How do I legally copyright pictures?

[Helevitia]

If anyone knows I would love to know.

Thanks,

Dave

[M|x]

that would be different from country to country....?
in norway the law goes like this: if you take a picture, its protected by the copyright act to the photagraphers advantage.

i think

[Tjalfe]

This would not happen to have anything to do with that metallica poster you did a while back would it?
In which case, can you copyright a picture which has a copyrighted logo on it?

[VJ]

Re: How do I legally copyright pictures?

There is no need to: following author's rights, every image you make, or every text you write is copyrighted. Automatically, you are the only one who has the right to copy and distribute the file (this of course under the assumption that your pictures/text are not made under a contract, e.g. as an employee; the contract should stipulate who becomes the owner of the work; most likely you are still the owner, but the employer gets the exploitation rights).

However, in this digital era, proving that you have the original picture becomes somewhat difficult. Often, one imprints his name near the bottom of the picture. There usually is mention of "(c) year", but this is not necessary. If it comes to a case however, the presence of this message can be used to indicated malice on the other person's behalf (he/she had to ignore that copyright message), so it is less likely they can say they didn't know it was copyrighted. RAW-files can also be interesting (provided you don't share them) to prove that you are the photographer.

tjalfe: If the pictures is not strictly about the logo (but the logo just happens to be there on the image), I don't think there is a problem. However, if the picture is clearly a picture of the logo, it could well be in violation of the copyright on the logo (I suspect that you can make such a picture, but you cannot copy or distribute it).

(I'm not a lawyer, but had some courses on this, mostly regarding copyrights on source code, but we got examples of other situations as well)


Jörg

[az]

To prove that you are the owner, never release your hi-res sources. Even if you release a hi-res versin of that picture, only release a modified version of it, including the copyright message VJ wrote about, or embedding a watermark. If you keep the RAW file, you'll be able to prove beyond doubt that you're the photographer, of course.

AZ

[mutz]

...but guarding and keeping track of your properties and prosecuting violators is wearisome and expensive.

Putting a tiny (c) Your Name 2003 at the bottom will discourage most people in the first place.

It you sell the work and its rights, of course you will have to remove it, unless you sell it with the condition that you are credited with the work, then it will no longer be a copyright.