The degree of monetary value comes from the person in the picture, but the photographs have value on their own. Maybe not much, but it’s there.
Whether or not anyone likes the capitalist system that’s behind needing to decide who can profit off of a photograph to what degree, the subject of a photo is only partly responsible for the photo.
Taking a picture of a is indeed different from that of a , but you can see that a human being in the picture doesn’t automatically change the value of it as art.
Portraiture, live photography of events, those are skills. It absolutely is not as simple as pushing a button. Even now, with digital cameras that can make some of the adjustments on the fly, a photographer getting a good image is more than luck.
That’s why, when doing portraits and event photography, there’s contracts in place. It is entirely possible to hire a photographer and have ownership of the images. It’s expensive, but it’s possible. You or me? We ain’t taking pictures of Ozzy and having them be worth much of anything at all to anyone else, including Ozzy. Our images would only be monetarily valuable because he’s in them, and maybe not even then. A selfie at a back stage event? You aren’t making shit off of that
A professional photographer, taking high quality images of famous people absolutely brings value to the end photo. There’s a reason why rich, famous people will hire them and negotiate contracts with them, and it isn’t because they’re too lazy to handle a camera, or don’t have flunkies willing to do the work.
Again, if we wanna debate the merits of capitalism and it’s impact on the arts, that’s a fascinating subject. But this lawsuit, within the current legal paradigm, is perfectly valid. The photographer has rights to the images, Ozzy doesn’t. If Ozzy had wanted those rights, it is possible (in general) to do so, either at the time or afterwards.
Maybe you haven’t run across it, but there’s actually a lot of people into portraiture as art. They’ll gladly pony up thousands, or more for what they consider great art photos of people that aren’t famous at all. Even Anne Geddes (the photographer of the baby bee image) has fans of her stuff willing to pay tidy sums, and her stuff is essentially fluff with little complexity. Well executed fluff, but still. You get into the serious portraiture photogs and you’re talking sometimes hundreds of thousands for prints, though it’s kinda rare to go that high afaik.
Portraiture, live photography of events, those are skills. It absolutely is not as simple as pushing a button.
This can’t be overstated. Taking good portraits of people is not easy. The requisite skills go beyond the technical aspects of photography, extending into social skill territory. You have to know how to direct people, you have to understand body language and what emotions it may convey. Being able to create flattering images, while working with subjects of various personalities and standards, takes skill.
An image can have earth-shattering aesthetic value due to the skill and sensitivity of the photographer, or can be an ineptly snapped photo of Jennifer Aniston that’s only valuable because she’s in it. Either way the photographer has all the rights and the subject has none, and I don’t think that makes sense.
That’s just it, the subject does have rights. I’m not sure why you think they don’t.
While truly public photos have distant different rules, these weren’t public photos.
Neil Zlozower is a specialist in music photography. While I don’t expect anyone to know that without looking, it is easily available information.
If you don’t know what that means, it means that musicians are his collaborators, not some random people he snapped pics of as they walked down the road.
The photos in question were taken under contract. Ozzy agreed to the terms, or Zlozower wouldn’t have been able to take them. The pics with Randy Rhodes may be famous, but that doesn’t mean that Ozzy can just up and decide to use them in violation of that contract.
This isn’t some random asshole that had a small 110 camera in his pocket and caught a few pics. He was a professional there to take pics, and everything was agreed on, and signed, before he took the first one.
Now, what that agreement was, I have no clue. But, and this is the important part, it absolutely would have included usage rights. Most of the time, such contracts don’t include the subject of the photos being able to use them commercially. And that’s what the lawsuit is about, the photographer is saying that the usage was commercial, and violates his copyright.
Now, if you want to say that isn’t the way things should be that’s a different issue. But that’s the way things are, no matter what anyone’s opinion is.
That’s not necessarily true though.
The degree of monetary value comes from the person in the picture, but the photographs have value on their own. Maybe not much, but it’s there.
Whether or not anyone likes the capitalist system that’s behind needing to decide who can profit off of a photograph to what degree, the subject of a photo is only partly responsible for the photo.
Taking a picture of a
is indeed different from that of a 
, but you can see that a human being in the picture doesn’t automatically change the value of it as art.
Portraiture, live photography of events, those are skills. It absolutely is not as simple as pushing a button. Even now, with digital cameras that can make some of the adjustments on the fly, a photographer getting a good image is more than luck.
That’s why, when doing portraits and event photography, there’s contracts in place. It is entirely possible to hire a photographer and have ownership of the images. It’s expensive, but it’s possible. You or me? We ain’t taking pictures of Ozzy and having them be worth much of anything at all to anyone else, including Ozzy. Our images would only be monetarily valuable because he’s in them, and maybe not even then. A selfie at a back stage event? You aren’t making shit off of that
A professional photographer, taking high quality images of famous people absolutely brings value to the end photo. There’s a reason why rich, famous people will hire them and negotiate contracts with them, and it isn’t because they’re too lazy to handle a camera, or don’t have flunkies willing to do the work.
Again, if we wanna debate the merits of capitalism and it’s impact on the arts, that’s a fascinating subject. But this lawsuit, within the current legal paradigm, is perfectly valid. The photographer has rights to the images, Ozzy doesn’t. If Ozzy had wanted those rights, it is possible (in general) to do so, either at the time or afterwards.
Maybe you haven’t run across it, but there’s actually a lot of people into portraiture as art. They’ll gladly pony up thousands, or more for what they consider great art photos of people that aren’t famous at all. Even Anne Geddes (the photographer of the baby bee image) has fans of her stuff willing to pay tidy sums, and her stuff is essentially fluff with little complexity. Well executed fluff, but still. You get into the serious portraiture photogs and you’re talking sometimes hundreds of thousands for prints, though it’s kinda rare to go that high afaik.
This can’t be overstated. Taking good portraits of people is not easy. The requisite skills go beyond the technical aspects of photography, extending into social skill territory. You have to know how to direct people, you have to understand body language and what emotions it may convey. Being able to create flattering images, while working with subjects of various personalities and standards, takes skill.
I enjoy photography. But I don’t do portraits.
An image can have earth-shattering aesthetic value due to the skill and sensitivity of the photographer, or can be an ineptly snapped photo of Jennifer Aniston that’s only valuable because she’s in it. Either way the photographer has all the rights and the subject has none, and I don’t think that makes sense.
That’s just it, the subject does have rights. I’m not sure why you think they don’t.
While truly public photos have distant different rules, these weren’t public photos.
Neil Zlozower is a specialist in music photography. While I don’t expect anyone to know that without looking, it is easily available information.
If you don’t know what that means, it means that musicians are his collaborators, not some random people he snapped pics of as they walked down the road.
The photos in question were taken under contract. Ozzy agreed to the terms, or Zlozower wouldn’t have been able to take them. The pics with Randy Rhodes may be famous, but that doesn’t mean that Ozzy can just up and decide to use them in violation of that contract.
This isn’t some random asshole that had a small 110 camera in his pocket and caught a few pics. He was a professional there to take pics, and everything was agreed on, and signed, before he took the first one.
Now, what that agreement was, I have no clue. But, and this is the important part, it absolutely would have included usage rights. Most of the time, such contracts don’t include the subject of the photos being able to use them commercially. And that’s what the lawsuit is about, the photographer is saying that the usage was commercial, and violates his copyright.
Now, if you want to say that isn’t the way things should be that’s a different issue. But that’s the way things are, no matter what anyone’s opinion is.