I posted a picture of a musician from a house concert on my FB Page and the person in the picture wrote that he is interested in buying this picture for use on his website etc. That's an absolute first for me!!!! What do I do? How much do I charhge????? Is there anything copyright-wise that I have to think about? I know many of you have experiences with selling pictures and I would be greatful for tips!!!
First, congrats on getting a request for an image. It's a great feeling, isn't it? What you charge is completely up to you. As far as copyright, that's also up to you. You could relinquish full rights, you could retain all rights and release just the artist to use it however they wish, or retain rights to the point of stipulating what the artist can use it for. There's a bit of a catch-22 here though. If you were not standing on public property when you took the photo and also did not get a model release from the artist, then you really couldn't sell it elsewhere anyway without risk of being sued. So the whole point of your rights to the image would start to get muddy. Also, you mentioned a "house concert", but if it was taken in a place of business which would be recognizable in the image, technically you should get a release from the business owner before you sell it. Just in case. If it was in someone's else home (or yours even) and there's anything recognizable to compromise the home (including any geotagging in the photo metadata) you'll want to resolve that before selling it. Nobody says they'll sue and we never think they will, but sadly...it happens.
I would say it probably ends up being a matter of what your future plans for your photography are. I encounter musicians and other artists when I'm doing event photography. If I take photos of other artists or individual proprietors (caterers, entertainers, etc), I usually ask for a business card and send the image(s) to them for free. I also "like" their FB page from my FB page and tag them in the image. This is in hope of establishing a reciprocal business relationship with them -- or if nothing else, at least leveraging their fan base as potential customers for me. All I ask of them is to leave my (fairly inconspicuous) watermark on the image so that if people like it they can look me up. And, it *has* actually worked - once. Granted it's only been that once and I've given many images away...I just view it as good karma if nothing else -- who knows? On the other hand, if that kind of business relationship is of no interest to you in the foreseeable future, then charge whatever you think the artist is willing to pay. The more of your rights to the image that you relinquish, the more you can charge.
I suppose if I truly was going to sell an image to an artist on their request, I would probably charge them slightly less than what my portrait sessions cost. That way they pay slightly less than what they would have if they had simply hired me to make a portrait for them. But what if you don't have a photography business yet and charge for portraits now, then what to charge? Well, when I started I looked up all the photographers in my area, compared my work to theirs, and charged what I thought was realistic based on my level of work in comparison to theirs.
Sorry, I tend to have long-winded answers because I try to cover all the bases which sometimes isn't even necessary. But if you got through it all I hope it helped.
I think in the end it comes down to whether or not you see this as a start of a business venture, or an acknowledgement of your work by someone else.
For what it's worth, last year I was at an arts festival in a Chicago neighborhood. I thought one of the artist's work was particularly interesting and took an image of it, then processed it a bit, and sent it to the artist just to say that I found his work intriguing. A few weeks ago he contacted me to ask if he could use the image on a business card and on his website. I gave him permission and asked him simply to share a link with me so that I could cite it if I ever decided to formally create a portfolio of where my work was shared, and asked that if he had an area of his website where he acknowledged credits, to include credit to me for the photo. And he agreed. A lot depends on whether you plan to open a business based in your photography work and then it's worth keeping track of income and expenses, or if it's more about recognition for when your work is used.
And congrats for this wonderful response to your image!
congratulations! I usually just give away photos requested (not many have been mind you). I just don't want the hassle of business stuff nor do I ever think I am good enough to charge for photography. whatever you choose to do, I would think photo credit on the site would be appropriate!
Thank you so much for congratulations and of course for your input! I feel much better now after the initial "shock" of someone wanting to have/use my photo! I feel better now after reading all of your helpful input.
@dbj_365 - Thank you for your incredibly detailed answer with lots of points that I haven't even knew were important. Very helpful!
Someone asked if they could use a photo I took of him and a burrowing owl last year to accompany an article he was writing for a bird of prey magazine. I was delighted and was happy to let him have it as long as he credited me. I have never seen it but I am an amateur and happy to share especially as he asked. Congratulations.
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I would say it probably ends up being a matter of what your future plans for your photography are. I encounter musicians and other artists when I'm doing event photography. If I take photos of other artists or individual proprietors (caterers, entertainers, etc), I usually ask for a business card and send the image(s) to them for free. I also "like" their FB page from my FB page and tag them in the image. This is in hope of establishing a reciprocal business relationship with them -- or if nothing else, at least leveraging their fan base as potential customers for me. All I ask of them is to leave my (fairly inconspicuous) watermark on the image so that if people like it they can look me up. And, it *has* actually worked - once. Granted it's only been that once and I've given many images away...I just view it as good karma if nothing else -- who knows? On the other hand, if that kind of business relationship is of no interest to you in the foreseeable future, then charge whatever you think the artist is willing to pay. The more of your rights to the image that you relinquish, the more you can charge.
I suppose if I truly was going to sell an image to an artist on their request, I would probably charge them slightly less than what my portrait sessions cost. That way they pay slightly less than what they would have if they had simply hired me to make a portrait for them. But what if you don't have a photography business yet and charge for portraits now, then what to charge? Well, when I started I looked up all the photographers in my area, compared my work to theirs, and charged what I thought was realistic based on my level of work in comparison to theirs.
Sorry, I tend to have long-winded answers because I try to cover all the bases which sometimes isn't even necessary. But if you got through it all I hope it helped.
For what it's worth, last year I was at an arts festival in a Chicago neighborhood. I thought one of the artist's work was particularly interesting and took an image of it, then processed it a bit, and sent it to the artist just to say that I found his work intriguing. A few weeks ago he contacted me to ask if he could use the image on a business card and on his website. I gave him permission and asked him simply to share a link with me so that I could cite it if I ever decided to formally create a portfolio of where my work was shared, and asked that if he had an area of his website where he acknowledged credits, to include credit to me for the photo. And he agreed. A lot depends on whether you plan to open a business based in your photography work and then it's worth keeping track of income and expenses, or if it's more about recognition for when your work is used.
And congrats for this wonderful response to your image!
Thank you so much for congratulations and of course for your input! I feel much better now after the initial "shock" of someone wanting to have/use my photo! I feel better now after reading all of your helpful input.
@dbj_365 - Thank you for your incredibly detailed answer with lots of points that I haven't even knew were important. Very helpful!
Vera