Photography news and tips for the hobbyist or seasoned pro
Using Photos from Facebook
As a photographer I’m flattered when someone decides to use my photo for their personal use. It shows that they enjoy it enough to show their network of friends. For me, it becomes a problem or a point of contention, when either of the following happens:
1) Cropping out the watermark or not properly crediting me as the photographer. How hard is it to mention, “Photo by: ……”?
2) Using the photo for commercial use. If someone is making a profit from it, or using it to make a profit in another endeavor then they should be compensating me as the photographer.
Stealing is stealing, even if you had the best intentions.
Personal vs. Commercial
Unfortunately it’s a regular occurrence. I have images that have watermarks cropped out, no one knows the image was taken by me. I don’t bother with those issues as it would take up a lot of my time. What I do go after is people using my images for commercial use. Those are less rare but also more damaging to the photographic industry. If someone is making money off of my photos then why the heck aren’t I?
My Example
I won’t use any names in order to avoid any further issues. The example I have below is one of where I was shooting for a music festival, the DJ took my image of themselves and used it for their profile pic (subsequently cropping out my watermark). A graphic designer for a promoter took that image to use in a flyer. The flyer was posted all over their Facebook page to promote a paid event in which commercial activity was happening (i.e. cover, selling drinks, etc.). Here are the steps I took:
1) Contacted the promoter to kindly add a photo credit or take all images down.
2) Provided them a deadline to take the images down should they choose to take that route.
3) After the deadline expired and some images still existed online, I contacted Facebook directly to have them removed.
How to get an image removed from Facebook
It was actually very simple and fast for me to get my images removed from Facebook (as long as you own the copyright to the images). Click on the link below to go to Facebook’s help section on this matter.
If, after reading the help section and you still can’t find the link to file a claim you can just click here. In my experience Facebook contacted me right away and said they would remove the photos. The photos were removed within a day.
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