> Fra: graywolf <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> <...> > For instance, say you took a photo a young girl riding a pony in front of a > distinctive barn. To use that photo commercially you would need a model release > from from the girl, and her parents. You would need a property release from the > owner of the pony. And another from the owner of the barn. Then you have a > sellable photo. The publisher then needs a release from you to publish the > photo. Sometimes the chain of releases is so difficult to chase down the photo > has no commercial value at all. > <....>
> That is international copyright law. There may well be other local laws that > apply. Anyone who is not pretty knowledgeable about how the laws work in their > area (country, state, county, local) really ought to talk to an attorney who > specializes in intellectual property. I don't agree with you there. There is a considerable effort made in Europe to harmonize the the national copyright laws and there are some things that differ from your law. There are two things you can't publish without permission, and that is persons and other, copyrighted material. There is an exception made for architecture. So you can sell a photo of another persons property, at least as long as you did not have to break an entrance to get there (in which case you have broken another law). So you can sell an image of a general crowd of people in front of a building (without any private persons standing out in the image), you can sell the picture of the neighbours dog (except if he made an effort in styling it), but you can not sell a photo of a sculpture (unless you have made a substantial effort to make the photo more than just a photograph of the sculpture). There are still some differences between the European countries, but the tendency is toward the right of the holder of the copyright. One important thing is that you cannot sell the copyright, only the right to control its use. DagT
