A Photo Editor recently updated us on the Richard Reinsdorf v. Skechers case, which illustrates the complexity of copyright violation cases and re-emphasizes the necessity of copyright registration.
The good news is that the United States District Court in the Central District of California ruled in favor of a copyright violation despite Skechers position that they were a co-author of the images because they had taken delivery of his RAW files and made “slight modifications in the models’ skin tone…” among other changes.
In any copyright infringement suit, damages can be awarded as either “actual” or “statutory.” Actual damages for copyright infringement can be notoriously difficult to calculate.
Copyright laws have had loop holes and generally at times it's hard to now what is right and what can be done. Whether a company is using your photos illegally, and why we need to copyright our images.