We all use stock images, but do you know if the images on your marketing materials are actually okay for you to use? 

I recently had a new client (a Brighton, Michigan based construction company) tell me that they were sued because their old designer used stock photography on their materials without the proper rights.  They ended up having to pay a few thousand dollars.  This really got me to thinking about copyright issues – especially with stock images.

It is extremely important that anytime you are using stock photography for your materials, you know how you can or cannot use it.  And the answer to that is really going to depend on where it came from.  Generally speaking, if your designer gets rights to a particular stock image, it is going to be for only one project.  So us designers shouldn’t be using the same images for multiple clients after only purchasing it once.  In fact, in many cases, the licensing requirements may actually require the image to be purchased for multiple projects for the same clients.  This means that if you have a brochure, a website and a flier that all use the same stock photo, you may actually have to buy the rights three times. 

Most of the time, there are also requirements on not using stock photos as part of logos or something you are going to trademark, or using stock photos for something you are going to sell based on the design (t-shirts, cards, etc.).  Some suppliers sell special licenses for these uses.

Again, all of this is going to depend on the origin of the stock image and the particular requirements of that supplier.  Because of the complex nature of copyright and the fact that the rights offered can vary so much from provider to provider, it is important for designers and clients to have open dialogue on the issue.  If there are stock photos or images in a piece, the client needs to know whether or not they need to repurchase rights in order to use that design for something else.  They should also know where the image came from.

Most of us would probably admit to occasionally, if not always, just skipping over the long bits of terms that we’re supposed to click to signify we agree to.  But for this issue, we really do need to read the small print, and share what it says.  Sure, it’s dry reading, but far better to know what you can or can’t do than be sued later on.

Do you know where your stock photography came from?

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