If you intend on having photographs in your marketing products, you will want to be sure you get the copyright permission from the owner. All graphic designers and printers - including First Place Publishing - need to have permission from the copyright owner in order to scan or use any photographic image supplied.

If you take your own pictures then you are the owner of those images. If you go to a local photography studio, such as a Glamour Shots, they actually own the copyright on those pictures. Although you may have paid them to take the pictures for your marketing products, they still own the copyright and you'll need to get permission from them to use those photographs.

The same goes for printed products, such as postcards, magazine or newspaper photos. For example, if you have a picture of a postcard that you want to use in a personal brochure design, you must contact the copyright owner to get his permission first. Without copyright permission, First Place Publishing cannot use photographs that are owned by someone else.

So how do you get copyright permission? Simple - you ask them for it.

Photography studios usually have their own standard copyright permission form that they will provide to you upon request. Printed products - such as postcards - may be a little harder to track down, but they are usually obtainable once you find the right person. Start by contacting the company that did the printing and ask them who the copyright owner is. Once you are able to speak to the owner, simply inform them that you like their image and would like to use it as a background for your marketing products. From our experience, most owners of copyrighted material are usually reasonable and provide the proper permissions. In some cases there is a fee that may have to be paid for this permission.

For your convenience, listed below is a graphic of a sample copyright form that you can use to ask the owner to fill out allowing you permission to use their image. If you click on the image it will open up a PDF file that can be printed.