Has anyone ever licensed a photo for a music album?

[Mjollnir]

I was just contacted by the manager for an indie group, well-known in it's genre with prior successful albums and currently on tour.

 They want to use one of my shots for the cover of the next release (yes, I know, there aren't really 'albums' anymore) and wish to negotiate for licensing rights.

 I'm at ease with legal language and licensing issue as I work in that business, but I have never sold (or tried to sell) a photo of mine before.

 Since I don't know their circumstances (it's a small label), and I've never done this before, I have zero idea what sort of sums of money would be reasonable.

 Anyone?

[fnagy]

Sorry for the late post, don't get around here much.

I have shot images for and licensed  existing images for albums? CD etc.  The only advice I can give you is that my fees for this type of image use has varied from $200 to $1600 (exluding actual costs of custom shoot).  Depends on what it's worth to the client and how much value your images bring to the table.

Be reasonable but do not under value your work, ask them what kind of budget for artwork they have (usually none), what other uses of the image do they invision, web? print?

Hope this helps

[louoates]

I wish I had. The closest I came was concerning the music group named "Magma Hotel" from eastern Europe somewhere. They simply stole a photograph from my web site called "Magma Hotel" that was a b/w shot of the long-closed Magma Hotel in Superior, AZ. They used it as a CD case cover. I notified them of the theft, showed them the original image and asked for payment. Never heard from them.

[tim wolcott]

Yes I had a Jazz band approach me since they were not to big I charged them 1000.00 US.  Hope this helps.  Tim

[Paul Williamson]

I licensed an existing photo for a CD album cover in 2003 in exchange for credit and a copy of the CD. The artist (a solo folk singer with one prior CD and no money) asked so nicely I couldn't see trying to charge him.

Searching the web today, the only sign that that CD ever existed is an entry on the recording studio's client list. I guess my photo wasn't enough to make it a hit! Ironically, the artist's web site domain name from back then now belongs to a professional photographer.

  -Paul

[Hulyss]

I just licensed some photos for a music album. At the origin, normally, the production have a budget for the album artwork/graphism/photos. In music this budget for photo is between 2500 and 4000 € (depend of the production, here it is a Parisian well know prod.).

For my example, my photos was chosen on the late, just some days before the end of the artwork of the album. They had a photographer but they preferred my photos...

I got a big 7 pages contract made by their lawyer and a check after that.

[joneil]

  At the opposite end of the scale, I was approched by a very small, indie group that bascially had little  money.   Still, the guys were very nice, and to make a long story short, we worked out a deal which I was very happy with.   

  You can see for yourself here:
http://www.bornhammers.com.p6.hostingprod.com/audio_gallery

   The first CD is my photograph.  Actually it was a good ole fashioned film shot too, 4x5 HP5, 90mm Komura lens

joe

[Carl Glover]

I make a living from photographing and designing LP and CD covers, I bill according to the size of the company - this usually agreed up-front so that nobody has any unpleasant surprises. Doing this usually leads to more work...

[Rob C]

It's something in the air. (Groan!)

I had a gallery of muso shots on my website and as they were all shot on spec and mainly as tests for the 'lo-lite' capability of my D700, when asked about images for personal use, I replied that sure, they only had to ask and I'd give them stuff to size for their own sites, but that any printed work would be expensive. For a while, it all went well, and use was made - always by request - on a variety of Internet locations. Then a few days ago, I walked into a bar and found, to my horror, that somebody had downloaded some images from my site, without asking. These were printed on letter paper, cropped, and horizontals presented as verticals within a horizontal frame with background board on show.

My site also indicates my willingness to make and market print...

My response?

http://www.roma57.com/music-1.html

Yes, I lose out in some respects, but as Chuck Berry said: never let the same dog bite you twice. Eff the music world.

Rob C

[mediumcool]

It's something in the air. (Groan!)

And you know that it’s right …

I had a gallery of muso shots on my website and as they were all shot on spec and mainly as tests for the 'lo-lite' capability of my D700, when asked about images for personal use, I replied that sure, they only had to ask and I'd give them stuff to size for their own sites, but that any printed work would be expensive. For a while, it all went well, and use was made - always by request - on a variety of Internet locations. Then a few days ago, I walked into a bar and found, to my horror, that somebody had downloaded some images from my site, without asking. These were printed on letter paper, cropped, and horizontals presented as verticals within a horizontal frame with background board on show.

Rob C

When you walked into the bar, why didn’t you see it? 

Seriously, was the download by somebody who you had dealt with, or just some arsehole wandering by (in an electronic sense)?

[Rob C]

No, it was by a guy who featured heavily in the gallery, who'd already been given free useage for his business card, had had additional and unrelated imagery for his professional (non-muso) business, freely, each time by asking.

That's what pissed me off almost as much as the lousy repro; there's something most distasteful about being taken for granted, to be thought of as a pushover because one has been generous. I guess there's a lesson there: make everybody pay, every time.

Rob C

P.S. I didn't see the bar because I was looking the other way. ;-)

[mediumcool]

… there's something most distasteful about being taken for granted …

Rob C

Your response was what I expected, Rob. Have you heard the old joke about the father and son returning home from the corner shop with a litre of milk?

Two dogs are in congress on the footpath in front of them—three-year-old says “Dad, what are they doing?”. Father replies “the dog on the back has sore paws, so the dog on the front is giving him a lift home”. Looks down at kid to see if he bought it, and three-year-old nods head sagely; “typical—help somebody out, and you get screwed every time!”


Two Irishmen walked out of a bar. [pause a beat]

Well, I suppose it’s possible.

[Rob C]

Now how can anyone not find LuLa a nice place to be?

I have a friggin' smile on my chops, and at 10.10 in the morning!

Rob C

[mediumcool]

Now how can anyone not find LuLa a nice place to be?

I have a friggin' smile on my chops, and at 10.10 in the morning!

Rob C

A grin is good. As a bipolar *carrier* (why say “sufferer”—the highs are so good?) I’m happy to bring a little sunshine, Rob! 

[Rob C]

A grin is good. As a bipolar *carrier* (why say “sufferer”—the highs are so good?) I’m happy to bring a little sunshine, Rob! 

You know, jokes aside, there really seems to be something about professional photography and the blues that marries too damned well, be those blues regular on/off ones as in electrical switch, or of the permafrost variety. I could list several 'star' shooters who have taken themselves out; it doesn't make for comforting reading.

Rob C

[mediumcool]

You know, jokes aside, there really seems to be something about professional photography and the blues that marries too damned well, be those blues regular on/off ones as in electrical switch, or of the permafrost variety. I could list several 'star' shooters who have taken themselves out; it doesn't make for comforting reading.

Rob C

I resemble that remark, Rob!



It’s the creative industries thing; a lot of photogs I have know are or were rather odd (or is eccentric better?). Speaking of the [ahem] self-regulation aspect, I have come very very close in my time. Now dealing with situational depression overlaying endogenous depression, all just before 60.

But fora are useful in a mental health way, not simply for exchange of data, in that they help build communities not defined by geographical boundaries, but by mutual interests. Must be me, but I have never found much intellectual stimulation or comfort from my fellow South Australians, even though there are one-and-a-half million to choose from. Luck of the draw?

Sent at 3.20am after not being able to sleep, even with 2.5mg of diazepam. Yawn.  Back to bed!

[Rob C]

You're probably right about it being to do with the industry aspect of it; at the very least, there's something rather difficult about dealing with the almost incompatible demands of your own artistic/creative reasons for being in the business and the client's grounded, mundane purpose in hiring you. I was never happy - well, seldom - in business; I enjoyed the brief moments of photographic work but hated the restrictions on that and the getting of the opportunities in the first place...

Folks worry themselves silly about what to put in their 'book' to entice clients. My ironic experience was to be hired on its strength, often, but seldom allowed to soar with my own goddam eagles! In fashion, where it was cool to have nice movement shots of swirling skirts, heads half-hidden in background flair, all that sort of editorial stuff, the reality was: I want to see ever stitch. Period. So what do you do? You do what you're told. Or there's no next time. The best chances I got to do as I pleased were when I departed for the calendar world; best pasport out I ever had. Okay, with some calendars; others were about as restricted as was the fashion, but the good outweighed the not so good. And it got me the hell out of grim Glasgow several times a year. They tell me it's changed... (Stay in Australia - you did produce Elle!)

With all that effort to find the daily (if lucky) you-have-it-but-you-don't going on in your head, no bloody wonder some of the fuses blow!

Rob C