Publishing Pitfalls

On the 2nd November, a storm battered Aberystwyth's promenade.  Waves crashed over parked cars, stones and debris rained down on the road and it was spectacular.  Naturally, Coyote and I were there with my trusty Pentax, snapping away and even taking a short video.

Always happy to help, on the following Monday I offered images from my Flickr page to a local newspaper for free; asking only that I received a credit in print.  The reporter I approached seemed over the moon, calling me a 'star' and stating that they had plenty of 'after' photographs but no 'during' images, so I was chuffed that I could be of assistance!

So when the new edition of the newspaper hit the shelves on the Thursday, I went to buy a copy in the hope of seeing one or two of my photographs in print.  Imagine my shock when I saw a photograph that Coyote had shared on Twitter on the front page of the Aberystwyth edition...

I took that photograph as we sat in Minty, enjoying the thrill of the storm.  Coyote uploaded it immediately, wanting to share our experience with our friends.  Within minutes, his phone was on overdrive with retweets, comments and favourites.  We'd obviously hit on a winner!  But little did we know at the time that this image would appear in at least 2 editions of The Cambrian News without permission or credit.

Disappointment soon gave way to a bitter curiosity.  Could newspapers actually lift images from social media and publish them without so much as a 'please'?  I immediately posed this question online, and all responses agreed that it shouldn't have happened.  Some likened it to an act of piracy while others pointed out that if the tables were turned and I published something of theirs without permission, they'd come down on me like the proverbial tonne of bricks.  All lights were green to let rip and unleash merry hell.

But this Roadrunner is, for her sins, a wary pessimist.  There was bound to be some red tape; some loophole...some niggling legality somewhere that meant they were perfectly innocent in publishing my photograph without permission...wasn't there?

I chose to start at the beginning.  That's usually a good place.  I emailed The Cambrian News with my concerns:

Dear Ms Thomas;

I'm emailing you regarding a photograph that appeared on the front page and inside the 7th November Aberystwyth edition of your newspaper and, I'm told, inside another edition (please see attached).

I'm a photographer.  On the night of the storm, my fiancé and I drove down to Aberystwyth with a view to taking professional photographs for publication and broadcast.  In a break from capturing images with my own camera, I took the attached photograph for my fiancé on his phone, and he uploaded it to Twitter to share with our friends.

The following Monday, I offered one of your reporters high quality images for free - asking only that I was given a credit.  Imagine my surprise, then, when I went to buy a copy of The Cambrian News as I do every week...and saw this photograph on the front.

At no point was permission sought to publish this photograph.

This has led me to wonder what your protocols are regarding using images found on social media.  I've spoken to several journalists and newspaper reporters who stated that every effort should be made to find the original source of an image; seeking permission for publication when the source has been found.

Please clarify your procedure for publishing images found on social media.  If there's a directive somewhere that means I could be surprised again by one of my snapshots appearing on a front page, I'd very much like to be aware of it.

Yours sincerely;

***

I received a response today:

Hi;

As you say, we do try to find out the source, but if we are unable to we have on occasion taken pictures from public pages when they are good images - which yours was.

I am sorry we didn't credit you on this occasion.

If you are keen to get some pictures published, I will be happy to consider images from you in the future, and to give you a credit in print.

Just out of interest, do you know which reporter you spoke to on the Monday - as I cannot find anyone who seems to remember the conversation.

Yours sincerely

***

Ignoring the backhanded compliments and condescending offer of future publication, it seemed that they were unable to find the original source of the photograph. Is it really that difficult to do? There was only one way to find out.

16 days have passed since that photograph was uploaded.  If it was going to be difficult to find it, I'd have my work cut out for me.  Ensuring I was logged out of Twitter to avoid any easy links to shared followers, I started the search...

Hmm.  How would I go about finding photographs tagged with Aberystwyth?  Oh, I know - I'll click the 'Photos' tab...

A tiny bit of scrolling to get past over 2 weeks' worth of images and, lo and behold, there's the photograph.  Now then - I wonder who posted it?  Let's click on the photo...

Hmm.  That doesn't seem to be the original poster.  The 'RT' at the start of the tweet gives that away.  The first person mentioned doesn't seem to be the original poster either...the 'RT' after their name gives that away.  But hang on a minute...who is this 'MarkTheTravel'?  Better click on his profile and have a look through his timeline...

Ah, look!  There's the photograph!  But how do I know it's the original?  Well - the amount of retweets and favourites certainly suggest it is...but let's be on the safe side and ask the poster, shall we?

Oh wait - I don't need to.  Because I took it and was sat next to him when he uploaded it.

Unable to find the source?  How?  Not quite up to speed on how to use a computer to do a quick bit of research?  They didn't even try.

Copyright legalities aside (I'm not in the mood for wading through treacle today), I'm shocked by the ease with which a photograph was lifted from social media and published in a newspaper without permission.  The managing editor of the newspaper stated herself that they 'do try to find the source' when clearly, on this occasion at least, they didn't.  If I could find the source of the image with a few clicks 16 days after it was uploaded, then it's glaringly obvious that no effort was made on their part.

Why didn't they try?  Perhaps a photo credit is a rare, mystical thing that should be closely guarded.  Perhaps their computers all broke in some mass hard drive suicide.  Or perhaps they're just lazy.   

This blog post isn't about rights and laws.  After all; I probably haven't got a leg to stand on legally...but I can share what's happened to me.  I just want this to serve as a warning to you all; photographers or not.  Next time you're about to share an image on social media, be aware that it could be staring out at you from the front page of a newspaper the next time you pop out for a pint of milk.

The Project

Greetings from a soggy Dulas Valley!

Just thought we'd keep you posted with what we're up to at the moment.

We've decided to lay our sprout guns down for a while and concentrate on something a little more artistic.  That's not to say, of course, that sprout guns aren't artistic (sprout purée shows up lovely on black paint and chrome), we just want to have a crack at something that involves longer attention spans.

This is where the problem may lie.  You see, we have the attention spans of goldf...ooh!  A MOTH!

...an hour later...

That was a very unusual moth.  He looked a bit like Michael Gambon.  Anyway...where were we?  Oh yeah. We want to create a video that features some of Wales' gorgeous scenery.  Be it lakes, cityscapes, forests, waves on the sand, busy shopping centres or sprawling mountain vistas, we want to capture a bit of Wales in pixels.  However, we don't want to do it the easy way.  Taking a few photos and bunging them together in a slideshow is a bit boring...as is setting up a camera on a tripod and letting it roll for a few seconds.  So - how to make it that little bit different?  Combine the two into something like this!

That's just a test batch we took in Aberdyfi yesterday.  39 photographs condensed into 9 seconds.  Ideally, we'd like around 30 different locations, all edited together in sections to present a funky tour around this unique country.  It'll be quite a big undertaking, but we hope to create something that reflects the beauty of Wales...with a little Coyote and Roadrunner edge.  The photos will be polished and the timing tightened up, so the finished result should be quite snappy and bright.

If you have any suggestions for places we should visit for this project, please let us know!  We've got a few in mind, but your input would be fabulous.  As regular readers will know; we've seen a fair old bit of Wales (656 places so far) but not all of it.  Your suggestions would be delicious...like a slice of hot, melted cheese on toast.  Mmm...melted cheese on toast...you want that now.  You know you do.

So yes - please get in touch!  Many of you have already got my email address - so use it!  Or you can tweet us: @Goleudy or @MarkTheTravel.

Tarra for now.  We hope to hear from some of you soon! xx

PS: We saw a fully-grown man skipping down the road past HQ last night.  Just thought we'd mention that.

A Load of Pap

Hi folks, Coyote here.

I know it's unusual for me to do the wordy bits (I'm usually busy pondering what bird is on packets of Stork), but I thought I'd tell you about what happened recently.  Roadrunner would tell you herself, but she can't muster up the courage to recall the events.

For some reason, her photographic career briefly veered off in an unusual direction.  A bit like when we see a BOFmobile; there's no telling where we'll end up in our clamour to escape.  You see; she usually takes photographs of landscapes, seagulls and dinosaurs in hedges.  However, recently she wandered into the realms of the paparazzi. 

'Ooh, glamorous!' you're probably thinking.  Er...no.  You see, she seemed to only photograph Welsh celebrities.  She wasn't at all interested in those plastic-types you see on TV these days; nor those puffed-up singers that invade our charts with soporific crap.

Just the other day, for instance, she was lurking outside a big marquee when HRH The Queen staggered out, drunk off her skull on gin.  Her Madge then proceeded to pick a fight with a nearby pigeon, loudly blaming it for her crown not fitting while throwing her shoes at it.  Was Roadrunner delighted to be presented with such a golden opportunity for shutterbugging?  No.  She was looking the other way and snapped...

Jamie Owen.  For those of you who don't know who he is, he's a Welsh newsreader, radio host and author.  He actually writes books about Wales, now I come to think of it.  Maybe we should introduce him to Wynford Vaughan-Thomas.

I thought it was just a blip.  She was, after all, a novice when it came to the cut-throat world of competitive photography.  Sadly, it happened again.

This weekend we were out and about stalking BOFs with our new sprout-launcher when we happened upon a large crowd.  We wrestled our way in to see what all the fuss was about...and found Alan Sugar and Simon Cowell playing naked tiddlywinks while Katie Price served drinks that were balanced on her exceedingly large bosom.  Not only that, but Boy George was riding about on a unicycle wearing a sombrero and singing Army drinking songs.  I turned, expecting to see Roadrunner snapping away with  glittering pound signs in her eyes...but no.  She was on the other side of the street photographing...

Derek Brockway.  As I understand that we have a worldwide audience, I appreciate that many of you won't know who this is.  Derek is a well-loved Welsh weatherman who makes forecasting look like ballet while wearing interesting ties.

Perhaps Roadrunner was just distracted by his fluffy microphone.  She does rather like fluffy things - like kittens and Brian May's hair.  I was willing to put it down to that; believing that she would get the hang of it eventually.  

I was wrong.

We popped into town yesterday to buy the newspapers.  We don't read them - good god no - they just make cheap fire lighters.  Especially The Daily Mail; and that's probably because of the high volume of methane emitted from the bullshit on the pages.  But I digress.

As we walked up to the newsagents, we heard a loud, blood-curdling scream on the other side of the road.  An elderly lady was beating someone over the head with her handbag, shouting obscenities while onlookers egged her on.  Upon closer inspection, it became apparent that the lady was thrashing ten shades of poop out of David Cameron.  He cowered at her feet, rambling something about being 'only economical with the truth' while she called him things that not even Samuel and Sybil would repeat.  Where was Roadrunner...?  She was facing in the opposite direction capturing...

Louise Elliott.  Another Welsh radio host, journalist and bunion expert.  I was going to tell Roadrunner that I thought she should give up the paparazzi lark, but just as I opened my mouth I noticed the expression on Ms Elliott's face.  Then I noticed that she was striding towards Roadrunner.

As I legged it faster than you can say 'cheese', I don't quite know what happened.  When I returned, Roadrunner was lying on the floor with her camera wrapped around her neck, croaking something about satsumas being 'surprisingly painful'. 

Since then, she hasn't taken a photograph of anyone else.  She hasn't taken a photo of anything, actually.  In fact, when I moved her camera from the kitchen table and went to hand it to her, her eyes widened and she paced backwards, twitching and crying.

I think, in time, she'll get back to photography.  I just don't think she'll be pointing her lens at any Welsh public figures any time soon.

Lord knows what Louise Elliott did, but Roadrunner now faints every time she sees a satsuma.

Photos: Landscapes

Sunsets, clouds, seascapes, cliffs...nature's finest :)

Photos: Animals

Cute, majestic, funny or random; here are just some of the critters we've snapped while out and about!