Why is copyright so important for photographers?

Photography is one of the most trendy areas nowadays. There are many reasons for this.

With the rise of the Internet many businesses start to use digital products, including photographs, for their advertising and marketing activities as a whole.

Apart from this, the digital technologies open the door for many new ways how photographers can make business out of their works.

Having said that, there are one element that is crucial for the success in the field of photography as a business. This is the copyright law. Yes it could sound too legal as a topic but it is a fact that copyright serves as a tool for managing every photo business, and it doesn’t matter whether we are talking about individual photographers, agencies or photo websites.

Copyright is a critical element when you want to make business with images. Every photographer should know at least the bare minimum of the rules stipulated by the copyright law in order to thrive especially in the light of the Internet which offers many opportunities but many traps too.

For instance, when you want to sell your photo to someone, you need to know how to license it correctly, what rights to transfer, for what territory and term. This is important because if you know how to do it properly you will be able to maximize your profit from every image.

Another essential moment is you to be aware for the main rules when you take photos in order to avoid legal conflicts. For example, when you are allowed to picture persons, or to include trademarks and other copyrighted works in your photographs.

If we have to summarize all benefits that copyright provides photographers with we can say that:

• It gives a legal protection over photographs;
• Photographers can control who, how, when and where can use their photos;
• Photographers can claim authorship over their photos based on the law;
• Copyright provides rules for commercial exploitation of photos;
• Copyright ensures that photographers can make their living based on the created images;
• Copyright serves as an additional stimulus for the photographers to continue doing their creative work in the future.

In case that you are interested in this topic you can subscribe for notifications for this new upcoming Udemy course that will teach you the most essential moments of copyright protection over images as well as some practical tips how to take photos avoiding legal conflicts.

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