Copyright Question....

Okay so say i have this coke can and i think it will look very cool on this fence rail on a foggy morning,i take the picture and everyone loves it....So i decide to print it and sell it and man people are buying this image and love it....

My question is can i get in trouble with Coke since i'm using a Coke can in the picture.Just as a model poses on a car,Fords not going to sue the photographer for using a Ford car in the picture.But theres a limit to this...For example i cant super impose Daffy duck into a picture and sell it as such that i know.What about games?....If the Monopoly game is in a image that i sell is that subject to copyright laws.

I'd think Coke with all the advertising they do would not mind at all.Free advertising for them.With everything copyrighted whats usable and whats not? The Monopoly game,seems like that would be fine...Just as the Coke can...Anyone know?Hear of any stories regaurding usage of something by a photographer perhaps? Is there a Lawyer in the house?What about music cds where the covers kind of a key part of the image something like that?

ErikJonas said:

Okay so say i have this coke can and i think it will look very cool on this fence rail on a foggy morning,i

Click to expand...

Hi Erik,

First let me stress that I do not give legal advice and my opinion is just an impression. If you were to use a trademark or © image to sell another commodity, not art for the moment, then you are in trouble. They will swiftly go after you. If, however, you make a work of art that's not defaming to them, then they likely, (my guess is 99.99% certainty, but just a guess, not to be relied on), have no interest in you at all. The place for trouble is when the interpretation of the art/photograph is ambiguous and it gets good coverage so it has traction in the public appetite for art, you might have awoken an angry hyena pack of lawyers against you.

If you are already published and your work is in the New Yorker, National Geographic, your book of photographs sold in major bookstores and your work is exhibited in several museums, likely important people with credibility will jump to your defense. Your case will be defended by lawyers wishing to make a name for themselves fighting censorship and for free expression in art. Otherwise know your are risking a lot.

Most professionals have no worry using a coke in a picture that's sold for it's sake, as art. However, if it's used as part of a spread for selling fashion, likely you have wasted your effort, as the art director wont use your pictures, (unless they arranged joint advertising with The Coca Cola Company).

That company has paid dividends to stockholders every year since 1920 and they have sales of 22.4 billion dollars a year, growing at 6.5% or so. With this at stake, they're not likely to tolerate "dissing" their brand!


Still, Any Warhal used entire labels and boxes of regular products for his art and got away with it. However, don't tread in deep water unless your boots are also just as big as his!

Asher

ErikJonas said:

Okay so say i have this coke can and i think it will look very cool on this fence rail on a foggy morning,i take the picture and everyone loves it....So i decide to print it and sell it and man people are buying this image and love it....

My question is can i get in trouble with Coke since i'm using a Coke can in the picture?

Click to expand...

IANAL, but it depends on the jurisdiction and the context. If the can would be the only subject, then you could be in trouble. But if the can is only a (small) part of a composition, then you have all the (copy)rights.

Bart

What follows is not legal advice. It is a recitation of guidelines followed by this office.

**************

Keep in mind the two quite different purposes of trademark protection and copyright protection. Confusion between the two concepts is all too common.

Copyright protection is intended to give the holder the exclusive right to make, or allow to be made, copies of an art work, literary work, and so forth.

Trademark protection is intended to give the holder the exclusive right to use the mark to identify a product. In fact for it to serve that purpose, it must often be copied. Owing a trademark does not prevent others from "copying" or "mentioning" that trademark; they just may only do so if it is in connection with identifying a product of the trademark owner.

Suppose the text "Snappyaire" is a trademark of a manufacturer for certain home appliances. A store, advertising one of these for sale, may of course say, "Snappyair refregerator, Model 35Z, $379.95."

Now what somebody may not do is to take some other refrigerator (not made by or being sold under the auspices of the copyright holder) and put on it a nameplate saying "Snappyair", or to advertise it by saying, "Snappyair refrigerator, Model AB19, $279.95."

So of course we can take and use photographs of trademarked items, including those showing the trademark.

But were we to take one of the graphic forms of the Coca-Cola trademark (called "devices") and composite onto a photo of a grapefruit, we might well be in violation of copyright law, by intimating that this graphic device pertains to, or identifies, some kind of grapefruit. It's not the copying of the graphic that is the violation; it is its improper use in (apparently) identifying a product.

There are of course many other legal issues that may affect how, and for what purpose, we may use photographs of certain items.