I slugged this out with a client once, and it was such a painful experience
that afterwards I started covering it in estimates or contracts. In that
instance, the client wanted me to make *large* trade show booth displays
from their Web sites, a task even more daunting than normal print work,
especially since they needed them in only five days. When I quoted a
significant fee for recreating the art in large sizes and tried to explain
the resolution issues, the client jumped to the conclusion that I was
trying to cheat them. She screamed angrily at me, ranting and raving about
how they "owned" the art work (not true) and should be able to use it any
way they wished. She seemed to think that I had some Quark Xpress or
Pagemaker files that I could just send over to the printer. Duh.
Finally, they took it to another area graphic designer, and I got a good
lesson in the value of being friendly with my competitors. The other
graphic designer asked who did the original Web site, told the client that
she knew me well enough to know that I would enforce my copyright to the
artwork, and refused to violate it. God bless her. She ended up making some
graphic elements that were suggestive of my art, but obviously different
and made "from scratch."
Since that fiasco, besides covering copyright issues, I always include a
statement in my estimates that indicate that "for technical reasons" Web
graphics are unsuitable for print reproduction (I don't try to explain the
reasons). I state that if the client later wants to use the art for printed
materials, there may be significant and considerable costs involved in
recreating the artwork. I also suggest that if they think they might want
to use it later, they should advise me in advance so that we can create the
original art in high resolution. I indicate that there will be additional
fees for creating high resolution original art, since hi-res files take
longer to process.
Suz
>I recently went through this issue with a new client, and I'm curious as to
>what others do. Normally, when I design a site, I include a condition in my
>contract stating that the graphic design elements may not be used for print
>work (disregard the issue that web graphics are low-res and not designed
>for printing, that's not the point here).
>
>If the client wants to use the web design for their print brochures, etc.,
>I charge them more. How much more depends on the client and the amount of
>work I put into the web design.
>
>I am curious as to how other web designers handle this issue. Do you always
>include print rights? Specifically exclude them? Don't care?
Suzanne Stephens, Dave Stephens Design; Ashland, Oregon
541-552-1190, 541-1192 http://www.KickassDesign.com/
CyberCircus Grand Prize Winners http://www.thecybercircus.com/
Web Page Design for Designers: http://www.wpdfd.com/wpdres.htm
Clip Art: http://www.freeimages.com/artists/
Tender Loving Care Interactive DVD movie: http://tenderlovingcare.cc/
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