Image licensing, in plain terms

Every commissioned photograph has two things attached to it: the copyright, and a licence. Understanding the difference saves time on the estimate and avoids awkward conversations a year later.

Copyright stays with the studio

As with most working photographers, we hold the copyright in the images we make. What you buy with a commission is a licence: written permission to use the photographs in agreed ways. For most clients this changes nothing day to day. It simply sets out where the images can run.

Personal licences

Portrait and wedding clients receive a personal licence with their gallery. You can print the images, hang them, share them with family and post them on your own social accounts. What it does not cover is commercial use, such as a venue or a brand using your wedding photographs in an advert. Those requests come to us, and we ask you before agreeing.

Commercial licences

For brands, a licence is written to the use. Before we quote, we ask four questions:

• Media. Website, social, print, packaging, out of home, broadcast.

• Territory. One country, a region, or worldwide.

• Term. How long the images run: one year, three years, or longer.

• Exclusivity. Whether we can license the same frames to anyone else.

The answers set the licence fee, which appears as its own line on the estimate next to the day rate and retouching. A campaign running on billboards across a country for three years costs more to license than a set of frames for one product page, even when the shoot itself is the same.

Editorial use

Magazines license images for a specific edition and its online version. If a feature is syndicated or reused, the publication asks again. For credited editorial use of archive images we often grant non-exclusive rights free of charge, subject to the photographer's approval.

Extending a licence

Plans change. If a campaign runs longer than expected or moves into a new market, write to us before the term ends and we extend it in writing. Extensions are almost always simpler and cheaper than a new shoot.

If you are unsure what you need, send us a description of where the images will run and we will write the licence around it.