Part 1 - The Rights of the Model Part 2 - The Rights of Subjects?

 My Little Lady

Very interesting series of posts written by Dr. L and Alex over at What We Saw Today concerning the rights of the model and the acknowledgment they deserve.  While I think both parties need to be fairly acknowledged, will this push move beyond models?

Part 1 

Without the hard work and gifts of the models I've worked with, my photos would be nothing.  I greatly appreciate them and give them the credit I can.  Along with paying their modeling fees, I also send them a cd with the images I find good enough for their own promotional use.  If I ever make a great amount of money off of an image, I will share a fair portion with the model since we made the art

As I wrote in my comments to one of the posts, 

"While sharing the credit for the contributions of both the model and photographer to the final piece is crucial, it must also be decided upon before the art is created. Both sides need to stop making assumptions on where the credit of the creativity belongs. It is important to decide these issues in the planning discussions before the first click of the camera shutter."

Two of the models I've worked with have specified in writing in the model release they want to know where I will exhibit, post or publish any images of the images they appear in.  Neither stated they would limit the usage of the images, just wanted awareness of their placement.  I've always honored their requests because it was the right thing to do and was in the contract.  One thing I suggest to all models and photographers is to make these decisions before the shoot, not after.  To be honest, I would be upset if a model wanted to add restricting or additional rights sharing clauses after the photo shoot.  That is why I will from now on send future models I work with my model release before the session so we can negotiate language changes.

Alex made an interesting comment about painting versus photographing a model.

Let's go back to the world of photography. Most nude photographers regard themselves as artists, and indeed they are, but photography is a very different art form from painting or sculpting. It really relies heavily on the active participation of another person, the model - unless of course the photographer only shoots landscapes or objects or is a street photographer, shooting subjects rather than models.

The input of the model is much more significantly tangible in an art photograph than it is in a painting. The photographic model has every right to be acknowledged, i.e., named. And yes, s/he should be entitled to share the copyright of the image and have rights to its reproduction. All sorts of restrictions can be put in place, of course, so that the image is not further processed or manipulated by anyone else once it is finalised, but share of copyright simply means that the authorship is shared.

There is a part of this I agree with concerning the art model's role in creating the image.  To paraphrase my statement above, my photographs with models would be empty without them and have no meaning or purpose.  They added crucial and very necessary contributions to the shared creation of those pieces

I am not sure how I feel about some of the subtle subtext in this statement that I am reading into it. This statement makes me think that Alex has a different opinion on the artistic contribution, creativity and role of the photographer in creating an image compared to a painter or sculptor.  I could photograph a nude and make a beautiful print of it or I could create a painting from the image, yet it feels like I am judged more as an artist by picking up the brush, not loading the image into the enlarger.  Maybe I am being defensive, but I feel the battle for recognition of photographer as artist is still not over.  Is it because of the ultra-realism of photography? 

I have a question about the rights of models who work with painters and sculptors.  What if a painter created a piece that was nothing like the model posed for, but was a graphic sexually explicit crotch shot painting with the model's face clearly visible and identifiable.  Does the model have a right to recourse?  I think the painter broke the trust of the relationship, but since the artist created a visual moment that did not exist, what can the model do?


Part 2

"... It really relies heavily on the active participation of another person, the model - unless of course the photographer only shoots landscapes or objects or is a street photographer, shooting subjects rather than models."  Alex from What We Saw Today

With the recent technology enabling everybody to take photos, people are taking more snaps of everything, everywhere, at all times.  Will subjects (or the owners of) soon be demanding profits and rights for the images?

I found this page at the National Park Service website about photography permits for professional photographers.  I can understand wanting a permit system if the park will have to provide extra personnel and/or will need to clean up or fix things after a photo shoot.  I am troubled that I  need to get the permit even if I am not requiring any more park resources compared to amateur photographers.  What is interesting that painters do not need these permits.

The most disturbing line (to me) at the website is:

In addition, the National Park Service has been directed by Congress to collect a fee to provide a fair return to the United States for the use of park lands.

I may be getting paranoid and probably will need to move back to Montana and live in the middle of nowhere worrying about black helicopters, but I am starting to think everybody is going to want a cut on anything produced by anybody.  Will there be a time when I will either have to pay a fee to San Francisco for photographing the Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz, or Coit Tower because I may make money with them?  Will I have to pay Yosemite National Park royalties on images of Half Dome that I sell?

At this point I have to ask, will painters, poets, sculptors, musicians, mixed media artists have to go through the same hoops?