When setting up a photography website, you'll need to make sure that your intellectual property rights are covered. In particular, it's important to understand what a copyright notice is, and what a copyright clause is. They're related, but separate parts of protecting your website content and photography.

This article will cover what copyright notices are, what copyright clauses are, and some examples of each for photography websites.

Let's get started.


Copyright is an intellectual property right. Intellectual property is a type of property people can have in things like ideas, expressions of those ideas, or creative works.

Copyright covers original works including writing, poetry, images, videos, music, theatre plays, and even computer software.

You gain copyright automatically when you are the author of the original work. In the case of photography, you are considered to be the author of the photograph when you have taken the image as the photographer.

A copyright notice or disclaimer is a symbol or statement that shows that you have copyright in a work.

It is often displayed as the © symbol, and includes the words "Copyright" or "All Rights Reserved." This symbol is used globally to indicate copyright in a work.

An effective copyright notice should include:

  • The copyright symbol or the word "copyright"
  • The name of the copyright holder
  • The year when the work was first published

Here's an example from Chelsea Heller Photography:

Chelsea Heller Photography website copyright notice

You can see in this example the words "Copyright," as well as the © symbol, the date, and the name of the copyright holder are included.

Because copyright comes to you automatically (you don't need to register it), a copyright notice is not always necessary. However, it can make it much clearer for your users, or for anyone looking at your photography work, that you have copyright in those images. It also makes it clear that they should obtain permission from you if they want to use the image.

If you run into legal issues or disputes, a copyright notice can make it very clear that you have rights in the photograph in dispute. You'll often see copyright notices on websites, and photography websites are no exception.

Let's take a look now at where you should display these notices.

You should display your copyright notice in the footer of all your website pages.

You can also include a watermark or copyright notice on your images if you choose to do so. These watermarks look like this example from Mei Photography:

Mei photography watermark

However, watermarks and copyright notices can be easily removed from images these days, so it has fallen out of favor somewhat in the industry.

A better practice for protecting copyright in the image is to only ever upload lower resolution images online. This way, if a copyright dispute occurs, you can prove that you are the only one who has the higher-resolution image.

Copyright notices on your website footer also indicate clearly that the content on the website belongs to you. Let's take a look at some examples.

This example from David Amoils Photography is displayed in the footer of the website:

David Amoils Photography website copyright notice

You can see that it includes the word "Copyright," the copyright symbol ©, the date (2020), and the name of the photographer, David Amoils Photography. It also states "All Rights Reserved," which is very common, but unnecessary.

You can also see in this example from Kristen Bullard Photography, which is also displayed in the footer of the website, that a date range (2017-2025) is included instead of one date:

Kristen Bullard Photography website copyright notice

The date range can be included when you are updating a website often or the website includes a range of works with different publication dates.

Alongside a copyright notice, you'll also need to include a copyright clause in your Privacy Policy or Terms and Conditions.

Let's take a look at those now.

A copyright clause is a clause in a legal document, such as your Privacy Policy or Terms and Conditions. It explains to your users what rights you have to your work, and what rights they have, if any.

A copyright clause could also cover any consequences for infringement (e.g. if someone steals your photographs) or ways in which website users could contact you, to ask permission to use your work.

There are several key points that copyright clauses should cover. These include:

  • What type of content your copyright is in and prohibited uses
  • Permitted uses for the content e.g. copying, adapting, sharing, including sharing social media, reposting as embedded or inline content, or other online uses
  • Consequences for infringement
  • Licensing

Let's take a look at each of those in more detail.

Type of Content and Prohibited Uses

Some copyright clauses, or portions of them, cover what type of content the copyright covers. This could be website text, photographs, albums in your portfolio, or user-generated content if your photography website allows users to upload things.

In this example from Spoiled Rotten Photography, you can see that the clause refers to "content and information of this site, including the arrangement and presentation thereof". This would protect the photographs, website copy, and website design:

Spoiled Rotten Photography Terms and Conditions: Intellectual Property Rights and Use of Information clause

You can see also that it specifies people may not "copy, reproduce, publish, distribute, transmit, display, license, sell, create derivative works from, or otherwise exploit the content" of the website.

It's up to you how specific you are with setting out prohibited uses, and it's also okay if you want to only state that you have copyright in the works, as copyright protects all of these things, as well.

This example from Duo Photography is very basic, stating only that the copyright is in "all photographic works resulting from the booking" with the photographer. It sets out potential things that the photographer might use the photos for, such as competitions, advertising, art, or other business purposes:

Duo Photography Terms and Conditions: Copyright Policy clause

Whether you decide to mention just your photographs, or other things from your website such as text or other items, is up to you. In this example from Mary Barella Photography you can see it covers "all text, graphics, logos, names, artwork, photographs and videos."

Whatever is important to you to protect and maintain legal rights in, you should state that in your clause.

Mary Barella Photography Terms of Use: Copyright clause

You can also see in this example that the clause states people may not "modify, copy, reproduce, republish, upload, post, transmit or distribute" the website contents. This is quite similar to the approach from Spoiled Rotten Photography, but you can see they've used slightly different wording.

Now let's take a look at how clauses approach it when you want to specify permitted uses of your photographs.

Permitted Uses

You can also include in your copyright clause a statement about which uses of your work are permitted. For a photography website, this could consist of personal use or printing of photographs at home, sharing on social media, or marketing purposes.

Here's one example from Jody Sutton Photography that includes permitted uses:

Jody Sutton Photography Terms and Conditions: Copyright clause

Here, you can see that the photographer allows reproduction and publishing for "personal use," including wall hangings at home, Facebook, or blogs. The clause explicitly does not allow sale or publication for profit without the photographer's permission.

In this example from Alice Whitby Wedding Photography it clearly states that the copyright of the photographs is retained by the photographer at all times. However, it also allows certain permitted uses, such as when a digital version of the photograph has been given to clients as part of a wedding collection:

Alice Whitby Wedding Photography Terms and Conditions: Copyright clause

The clause outlines that those digital versions of photographs are able to be used online or printed, but only for personal use. Commercial use isn't allowed, unless the person gets permission from the photographer.

Think about what uses would make sense for your photography clients to have: personal use is a common one, for example.

In this example from Emma Gibson Photography, it also allows photographs to be used for personal use, particularly the digital images. Like other clauses, it specifies that commercial use is not allowed:

Emma Gibson Photography Terms and Conditions: Intellectual property rights clause

In addition, cropping, resizing, editing and otherwise altering the photographs is also not allowed.

In this example from Elise Roseann Photography, the clause provides a similar example, but in simpler language:

Elise Roseann Photography Terms and Conditions: Intellectual property rights clause

Here, you can see that people are allowed to "view, download and print" content from the website for personal use. Commercial uses and modifications are not allowed. In addition, copyright marks, trademarks, and other proprietary marks (such as watermarks) have to be retained on the image.

Consequences for Infringement

You should include a clause or portion of the clause that deals with what will happen if someone breaches your copyright.

You can see in this example clause from Kristen Bullard Photography, that it covers potential consequences for infringement. This includes financial penalties and injunctions (a legal order to stop doing the infringing act):

Kristen Bullard Photography Terms and Conditions: Intellectual property notice clause

In this example from First Man Photography, you can see it takes a different approach. It doesn't talk about prosecution or injunctions, and focuses rather on smaller penalties:

First Man Photography Terms and Conditions: Intellectual property rights clause

You can see in the clause that printing, copying or downloading parts of the website, such as the photographs, without permission, will terminate the person's right to use the website. It also says that the person must potentially return or destroy any copies that have been made.

Approaches like this are often used as a way to prevent escalation, and prevent lawyers from having to get involved. Photographers can explain smaller penalties for violations, while having legal recourse as a backup option if the infringing person doesn't listen.

Licensing

Finally, similar to the "permitted uses" section of a copyright clause, you might also want to include specific licenses. Licenses are permitted uses, but with a more established framework and language around what that license is for. Some clauses talk about permitted uses, while others talk about licenses. It's up to you how formally you want to approach the process.

This is an example from Chelsea Heller Photography. It's a little bit similar to some of the "permitted use" sections or clauses, but it explicitly describes it as a license that is given for personal, non-commercial, transitory viewing only:

Chelsea Heller Photography Terms of Use: License clause

Note that the clause also explicitly does not allow modifying or copying, using for commercial purposes, reverse engineering of any software, removing copyright marks, or mirroring the materials on any other server.

This example from Matt Cant Photography also establishes licenses, under what it refers to as a "Usage License:"

Matt Cant Photography Terms and Conditions: Copyright and usage licences clause

The Usage License in this case is agreed individually between the photographer and the client, depending on the circumstances. You can either keep all licenses the same (i.e. grant all clients the same license), or determine the license conditions differently for each person, depending on what you need and what they need.

Summary

Copyright notices and clauses for photography websites can be confusing, and people often include symbols and terms without knowing what they mean. But both the copyright notice and the clause in your Terms of Use have set purposes and formats that you should follow if you want to make sure you are legally protected.

Including both a copyright notice on your website and a copyright clause in your legal documents, can help to protect your intellectual property.

Don't forget to include statements on what content is protected, which uses are prohibited, any permitted uses or licenses, and the consequences for infringement.

With this approach, you can be sure that your photographs are protected, and that you have a clear path of recourse if someone should breach your copyright.

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