April 11, 2021

Licensing photography can be an incredibly advantageous source of income for a photographer. Commercial and editorial photographers will look much more often at these subjects than retail photographers, but every talented photographer out there has a library with images with license potential. If you navigate through the combination of commercial, legal and artistic considerations, it can be complicated, but it doesn`t need to be overwhelming. It becomes easier, and there are resources available to help. Retail photography is usually commissioned or purchased for the client`s personal use (e.B. wedding photography, portraits of the elderly, animal photography, visual arts, etc.). Licensing problems are not so common in this category. While the photographer retains the copyright, the client`s fees may include the granting of reproduction rights. The contract defines the conditions for the licensee to use this photo. In the photo license agreement, the licensee is the one who owns the copyright or has the right to use the image. The licensee is the person who obtains the rights to use the image. A licensee can also obtain the rights to sublicensing the image – in this case, the licensee may be a licensee in a sublicensing contract.

Once it has been determined whether an image license agreement has granted exclusive or non-exclusive use rights, you should also determine how the image can be used. A type of use can be clearly defined, this refers to technical use (such as scanning, copying, printing, GRAVURE of CDs) or commercial (such as distribution, reuse). Do you want to terminate a licensing agreement? The termination of an agreement is in accordance with the common rules for the continuation of contracts. If the contract has been concluded for a fixed term, it automatically expires at the end of the agreed term. If the license agreement is indefinite, you need a declaration of intent from one party (unilateral termination) or both parties (reciprocal decision). A photo license agreement allows the copyright holder and licensee to clearly define how an image can be used. This protects both parties and allows for a mutually beneficial professional relationship. Discuss the agreement before the licence fee is sold. If you clearly define how photos can be used, it will create a mutually beneficial professional relationship.

To protect the interests of the photographer and the client, please provide the following details in the photo licensing agreement template: “What photo licensing options are available to photographers? Customers can obtain licensed photography in two ways. First, they can hire a photographer to create new jobs (Assignment Photography) that are granted for the specific purposes of the client. The second option – and less expensive – is that the customer gets a license for existing jobs (Stock Photography). While order photography is essentially a service activity where the photographer creates something new, stock photography is rather a commodity. As most photographers already know, stock photography is pretty much dominated by a relatively small number of agencies and has a series of business strategies that have their own. You can license your own stock directly to your customers, but the overwhelming majority of photographers who license commercial or editorial photos do so with original work. Can`t find the forms you`re looking for? Take a look at these corresponding models: you can view and download a typical license agreement here (and in Word format here). When granting an image license, the rights to use may be limited to commercial or purely private use. The use of the image may also be limited in space to a given country or continent. A photo license agreement is usually used when a photographer wants to concede his work for use without selling the copyright to the image.