Photographs Taken In the Department and Posted on our Site:
Photographs taken by the department of events or individuals, or a photograph taken by an individual submitting a story to the site, can be used, so long as the following guidelines are met.
Photos of Individuals, or a Group of Individuals:
- To see if we already have a Photo Release Form on file for these individuals, contact Liz Collier who maintains this file.
- Use the Photo Release Form:
The UW has a catch-all form that should be used for all such photos. It is written in such a way that one form can be signed by a person only one time, and we can use their image going forward. They will not need to sign it every time we take a photo of them. Get this form from the UW Brand Guidelines page.
Group Shot Guidelines:
- In terms of group shots, as long as you are in a public space, you don’t need a release unless there is a prominently featured individual(s). If there are prominently featured individual(s) a Photo Release Form should be used (as per above).
Commercial and Non-Sociology Materials:
Copyrighted Materials such as images, commercial photographs, music, and other types of items, generally require payment for use (licensing). There are some resources that are free or low cost.
It is critically important to only use trusted, documented resources for getting things like stock photos or background music. We need to be able to show that we have gotten the image or material from a resource that allows for it's use for free, or have paid for it's use.
Departments who have accidentally used a photo that required payment for use due to copyrights have ended up getting cease and desist orders, and bills for the usage.
Do not simply go out and search the internet, say in Google images, and copy and paste something.
Important Guidelines and Documentation:
- Read the Instructions:
When you use one of these types of resources for free images, be sure to read the instructions on the site. Some require that a source citation is used, some do not and the image can just be used. - Document where the item came from as follows:
Document where the image came from, and give this information to Tess McShane to put with other photo/image/media source documentation:- A copy of the image
- A screen shot of its source
Images:
- The Arts & Sciences Marketing and Communications team can provide resources for both free for use or low cost images.
- While researching images for vintage website photos in 2016, the department looked at old UW yearbooks (called "Tyee"). The Special Collections librarian provided these guidelines:
- If we find a Tyee photo, and make the reproduction from it on our own, we do not have to go through the Library to use it.
- If we ask the Library to supply us with a reproduction, we would then have to pay for the reproduction.
- The Sociology Department will not be charged a use fee to use the image itself, as we are a UW department.