Hi Members
DON’T MISS OUT
EXTENDED COLLECTIVE LICENSING
VIDEOLIBRA
MOVEMBER
ROBIN ELEY
ABSTRACT CONCEPTS
CONFUSION
DON’T MISS OUT
We’ve just done a big deal with Encyclopedia Britannica to use thousands of our images — that is to say, YOUR images. They are choosing the images by Category, so if you haven’t placed your images in Categories (see our Taxonomy Matrix in the Submission Guidelines) then please do so as soon as possible. Otherwise they will be overlooked for this deal — and others in the pipeline.
"I suppose you know you're doing that all wrong."
EXTENDED COLLECTIVE LICENSING
Our trade body BAPLA says that the proposed clause on Extended Collective Licensing in the UK Government's proposed Enterprise & Regulatory Reform Bill poses the largest threat to our industry and for creators working with a direct licensing model.
The concept is to allow mass digitisation of works held by user organisations by extending the rights of the works without permission. This fundamentally takes away the right of the copyright holder and their representatives to agree or object to further use, negotiate rates of remuneration and easily opt out of an ECL scheme should they wish to. It proposes that any remuneration is passed exclusively to a collecting society whether a rights holder is a member or not.
There is a practical implication for rights holders as they would have to check each ECL scheme to find where images are included so that they can opt out. This would be an enormous, painstaking and costly undertaking for us all, especially for content that has exclusives, or limited terms based on clients, models or locations. But most importantly it will have a direct impact on our businesses and affect the market value of content across the entire sector. As Lord Grade said at the reading, "If someone invests in creating original material, and then invests further to digitally preserve it so that it can be licensed to others, that individual or company has a right to expect a full commercial return on their creative and financial investment."
Please make your voice heard: write with your objections to Baroness Buscombe, Lord Clement-Jones and Lord Grade at the House of Lords. Lord Grade hasn't disclosed his email address — but you could try gradem@parliament.uk — so it's snailmail c/o The House of Lords, London, SW1A 0PW.
VIDEOLIBRA
The hot discussion topic in the picture library world at the moment is not about stills photography, it’s Footage — the trade term for film and video, or as I prefer to call them, Moving Pictures.
We mooted the concept of videoLibra when the company first started, but rejected it on two grounds — the cost of storage was beyond our means at the time, and the quality of the movie content would not match that of the stills. You just know that sitting through endless home movies of someone else’s brats wouldn’t ring many bells for you or me, nor would it, I’m afraid, for our customers.
Times change. Most modern cameras have excellent video capabilities. We have a lot more storage space. But we can’t apply fotoLibra’s famous Open Access principle to footage.
Other aspects could work in videoLibra — my Picture Calls, for example. But when we open our doors to footage submissions, they will be exactly that — submissions. The service will be free, of course, but fotoLibra will reserve the right to vet, reject and delete any footage which we deem unmarketable.
Let us know what you think. And let us know what file formats you would like us to accept.
MOVEMBER
Now I have known the Dear Leader for some ten years now, and never once in that time has he exhibited the slightest tendency towards facial growth. So I was as surprised as anyone to hear he was attempting to grow a moustache during November in aid of the prostate and testicular cancer charity Movember. It seems to have really caught on this year; all my friends in the village are sporting hairy upper lips, and the men are even worse. But I’m proud to say I was the first to sponsor the DL (beating even the esteemed Yvonne), and although he’s unlikely to be able to wax and twirl the ends by the end of the month there are visible signs of progress on http://fotoLibrarian.fotolibra.com — which is his personal blog, not the fotoLibra Pro Blog.
There is still time to sponsor him, so if you’re feeling generous (and it is for a very good cause) please make a contribution, however small, at http://mobro.co/gwynheadley. I can assure you he will acknowledge every donation personally. It’s also Gift Aided, so if you’re a UK taxpayer and you tell them, the charity will receive more than you actually give.
ROBIN ELEY
Talking of moustaches, here’s a fanciable hunk. It’s a strange image to take, mind you, and it’s hard to capture the light reflecting off the weird vinyl sheeting as well as he has. But look as close as you can at the picture — can you see how he’s done it?
Anglo-Australian-American Robin Eley created this image without a camera. Impossible, you might scoff — but there is another way. Eley is an artist, and this remarkable image is a painting, not a photograph. See more here.
ABSTRACT CONCEPTS
The famous Pont cartoon at the top of this newsletter shows how an expression or mood can be captured by a few deft strokes of the pen. Well, anything an artist can do, a photographer can do better, right? Anyone can photograph a house or a tree. But could you capture The Unbearable Lightness of Being? How do you capture a mood? An emotion? Hope? Forbearance? In Gwyn Headley’s train reverie (blogged about here) he imagined a series of books on national characteristics based on the pre-war cartoonist Pont’s series on The British Character. For those who are unfamiliar with Pont's work (that’s anyone under eighty, basically) here’s another of his wonderful drawings from The British Character, with the title below:
Importance Of Being Athletic
I’ve found a list of many of Pont’s British Character captions, and frankly, these could apply to almost any nationality. This is a challenge, not a commission or a Picture Call, but it would be interesting to see how many of these concepts could be captured in an amusing or witty way by a camera. Give it a go — you never know what fun we might discover.
Adaptability to foreign conditions
Reserve
Love of open air sports
Skill at foreign languages
Love of games
Absence of the gift of conversation
Importance of not being an alien
Attitude towards fresh air
Attitude towards hostesses
The gift of water colours
Keen interest in historic houses
Love of detective fiction
Inability of British broadcasting announcers to speak English
Absolute indispensability of bacon and egg for breakfast
Love of arriving late at theatrical productions
Strong tendency to become doggy
Fondness for laughing at own anecdotes
Importance of not being intellectual
Absence of ideas for meals
A tendency not to join the ladies
Tendency to be embarrassed by foreign currencies
Curiosity
Love of keeping calm
A reverential attitude towards bridge
Fondness for cricket
Importance of being athletic
Absence of enthusiasm for answering letters
Preference for driving on the crown of the road
Love of travelling alone
A tendency to be hearty
A fondness of anything French
A tendency to learn the piano when young
Love of being horsey
Ability to manage for oneself on Sunday evening
A weakness for mid-morning nourishment
A tendency to put of to the last minute
A regard for good tailoring
A disinclination to sparkle
Ability to be ruthless
A tendency to leave the washing up till later
A disinclination ever to go anywhere
A keen curiosity about the future
The importance of news
Attitude towards insomnia
A tendency to be conscious of draughts
Attitude towards Sunday mornings
The tendency among weekend guests to leave things behind
The conviction that things aren’t what they were.
CONFUSION
Transcript of a recent telephone call received at the fotoLibra Sales Office:
CUSTOMER: Allo. Yer Singer 10 on yer website. Ow much yer askin’ fer it?
STAFFER: Certainly sir, what usage will you be requiring?
CUSTOMER: Yoosage? I’ll be drivin’ arahnd in it. That’s me Yoosage.
STAFFER: Oh. I see. We’re not actually selling the car, sir, we’re a Picture Library. We’re selling the usage rights for the picture.
CUSTOMER: You’ve got an advert for the car and yer not selling it? That’s no bleedin’ yoose to me, innit?
STAFFER: No sir, you see, we’re a picture library, not a garage. We only sell pictures.
CUSTOMER: Only sell pickchers? That’s not much of a job, innit?
STAFFER: No sir, you’re absolutely right. It isn’t. I think I’ll go and lie down on the railway line.
CUSTOMER: Oh no, come on, I woz only joking. Cheer up! I’ll buy you a drink.
Reader, I married him. (All this was true — well, right up to the last innit).
Kind regards
Jacqui Norman