Market photo competition

[Wookie]

I've been busy researching a market stall for a little (?) business venture we're working on and came across this photo competition :

http://www.fedmedia.co.uk/photocompintro.html

which may be of interest to some people here

its for the NMTF (National Market Traders Federation, main website here: http://www.nmtf.co.uk ), to get photos for a calender for their benevolent fund. £100 prize

closing date 1st November, old photos accepted

 

[awp]

Don't touch this with a barge pole!!!!!!! Have you read the terms??

Also note that by submitting your entry you agree that you assign the copyright of the photo to Fed Media Ltd.

 

[Wookie]

no I didn't read the terms awp, but surely if you dont mind them its not a problem.
It may still be of interest to some people here
I agree though that you should always reads the terms before entering any competition, and I suspect most will be quite bad.

 

[awp]

You should NEVER EVER give away your copyright - in this case they are paying £200 for potentially hundreds of pictures! What a scandal.

 

[Wookie]

I think the copyright signover issue is low dispicable and underhand, which sadly appears to be too common, but is only a problem if you care. If your stupendous market photos are going to sit on your hard drive until doomsday and otherwise never be seen by a living soul then who gives a fig? And lets face it, Fed Media and its "Market Times" is hardly a multinational publisher (http://www.fedmedia.co.uk/)


however an interesting legal question applies for this one . . .

they only get low res images for the competition, so apart from small prints they are useless.

Note that the photo must not be larger than 2mb, preferably not less than 1.3mb.

If you have reduced the file size please keep the original. It will be needed to be used in Market Times and any calendar we may produce.

Also note that by submitting your entry you agree that you assign the copyright of the photo to Fed Media Ltd.

So where does copyright start and finish?

if you submit one image with certain editing and at certain resolution then that is the one they have and all they have . . . does a different resolution and/or different artistic interpretational editing (eg. sharpening, obviously a judgemental and therefore artistic but necessary feature at a different resolution) constitute a seperately copyrighted image? . . . so would the useless low res image they have for the competition be effectively a seperate copyright from your unprocessed master . . . ? . . . ?

sadly in quick reply so no wry smile smiley or evil grin to hand !

 

[awp]

NO - if it's the same image from the same original file number then it's gone - and they have it! It's stuff like this that devalues photography for everyone.

 

[Airscene]

If your stupendous market photos are going to sit on your hard drive until doomsday and otherwise never be seen by a living soul then who gives a fig?

I agree with this wookie, and I am sure many others here do too. I am certain we are all/have been guilty of valuing our work based on the concept of "one day I might like to make some money from it".

I am sure many of those who have had this thought will also agree, sometimes its a long time coming.

I am not saying we should all give our photos away, neither am I encouraging the theft of copyright to entries submitted for competitions.

Rather, we all need to be sensible and put a realistic value on our own work. Its been some time since I was even a semi-pro (so my point may be moot), but I would always categorise my photographs as follows:

A) Those I thought I come make money from
B) Those with little chance of making money, but might still have a crack at winning a competition
C) Those I would "share" for the purposes of demonstrating techniques or faults or in recent years for sharing in online galleries

If I enter a competition I usually go out and take a photograph purely for the purposes of that competition - by doing this I feel I cannot attach any further monetary value to the photo - if it really is outstanding then I will keep it myself and enter another.

I remember selling a photo of the Vulcan bomber when it last flew (back in the 80's) for a centre page spread in a magazine and it made me £120 - only to find a similar photo winning in a competition for an SLR kit worth £500 (thereabouts). I never made another penny from the Vulcan photo!!!

As for my own competitions... I never ask for copyright myself and in fact place copyright notices on all images after the competition has closed. A couple of times publishers have contacted myself for entrants details who have then gone on to be paid for the use of their work.

I cant remember the point I was gonna make now, so... If you really are making a living from your photography that you need to protect then DONT ENTER COMPETITIONS, otherwise enjoy the competitions - and who knows - one day you might even win one.

 

[awp]

:bang: