[pure-silver] Re: Uneasy Question From Nervous Uncle - now becoming easier...
- From: Dave Hornford <Dave.Hornford@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: pure-silver@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 31 Jan 2005 11:12:55 -0700
Lloyd Erlick wrote:
>Jan3105 from Lloyd Erlick,
>
>I believe it is the same in Canada. Essentially, the owner of the copyright
>is the person who paid for the work. (Things may have changed since I last
>paid attention, so if anyone knows the facts of Canadian copyright law
>regarding photographs, I'd be interested...).
>
>In the case of portraits, the situation is more complex. If a portrait
>subject does not pay for it (I doubt I'm the only portraitist who does lots
>of free work), they do not own copyright, but they retain rights to their
>own visage. As the portraitist, I own the copyright if they don't pay, but
>I don't control use of their face(s) unless I have been given permission.
>
>Furthermore, there is the issue of ownership of the physical negatives.
>Whoever pays for the film owns the negs . Again, I am probably not the only
>photog who never parts with his negatives. Whether or not I own copyright,
>I own the negs, and even the copyright holder must negotiate with me to
>have prints made.
>
>An interesting corollary issue is length of copyright. There was a bit of
>controversy some years ago when the laws were altered in Canada, and
>copyright for photographs was set at (I believe) twenty years, which was
>much shorter than for other art forms such as music. I have plenty of
>portrait negatives older than twenty years, so who owns those copyrights?
>Rights to one's own visage do not lapse, (except in cases where people have
>lost their face over twenty years ago?? Horrible legislators to set up
>conundrums like this) so I still can't use them for profit.
>
>Really, why become a portraitist?
>
>regards,
>--le
>
>
Lloyd,
Don't confuse paying money with 'valuable consideration'. It is a common
error. Usually 'valuable consideration' is a monetary payment, but it
can take other forms. (As part of my day-job I was recently involved in
copyright ownership of software, I only needed 'valuable consideration'
explained to me twice).
Under the current Canadian copyright act the length of copyright for
photographs is dependent upon who is the 'author' of the photograph. If
the Author is a natural person (or corporation with majority ownership
by the author of the photograph) it is end-of-calendar-year author dies
+50 years. If the Author is a corporation it is end-of-calendar-year
photograph taken plus 50 years.
There are three categories for photograph copyright ownership in Canada
- 1) work done as part of employment (work for hire), 2) commissioned
work, 3) all other photographs. Photographs taken as part of employment
authorship resides with the employer. With commissioned work, the
commissioner has copyright once they have rendered 'valuable
consideration' (prior to 1998 they didn't actually have to provide the
'valuable consideration'). In all other cases authorship resides with
the person who owned the negative at the time the photograph was taken.
In Canada you will note that the photographer isn't necessarily involved
in photographic copyright. If Lloyd uses my film to do one of his free
portraits the question of authorship is between me and the person who
may have commissioned the work for valuable consideration.
There is an information circular at:
http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/sc_mrksv/cipo/cp/cp_circ_11-e.html (be aware
it has at least two places where it can lead you astray: it refers to
the photographer not the negative owner and uses fee for 'valuable
consideration').
Where the copyright holder cannot be identified you can apply to the
Canadian Intellectual Property Office for a licence to reproduce the
works. Most commonly done for architectural plans.
Dave
=============================================================================================================
To unsubscribe from this list, go to www.freelists.org and logon to your
account (the same e-mail address and password you set-up when you subscribed,)
and unsubscribe from there.
Other related posts:
