Page:The copyright act, 1911, annotated.djvu/147



and that the sitter sat at his request either for a money consideration paid to the sitter, or in consideration for a copy or copies of the photograph, or for no consideration at all. Where no money consideration passes it is not always easy to determine whether the photographer took the photograph for his own purposes or whether he was commissioned for valuable consideration. The opportunity which the photographer gets of taking the photograph and his chance of selling copies to the customer if the photograph turns out to be satisfactory may be a valuable consideration, and if the photograph was made in pursuance of an order the copyright will vest in the person who gave the order, even although he did not pay and was not bound to pay for the photograph or to order any copies unless he pleased.

As no registration is now necessary as a condition precedent to action, the case of Pollard v. Photographic Company has lost much of its importance. In that case it was held that where a photographer was employed by a customer in the ordinary way, then even although through want of proper registration the customer could not sue on copyright, yet, as there was an implied term in the contract between the parties that the photographer would only use the negative for the purpose of supplying his customer with copies, the customer could restrain the photographer from making copies for his own use or selling copies or exhibiting them in public.

Difficult questions sometimes arise out of the transactions between press photographers and the proprietors of illustrated papers. It is common for the press photographer to take large numbers of photographs of sporting and other events and places of current interest, and to submit prints to the numerous illustrated papers. The editor of the paper selects such photographs as may be suitable for his current issue, and may put some of them