photo ethics class.
Someone today requested I take her photos down from my site, which I did right away. If you pay that much attention to my site, you'll know which performer it is. But really, if you pay that much attention to my site, you need to get a life. Seriously. It's very warm outside. Go for a walk.
This is fine. I respect her shyness, which is why I asked her if I could photograph the event in the first place, with the mistaken understanding that she knew what I did with my photos. Only, she went further to express her strong opinion that what I'm doing on my website in general is wrong. According to her, I simply cannot publicize or sell pictures of other people.
Only, I can. Whereas the moral questions may be more ambiguous, I have a legal right to make public anything produced by my camera, provided it does not incite violence, breach the peace, or contain obscenity. (I can't find anything mentioning obscenity as an exception per se, so I'm really assuming that's also not allowed by the first amendment.) For certain purposes such as informational or educational use, I can even sell those photos. For any other sales, I'd need a model release.
I have to wonder how people can not expect pictures taken in public to appear on the internet in the year 2005. It's become the standard way to share them with your family and friends! Websites such as flickr, Hello, and fotki, and Pbase, to name a few, make it so easy that people do it almost automatically now. Also, if you put yourself up on a stage, how can you not expect pictures to be taken of you? To me, this is the same issue as oh, I don't know, say, constructing a giant silver reflective kidney bean in the middle of a major metropolitan area and thinking it'll stay out of the public's eye - and camera. Well, no, it's not the same issue - both have requested their images not be publicized, however, in the one case, I respect my subject's shyness and have willingly complied with all her requests. In the other case, I don't respect Anish Kapoor's greed.
So after dumping all that on you, let me just say that I've familiarized myself with the industry's code of ethics and believe, to the best of my knowledge, that I've been following those principles. From now on, I'm asking every band to sign a model release form. Finally, much like a lot of other things in life, this makes photography a little less fun, which was originally why I started it.
listening to: bob marley, new black remixed by dj steve sleeve, the leaked nine inch nails album (bad me)
in my sink: about 3-4 day's worth
This is fine. I respect her shyness, which is why I asked her if I could photograph the event in the first place, with the mistaken understanding that she knew what I did with my photos. Only, she went further to express her strong opinion that what I'm doing on my website in general is wrong. According to her, I simply cannot publicize or sell pictures of other people.
Only, I can. Whereas the moral questions may be more ambiguous, I have a legal right to make public anything produced by my camera, provided it does not incite violence, breach the peace, or contain obscenity. (I can't find anything mentioning obscenity as an exception per se, so I'm really assuming that's also not allowed by the first amendment.) For certain purposes such as informational or educational use, I can even sell those photos. For any other sales, I'd need a model release.
I have to wonder how people can not expect pictures taken in public to appear on the internet in the year 2005. It's become the standard way to share them with your family and friends! Websites such as flickr, Hello, and fotki, and Pbase, to name a few, make it so easy that people do it almost automatically now. Also, if you put yourself up on a stage, how can you not expect pictures to be taken of you? To me, this is the same issue as oh, I don't know, say, constructing a giant silver reflective kidney bean in the middle of a major metropolitan area and thinking it'll stay out of the public's eye - and camera. Well, no, it's not the same issue - both have requested their images not be publicized, however, in the one case, I respect my subject's shyness and have willingly complied with all her requests. In the other case, I don't respect Anish Kapoor's greed.
So after dumping all that on you, let me just say that I've familiarized myself with the industry's code of ethics and believe, to the best of my knowledge, that I've been following those principles. From now on, I'm asking every band to sign a model release form. Finally, much like a lot of other things in life, this makes photography a little less fun, which was originally why I started it.
listening to: bob marley, new black remixed by dj steve sleeve, the leaked nine inch nails album (bad me)
in my sink: about 3-4 day's worth
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