This is a very short and important post:

Recently one of our Community Members has fallen foul of picture copyright. The issue comes from using an image that is seemingly ‘free for use’ and is then used on a website or page.

The copyright parasite has software that trawls the web for infringed use of the image. Once an image is discovered the user of the picture has a very nasty demand for a so-called fine. This can be anything from 50-1000 pounds. The advice here is to only use your own images or those which you know to be copyright free. Please do not get yourself into the copyright spiders web.

There will be photographers amongst you who will understand the need for their work to be recognised and indeed paid for but in truth: the fee’s being charged is excessive, to say the least. As a professional photographer myself: I would never wish for my work to become the source of financial hardship to someone who’d used my work in error.

This is of course the way of the world! Greed and excess are why our societies are in such disarray. There is only so much to go around and there are too many dipping into a dry lake. When I looked at the image used in error: my thoughts were it is not worth a penny. Anyone with a phone camera could do better. But that is not the point here: the point is: be very careful where you source your images.

How do you find out if the image is copyright? The answer is: The PicScout Search enables image buyers to identify and license the images to use. Whether you’ve taken a picture of an image, downloaded one from Google Images or another website, or seen an image you like on social media, you simply upload the image to PicScout Search and the tool will find the image if it’s on the PicScout platform. If the image is found, a link will be provided to where the image can be licensed.

One last word:

If you have ANY doubt about an image DO NOT USE IT!

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