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The photographic news
- Bandzählung
- 12.1868
- Erscheinungsdatum
- 1868
- Sprache
- Englisch
- Signatur
- F 135
- Vorlage
- Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig
- Digitalisat
- Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig
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- Public Domain Mark 1.0
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- urn:nbn:de:bsz:14-db-id1780948042-186800009
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- http://digital.slub-dresden.de/id1780948042-18680000
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- Fotografie
- LDP: Historische Bestände der Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig
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- Bandzählung
- No. 528, October 16, 1868
- Digitalisat
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Zeitschrift
The photographic news
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Band
Band 12.1868
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- Titelblatt Titelblatt I
- Kapitel Preface III
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- Register The Index To Volume XII 619
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Band
Band 12.1868
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- The photographic news
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494 THE PHOTOGRAPHIC NEWS. [October 16, 1868. sitter, although it has been frequently raised, and always maintained satisfactorily, we believe, by the photographer, has not, so far as we remember, come before any court. We remember one instance in which one of our ablest photo graphers, having taken several portraits of a certain high personage, did give up, in accordance with the request made, the negative as well as the prints ordered. This was by no means, however, intended as a surrender of the rights of ownership, for when the account was sent in, each negative was duly charged at a price distinct from that of the prints ordered. The business representative to the high personage in question took exception to this account, and sent it back with each charge for a negative struck out, and remonstrated against the excessive charge for what he styled “ a piece of glass—a piece of glass !" The photographer, with quiet self-respect, pointed out that a negative was not in any sense merely a piece of glass, but the cliche from which thousands of valuable pictures could be produced ; he therefore maintained his right to the charge he had made, and received it. The custom of the profession, recognized and acquiesced in by the public, could of course be proved by a thousand instances. We were told, by an English gentleman, that on visiting the studio of M. Adam-Salomon last year, he asked the young lady in attendance if he could have his negative, and on what terms? “Not for a thousand pounds; M. Adam-Salomon in no case parts with a negative,” was the response. “ And, pray, why not ?” was asked. “ Because he has a reputation to maintain, and this must be done by the mode in which proofs are printed, and the care taken to make them permanent. Bad prints in circulation from negatives known to be his might seriously injure him.” M. Silvy, on retiring from business, for mouths advertised that persons who had sat to him could have their negatives on a certain payment. In fact, the whole practice of the profession proves that it is the custom for the photo grapher to affirm his ownership, and the public to ac quiesce. The customs of all other trades by analogy support the same position. When the manufacturer of a steam-engine, or any similar piece of machinery, receives an order for a specific engine, a number of designers and draughtsmen are at once set to work to produce the scheme of the engine on paper. Next, a number of pattern makers are employed to make various patterns in wood, from which to produce moulds for all the castings. The person for whom the engine is built might with equal propriety demand the moulds, patterns, drawings, and calculations which had been prepared as necessary adjuncts in the construction of the engine, as the sitter demand the negative necessarily taken as a means of supplying the portraits; the painter might be required to give up the studies and sketches taken as aids in the produc ion of any picture; the type-founder might bo required tot give up the matrixes in which a fount of type, produced to order, was cast; the printer might be required to give up the forme of typo he sets to produce a circular or poster ; the frame-maker might be required to give up his patterns and moulds; the tailor to give up his patterns and measures; and so on in many other instances. We here refer, not to general trade tools, but to cases in which some thing is specially prepared as a means to the fulfilment of an order, just as a negative is a necessary step in the pro duction of a portrait, for a negative is no more a portrait than a matrix is a type or a mould a casting. The only analogy of trade we remember, which might seem to point in an opposite direction, does not do so in reality. We have heard it urged that when a person orders an address card to be engraved, and a number of cards printed, the plate is always delivered with the cards, and regarded as the property of the customer. This is so, we believe, generally ; but that it is an exception to general practice is emphasised by the fact that it is the custom of the trade to make the special announcement, “ A card plate and 100 cards for so much.” If the plates were delivered with the cards as a matter of course, no special mention of it would have been necessary; but the circum stance that it is so specially mentioned in the trade announce ments of engravers points to the fact that it is an excep tional and not a common practice in trade to give up a mould or a cliche. The nature of a photographer’s contract with his customer is simple enough : he engages to produce a given number of portraits at a given price. His contract is fulfilled when he has delivered these portraits and received the price; no question of the ownership in the negative necessary to the production of these portraits should arise beyond this: the sitter possesses a clear right to forbid the production of further prints from it without his consent. This is a tacit understanding between the photographer and his sitter, and it is rarely violated. Possibly the law of copyright may throw a little light on the legal question, for where no provision to the con trary exists, the ownership of the negative would generally follow the ownership of the copyright. The clause in the statute, stating the conditions of ownership in the copy right of a photograph, provides that if a photographer take a negative for his own purposes, and not as a commission, the copyright belongs to him; but if it be produced as a com mission—as a portrait usually is—then it is necessary that an agreement in writing be entered into at the time of the production, in order to secure the copyright either to the photographer or to the person giving him the commission. But it no such agreement be entered into, the copyright belongs to neither, and is, in fact, lost. If we follow the analogy of the case, it would result that where, as in the ordinary transaction of business, no copyright is acquired, no property in the negative—that is, in the image—could be acquired ; the glass upon which it rests clearly belongs to the photographer, the image upon it constituting the nega tive ; he can, therefore, clean it off if he choose, or he can, as a matter of convenience, keep it in existence for the future accommodation of the sitter ; but it is clear that the latter could not, according to the analogy afforded by the Copy right Act, acquire any property in the negative. The loss, risks, and inconvenience which would be involved if the sitter became owner of the negative can scarcely be estimated. Besides the immediate and contingent money loss, the possible loss of reputation, such as that suggested in M. Salomon’s answer, would be serious. Again, prints from a photographer’s negatives being sent out from various estab lishments, possibly with other names attached, loss of legiti mate reputation might follow from that cause, and one strong stimulus to excellence would be destroyed. It is not neces sary, however, to enter into detail on the evils which would follow such a decision. They are numerous and patent enough. But should the law ever decide that the sitter was owner of the negative from which his portrait was taken, the photographer would be simply placed under the necessity of defining his contract, by publicly announcing in his recep- tion-loom and studio that the property in the negative was always retained, and, in any form of receipt, distinctly stating that the payment is for a given number of portraits, not including the negative. PHOTOGRAPHY OR BRANDING? Attention has recently been called in a daily contemporary to the degrading and brutalizing effect of the practice in the army, which still occasionally obtains, it appears, of branding an offender with some indelible mark, so that he shall bear the stigmata for life of the crime, and the disgrace attending it. All punishment is, of course, degrading as well as painful, as it should be; but the degra dation is rarely, and should never be, of a character which clings for life, no matter how deep the repentance, no matter how full the expiation, or how complete the amendment. But the brand B. 0.—bad character—burnt on a man's skin
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