My local newspaper does a feature every week about a wedding. Well, today they featured my husband and I which was great! I submitted some photos from our photographer and they ran them with "Courtesy of Spark Photography" at the bottom. Then I clicked on one of the photos and they give you the option to BUY the photo! ($15 for a 5x7 . . . my photographer charges $12.50)

I've emailed both the newspaper (asking if they had permission to do this) and our photographer (asking if the newspaper contacted them), but I haven't heard from either of them. Not to mention the photos I sent them were low resolution and only good for a 3x5.

This can't be legal . . .right?

Hey Erin! They tend to do that to every photo they post on there and they should not be doing that to ones their staff photographers did not take!!

Which reminds me, I had a full page spread in Delaware Woman this month and better go check that they don't have that option on mine!!

Email me and let me know what comes of this...I'd be very interested

I don't think this is legal. But lets be clear:
1) You submitted the photos not your photographer? Right?
2) Did you sign some kind of release?
When you submitted the photos, what exactly did you do?
-Did you e-mail them to the newspaper, walk in the door with a disc, or something else?
3) Have you physically gone to the editor of the newspaper and had a very serious conversation with him/her?
4) Did you relay this information to your photographer before you gave the images to the newspaper?
-Technically, if you and the photographer are splitting image rights then you need to have his approval before they're published. Most likely he would probably say yes, but some photographers only want the images they produce to go through specific communication channels.

-BT

probably not legal, and you're right they would be terrible quality. whether or not you had permission to give the photo to the newspaper, you did exactly the right thing contacting both the newspaper and the photographer. probably no one has written back because they are still straightening out on their end how to approach the situation.

1. Yes, I submitted the photos and my photographer was fine with that
2. I did not sign any release. They sent me an email with a few questions to answer and said this about the photos [i]:"Also, please send me a wedding photograph that clearly shows both faces and has a resolution of 200 dpi. Any additional photos can be included in an online slideshow, and they need be only 72 dpi. Let me know if the wedding photographer will be sending the files, and also to whom we should credit the shots. (They will read "Courtesy of _____.")"[/i] oh, and I emailed the photos to them

3. I sent the author of the article an email. He just responded today and this was his answer:
[i]"I think the option to the buy a photo is automatically rendered by the Web site. (I didn't see that in the print edition, so let me know if I missed it.) In other words, every image posted online has that option attached to it. I haven't heard of anyone outside a relative buying such images, but I'll let you know if I hear anything."[/i]



I have been in contact with my photographers who don't mind about the photos being used, but are shocked to see that they are selling them. They said they will also be contacting the newspaper.

My local newspaper picked up snow pictures off my Web site and put them on their site with a "click here to buy" option.

First of all, they never asked me if they could take them off my site.

Second, they didn't ask to publish them.

Third, they are low res, so if somebody DID buy them, it would make ME look horrible.

Fourth, did I mention they never asked my permission to post them in the first place?

I work for a major newspaper. One call to my legal department took care of this. It is not legal for any publication to sell copyrighted images without permission. Just because their web site automatically creates this option doesn't make it right. They need to fix it so that it doesn't put images up for sale automatically. They'll fix it when somebody raises cane about it. They won't bother fixing it otherwise.

I bet the PPofA would like to hear about it.