Stop Your Clients From Copying Your Work By...

Going to programs, seminars and conventions I have categorized photographers and their concerns about copyright protection into two groups, the photographers that don’t worry enough about protecting their work and those that worry too much about it. On one side you have photographers that profess that clients copying their work are putting them out of business and on the other side are photographers that are mildly concerned about protecting their copyright, but don’t think they lose enough business to worry too much about it. Just like most topics somewhere in the middle is where most photographers should be.

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For those photographers that look at each client as a potential copier you must realize that most people are good people and as long as you don’t make copying easy for them, they won’t cross the line and infringe on the copyright of your images. If you are being “put out of business by copiers” there are probably many other areas of your business involved in your business’ demise.

The second group of photographers is optimistic at heart; “All people are g ood at heart and my clients love me so much they would never copy my work, they are my friends”. Wake-up Alice, the dream is over. If an employee or bookkeeper stole 5% of your profits, would you be upset? Of course, you would be so mad you would want to call the police, well if you don’t protect your images you are losing more than 5% of your profit from copying.

Today, people are conditioned to look for a ways to obtain materials that have a copyright, without actually having to buy them. Music, Videos, software and yes your images all fall into this category. Talk with today’s high school/college age people and ask them about getting a single music track, they will tell you all kinds of sites that offer the latest music (which is of course has a copyright) for free. I have seen people at parties (photographers I might add) show a movie that was just released and is only showing at the movie theaters. However did they achieve that? (I wonder!) This brings up the first point of copyright protection, if you download music, videos and/or software for free that are illegally obtained you are a hypocrite if you complain when your clients copy your images. If the rules don’t apply to you, they shouldn’t apply to them either.

I personally think that the largest problem with the copying issue among photographers is that photographers enable their clients to copy by not establishing measures to stop copying. First question, do images (paper or on CD) leave your studio before they are paid for? This is a practice that photographers have engaged in for years and they never learn. If a store has something of value, do they allow you to take it home without purchasing it. I challenge you to do this, go to a jewelry store and have the person helping you take out three diamond rings that you like. Next give them a business card with all your contact information on it and then walk out of the Jewelry Store, explaining as you go that your husband/wife has to see them to help you make a decision. If you did this (I truly suggest you don’t), what would happen? Alarms would go off, an armed man would appear and take you somewhere but it wouldn’t be your “happy place”. (Stupidity Warning! If you are the type of person that needs McDonalds to put “Hot” on their coffee cups so you don’t pour it between your legs, then I need to tell you hear I am joking to make a point, please don’t try to take something out of a store unless you buy it first!”

This would happen for two reasons, reasons that many photographers don’t understand. First, if they let a customer, even a good customer take home their jewelry without payment it would say to the client the jewelry has little or no value, “after all, if it had any worth they wouldn’t have let me take it home without payment”. The second reason that any store or professional service, (except photographers) don’t allow products of value to go home is that no sales has ever been made in the history of business at home (when sales are set up to be made at a business location). You have no sales person, you have no credit card machine, nothing can happen at home, which is why clients want to take them home.

In the case of the photography studios, there is a third reason, and that is the client wants to get your images out of the studio so they can copy them. They take them home, scan them and then return them to you trying to get the deposit they paid returned to them. If you let any images out of your studio, the client must pay a high, non-refundable deposit to take them home and that deposit is only good toward their order. If you give clients a CD with the images on it, I want to go to your computer and print out a big sign, that says, “FREE IMAGES WITH EACH SESSION” because that is what you are doing. (Stupidity Alert! Again I am kidding here)The best situation is never let any of the images you have created leave your studio until the client picks up their final portrait order, period!

Once stop letting the images you create leave your studio, you have to take control over the three other areas that encourage your clients to copy your images.

1. Offering single portrait orders.

2. Have a logo on the front of each image and a copyright sticker on the back.

3. Texture all paper prints ordered up to 11x14 size.

Have you ever had a client that loved the images in the session you had created, but when it comes to ordering they tell you want an 8x10 of their two favorite poses? This is a strategy used by people that copy your images. Those 8x10’s go from your studio to the local Kinkos or other lab for all the copy photos for all the family and friends.

I believe you should never tell a client “No” when they ask for something, however I do think you can direct a client by your pricing to what you want or allow them to purchase. Some photographers have a minimum order, others will price a single 8x10 unit at the same price as their smallest package. However you do it you must price your single units so high that no one will order them. For photographers just starting out this seem crazy, but trust me the only clients that will complain are those that plan on copying your images.

In each of the steps you will get complaints, but those who are complaining are the people you want to stop. Would your good clients complain because you charge $200 for a single 8x10 with nothing else ordered? Of course not because your good clients don’t just order an 8x10 from a session!

By not allowing your images (except for the final orders) out of your studio and eliminating single unit purchases you will take care of most of the largest losses caused by copiers. For these are the people that know what they are doing is wrong and they just don’t care. The next two steps help keep your better clients honest and trains them to order what they need instead of wasting time trying to copy.

You need to put your logo on the front of each image that is produced by your studio. Make sure it is visible enough to be seen at Kinko’s or other copy centers but not so visible it becomes an eye-sore to the viewer of the portrait. We simply make our logo transparent in Photoshop, adding enough of a drop shadow and outer glow to make it visible. We then have an action add this and keep it the same proportional size for every size from wallets to 30x40.

In addition to that we apply a sticker to the back of each print which has the logo, copyright symbol and our phone number. In the past we have been told that some workers at the labs missed our logo on the front and it was caught after the prints were already done before pick-up. This sticker insures the honest printer will clearly see a logo and know not to run any copies.

The final step helps curb copying from the worst offenders, the techies. These are the people that work with computer frequently, have good scanners and think it cool to get products with a copyright for free. We texture every print that leaves the studio with a linen texture. The texture machine was about $1800 but it was worth every penny. The linen texture isn’t noticeable under glass or at a normal viewing distance, so your good clients have no reason to complain about it, but the texture is strong enough to degrade the copied image, making it a really bad copy.

No matter how many precautions you take to eliminate copying, you will always have some clients that try. The idea is to make as difficult as possible so copying takes up more time and is less convenient that just paying the price and ordering them from you in the first place. An additional benefit is that people talk. As you implement these ideas you will find that you have to deal with fewer people that want to copy. “Evil-doers” tend to spread the word for you to other potential Evil-doers. Once you implement these steps you will have greatly reduced the number of images that are stolen, at the same time you are free to focus on more important business matters.