associated with. Now they live forever on the internet.

BradS · Apr 27, 2018

blockend said:
Yes it's partly that and also the fact sharing images is only a click away - no dark room alchemy and print wizardry before someone can see your shot.

Yes.. the relative ease of production definitely drives over supply.

blockend said:
The attention span of the average Joe is about 3 seconds for the finest photographs ever taken. Most people just don't have a visual appreciation or the vocabulary to discuss work.

I'd expand this to all of the visual arts.

winger · Apr 27, 2018

Eric Rose said:
I would love to find a forum where it is the other way around. Mainly images and the discussion of said images.

I also know of a forum like that. The forum area used to be pretty active, but now the only new posts are in the gallery. But only about 10 people these days, too.

pdeeh · Apr 27, 2018

Eric Rose said:
My opinion is a 3 inch image uploaded to Photrio isn't worth anyones time and effort to uprez and try and sell.

I doubt anyone does that.

However I've seen plenty of people (elsewhere, not necessarily here) complain that their images have been appropriated and used for the manufacture of other goods - clothing usually, but also mugs and similar giftware. A 1024x768 image is easily good enough for this.

I still have thousands of pictures on Flickr, and I wouldn't be pleased to discover that one of them had turned up on eBay or Amazon printed on tee-shirts. I wouldn't feel flattered, and I'd feel pretty pissed off that someone was making good cash off my 'vision' (such as it is, if any) while I wasn't seeing a brass farthing. It's of no import that I don't ever expect to make money from the pictures I've taken, by the way; But I do feel that I have a right to decide how and where they are reproduced, and for what purpose.

This may not matter for much longer as those of us with an ownership relationship to our productions die off. Younger people (including professional artists) not uncommonly release their work under a variety of Creative Commons terms; and there may be less expectation that artistic works in whatever medium (perhaps especially digital media) are products of a single persona rather than as collaborations.

Still, professional or amateur, I think people have every right to attempt to protect their images in whatever way, even if there's an element of self-delusion involved for some.

slackercrurster · Apr 27, 2018

OP...beginner fright. Usually things calm down with paranoia after some time. And for some...not.

I did the same thing when transitioning from film to digital. Now I post very hi res photos online. If you are famous, without the signature the photos is not worth anywhere near what you get with a sig.

Worries about posting images

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