Wedding Photography...Here Comes the Bride's Lawyer

Just my .02

A few years back my friend’s mother passed away. Before she had passed, he moved in with her and took care of her for about 3 years. Well after the reading of the will, his only sibling, a sister, insisted that he gets nothing. She felt he already got his half when living with his Mother.

To make a long story short, I asked him, What’s more important to you, a sister or the money.” He contacted his sister and basically told her, that if the money was that important to her she should keep it and would rather have her as family. BTW he was broke from not working for 3 years taking care of his sick elderly mother.

After a couple of weeks, his sister called him and apologized and did the right thing.

My point is sometimes it is better to take the morally higher road and not let BS no mater how big or small, ruin your relationship your siblings.

It is always great to have someone else enjoy the photos you took, but I would take them down and apologize to your sister for upsetting her after her special day. I would offer her all of your photos on a CD/DVD for her to enjoy them when she wants. I would also tell her of what your intentions were and abide by her wishes, not because of any lawyer, but because she’s your sister. My bet is that in a few months, she will have calmed down and will let you use the photos for your portfolio, and if she doesn’t, well family is more important than the photos of them.

Like I said my .02 and my honest opinion.
 
Just my .02

A few years back my friend’s mother passed away. Before she had passed, he moved in with her and took care of her for about 3 years. Well after the reading of the will, his only sibling, a sister, insisted that he gets nothing. She felt he already got his half when living with his Mother.

To make a long story short, I asked him, What’s more important to you, a sister or the money.” He contacted his sister and basically told her, that if the money was that important to her she should keep it and would rather have her as family. BTW he was broke from not working for 3 years taking care of his sick elderly mother.

After a couple of weeks, his sister called him and apologized and did the right thing.

My point is sometimes it is better to take the morally higher road and not let BS no mater how big or small, ruin your relationship your siblings.

It is always great to have someone else enjoy the photos you took, but I would take them down and apologize to your sister for upsetting her after her special day. I would offer her all of your photos on a CD/DVD for her to enjoy them when she wants. I would also tell her of what your intentions were and abide by her wishes, not because of any lawyer, but because she’s your sister. My bet is that in a few months, she will have calmed down and will let you use the photos for your portfolio, and if she doesn’t, well family is more important than the photos of them.

Like I said my .02 and my honest opinion.

Probably the best advice so far. And besides, 3 years from now, when your sister is divorced (which is a 50% statistical probability), the photos will be in the trash anyway. :meh:
 
Thanks for all the feedback so far. I wasn’t looking for legal info per se, but more what pros have experienced, or how they might handle such a situation. I would not be the one to go to court, and I’m not giving legal advise to either side. My goal is to get some background so that I can hopefully resolve a family dispute with common sense. My sister can be a bit of a bully, and my brother is often the victim. Again, what I'm looking for is help from experienced people to determine what is reasonable and fair in order to hopefully avoid family suing family.

I guess I should clarify a few things.

First & foremost, my brother has always offered family any pictures he takes at no charge, and didn't charge my sister for pics from her first wedding. Had she talked to him, he would've taken them down completely and given her full rights to whatever she wanted. She has yet to talk to him, just sent threatening emails.

The magazine submission is something she hopes to do, and given the overall situation (not the dispute between her and my brother or the hired guy), I don’t think the likelihood of publication is very high at all. This wasn’t a high dollar glam wedding, and a good amount of the shots were taken in a parking lot. The May Day theme was really out of place in the late 1800’s setting, with “Spring Sale” signs in the shop windows, restaurant signs, restroom signs, etc. If it were scheduled to be published, or even considered, I could certainly understand the desire to not have competing images on the net. I’ll be sure to address that with my brother & sister.

As far as I know, the hired photographer hasn’t said a word, and he actually had quite a bit of friendly conversation with my brother at the reception, as did the sub at the ceremony. The pro actually stepped back after he took his posed shots so all the moms/granparents/weepy aunts could take pictures with their personal cameras. Should I call the hired guy to see how he feels about all this, or to see if any of this (breach of contract etc) is coming from him? I don’t want to involve someone outside the family in the arguing, but I would like to know if the accusations are fairly based.

The 400 pics were taken over 2 days. I don’t think 400 shots is all that much for even a serious hobbyist to take in that timeframe, especially if shot on digital. I shot about 100 on my PAS and I wasn’t there the whole time. Many of my brothers shots were macros of flowers, plates of cookies, tightly framed shots of flowerbeds, etc. He really didn’t interfere with the hired guy, and used no extra gear like reflectors, tripods or extra flashes.

Keith & JIP, I understand where you’re coming from, and I appreciate your feedback, but just because somebody has a nice camera doesn’t mean they’re competing with a hired lens, does it? But Keith, if racers are receiving photos from people they know, aren’t they getting an aspect that you can’t provide…”This picture was taken by my buddy…” In the same light, your pictures would have a different value because you are probably shooting from a perspective most amateurs don’t get (from the infield), and since you are focused and experienced with the subject, you’re capturing sequences an amateur probably can’t produce (love the wreck sequence on your site btw).

The site where my brother posted the pictures isn’t his advertising website. He has a separate one with its own domain name with sample shots of his work, his pricing structure and packages, and that’s the address on his business cards and brochures. The other is where he sends already paid clients to order their finished work. Even if he removed all the shots that showed any discernible wedding activity at all, he’d still have 100+ shots that could be useable elsewhere. Would it be fair to demand that he couldn’t use those too, even if it were to keep the family peace? What about pictures of nieces/nephews/grandbabies that the hired guy had no concern for and didn’t shoot anyway?

As a pro wedding photographer, I understand that you’d want to sell as many prints as possible, but what’s the realistic market for extras? Who, besides the bride & groom, parents & maybe grandparents buys wedding photos? I have a big family that has had lots of weddings, and I have never purchased a pro’s work outside my own wedding (although parents have purchased group settings from the pro for each sibling). And what about if you do post someone’s wedding photos on a shopping cart site…how many get sold to complete strangers? Is that even a reasonable market to be concerned about losing business to?

Thanks again for the feedback. I’ll take as much as I can get.

P.S...Rick, that may be more true than you know.
 
I read through this and unless I missed it somewhere, I don't really understand what the sister's motivation is for the nasty email. Why is your sister doing this? Sounds like the pro caught wind that your bro put the pics on his site, got peeved, and contacted your sis. I can't say anything about the law, but I don't get what the reason for your sister's reaction is.
 
That is why I am going to charge for wedding sessions as our wedding photographer is doing for our wedding, as well as sign over the rights of the photos.. makes customers soo much more happy and as long as the customer signs a release to let me use photos I take as advertisement and such... then it wont much matter to me... I get paid before the wedding session.. show up.. take photos.. give the party their digital prints.. I'm done..
 
Middleman, I think that once your sister gets over daydreaming about her wedding in a magazine, everything will blow over.

Your brother does not seem to have done anything any other small business person would have done with a new business to grow.

Your idea of calling the contractor is the best one yet. Especially as he and your brother seemed to get on well.

Good luck and RUN!!! :mrgreen:
 
My point is sometimes it is better to take the morally higher road and not let BS no mater how big or small, ruin your relationship your siblings.

Doesn't that work both ways though? Did the sister have to email the brother as rudely as the OP made it out to be? If I were in that situation, I would hope that my sister would call me and try to reason with me before flying off the handle in a threatening manner.
 
Doesn't that work both ways though? Did the sister have to email the brother as rudely as the OP made it out to be? If I were in that situation, I would hope that my sister would call me and try to reason with me before flying off the handle in a threatening manner.
I agree here. The sister could have handled this much better from the start. I take my gear to all of my family events. But if I went to a wedding with a pro photographer i would not be taking any photos over his shoulder. I actually went to a wedding of a friends and the photographer saw me off out of his way with my camera and told me to get out there and start taking pictures. I was really surprised with that.

Of course I did say I would hope for better from the sister but I do have a sister who hasn't talked to me in 4yrs becouse I didn't call her right after they surgecally removed a baby from me. LOL Aparantly I was supposed to ask them to untape a arm ignore keeping me alive and let her know I had a baby. :confused:
 
Is it just me or can I see that marriage not lasting?

Interesting ... as I'm reading this thread trying to put myself into the different people's shoes, that is exactly what I started thinking about the situation ... and then you said it ... cheers :lol:
 
Interesting ... as I'm reading this thread trying to put myself into the different people's shoes, that is exactly what I started thinking about the situation ... and then you said it ... cheers :lol:

Dictating the acts of another is not the best foundation upon which to build a marriage.
 
I'm not sure a lawyer is just yet necessary.
I would first try a conference call.
 
Doesn't that work both ways though? Did the sister have to email the brother as rudely as the OP made it out to be? If I were in that situation, I would hope that my sister would call me and try to reason with me before flying off the handle in a threatening manner.

I agree the sister could have but thats also the point, she didn't.

Now the brother should "be the bigger man" and take the high road the sister didn't.

Its easier to shut her down and take the wind out of her sails than fire her up and have this blow out of proportion. Not that she didn't already if we are getting the full story.
 
In my experience, when people act irrationally, it is often because they are acting on information you do not have. Perhaps the hired pro contacted the bride and made threats, perhaps she is just afraid that will happen, or perhaps she is upset about something entirely different, and taking it out this way. Most times solving an issue like this happens not by calling a lawyer, threatening anyone or conjecturing in a public forum where nobody knows any of the players, but by entering into a sane discussion with the parties involved. If it was me - I would call your sister, ask her why she is so upset. I would call the brother, and remind him that displaying pictures on his web site is commercial use (regardless of the shopping cart or any disclaimers), and ask if he would mind taking them down, or putting them on a site totally unconnected with his commercial site. After getting all sides of the story, maybe it makes more sense.
As others have said, I am no lawyer, and more importantly I have no first hand knowledge of the situation. That makes any advice from me largely irrelevant.
I would suggest though that you might not want to accept the responsibility of fixing the situation. That does not mean not to help, but do not let anyone make it your problem - older brother or not.
 
If the sister is a bully then put her in her place. Send her a Dvd of the photos and delete them on your end and wish her well.

Better than that - put a great big watermark across the faces too.
 

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