I’m a photographer. I recently started a project where I listen to music, find some visual inspiration from them (not necessarily in line with the message of the song) and then go out and shoot those concepts. And to identify which project is which, I name the series of images with the song’s title, which as far as I know, isn’t copyrightable anyway.
The eventual goal for the pictures is to put them up on my website (www.rajibarbir.com) but WITHOUT the songs. In other words, I want the imagery to stand on its own with the music serving only as inspiration for a shoot concept. I know that using the actual song in conjunction with the imagery would likely get me in trouble so I’m avoiding that.
But if some record company were to trace the images on my website back to my blog where I do identify which song I used (I just did this the other day: http://rajibarbir.com/blog/2010/05/04/the-music-project-part-1-of-infinity/), can I be sued for copyright infringement? Will I be sent a cease and desist letter (this would force me to remove a lot of work from my website)?
They could sue you straight off but this is 99% not going to happen.
What they will do is contact you and tell you to remove it. If you fail to do this they will send a DMCA notice to the host of your site. Your site host will then tell you and you have to reply. After the reply the company that filed the DMCA notice will have a short time period to sue you or not.
I do parody websites and usually get DMCA notices once per year. So far I respond to them and I have never been sued. I don’t think I’m infringing, but the only way to find out for sure is for the companies to take me to court. Which none has ever done.
I think part in my favour is my websites are totally non-profit and for fun only. There is no ads or any intent to make money and I make it clear on every page that there is absolutely no connection with the original owner and I provide a link to the original material.
Since the hits are so small, it’s probably not worth suing me or they companies know they don’t have a leg to stand on.
Either way, you’ll be issued a cease-and-desist letter long before you’re actually sued, though technically they could sue you straight off, but why would they, when most of the time the C&D letter works
I also wanted to comment and say that you have the gift. Those pictures on your site were gorgeous and when it is time for me to get a proper portrait, I’ll be keeping you in mind! Sadly, as a middle age man, I don’t think I will have quite the same zing as some of those young female models!
Any copyright claim on this would be pretty tenuous and unlikely to succeed. I suppose they might try to claim it’s a derivative work, but even that is unlikely if you do as described.
Copyright is the right to make copies. You aren’t making copies. You’re not even playing the music. So the photos themselves are not an issue.
If you’re quoting from the lyrics, though, then you can infringe – not for the photos, but for the lyrics (basically, there’s no fair use for song lyrics).
If you just title that montage “Summer in the City,” though, the connection is not infringement. You can even acknowledge the inspiration. As long as the words of the song aren’t part of the work, you should be safe.
Seems to me one frequently sees episodes of TV shows bearing the title of a famous song. I can’t imagine that this involves any infringement or would invite any legal action.
I can’t see how what you propose would be any different, especially considering the total audience your work would be exposed to would be a small fraction of the audience of even a low-rated show.
I called an attorney and he said that the only issue that might arise is that a record company could claim that my work is an unauthorized derivative work from the songs I’m using for inspiration, but even there it’s highly unlikely and I could still fall back on fair use.
I researched derivative work and from what I could gather, my work would essentially have to be a copy with only minor adjustments. Like the Mona Lisa with a mustache.
And that’s the other thing, all the examples I’ve seen for derivative works being an issue, describe works within the same field. So music with a slightly different arrangement, a picture of a sculpture, a sculpture of a painting, etc etc. No mention of an artist translating music into imagery or any other cross-field artistic endeavors.
So from what I learned and from what the attorney told me, yes, I would have to remove the lyrics from the blog as they are basically like a poem and I can’t just use those, but I should be fine using the music for inspiration.
Hope this helps anyone else who ever comes across this question
Level3Navigator; Wow thanks for the compliments!! Are you located in Utah? I shoot for Utah Business Magazine every now and then, and all the men I shoot are about how you describe yourself. Middle-aged, good looking men who don’t particularly enjoy having their pictures taken They’re actually on my website, in the Portraits section
I would really like to emphasize that this was a very important thing for you to do. I’m glad you did it. And the advice he gave you seems pretty sound to me.
How is there no fair use for song lyrics? Why is it not like any other written artistic work, where you can quote small pieces? And why in the world are there so many lyric sites out there if they have to worry about getting cease-and-desist orders?
Wikipedia seems to be really big about copyright, and they’ll definitely quote lyrics under claims of fair use.
hmmm… That’s a good question… And now that I think of it, I only mentioned to the attorney that I would be quoting lyrics, not how much of them (in my case, just little portions of the whole thing).
Lyric sites by definition can’t be fair use, for at least two reasons: (1) they always copy the entire lyrics, (2) for no other reason than to tell people the lyrics. There’s absolutely no transformative use.
Quoting titles or small bits of lyrics can be fair use, depending on the circumstances, but the OP stated that he wasn’t planning on doing that anyway.
There is some pretty experimental music approaches out there. I can’t give you specifics, but my friends probably could. I myself, while not a musician, have wondered about converting images to MP3 files (or other playable formats) and listening to see what would result. Or in the other direction, taking music and making an image. Or making music or an image from the text in a book.
I am not so sure these would be fair use, especially if I commercialized them.
This is not what you are doing in your project, but it is what you are suggesting above. I am sure it is done all the time in the digital artistic world. Should any of it achieve commercial success, problems might arise.
I’m a musician and composer, so I have to deal with these issues all the time. As others have said, you can’t copyright a title. And parody/homage doesn’t infringe on copyright so long as you aren’t recreating content. So, as long as you don’t take a picture of the songs’ lyrics you’re fine.
Composers write songs inspired by other songs all the time and they don’t get sued for it. Why would you get sued for taking a picture inspired by a song?
“Songs inspired by other songs” covers a lot of territory.
Someone who came up with a parody song (e.g., Weird Al Yankovic’s “My Bologna”) would indeed get sued if he or she didn’t credit or co-credit the original song’s composer. (The composer credit on Weird Al’s parody remains Fiegler-Avarre, the members of The Knack who wrote “My Sharona.”)
Same deal with the “answer songs” that were once in vogue, such as Jeanne Black’s “He’ll Have to Stay” answering Jim Reeves’ “He’ll Have to Go.” (Does anyone do answer songs any more?)
On the other hand, if it’s just a brief lyrical snippet meant as an obvious homage (e.g., the “Lucy in the sky” reference in Pink Floyd’s “Let There Be More Light”), that’s not a problem.
In general, you can’t stop someone else from recording a cover version (or a parody) of a song you’ve written. (Weird Al’s policy has always been to ask the original artist for permission, and usually it’s granted.) But if you do this, you have to make sure the composer credit is handled properly.
