Legal and ethical considerations

As a photographer, there are many laws that I must follow and I will be highlighting these here and discuss how I am going to be addressing these issues.

In terms of copyright, I must ensure that any images that are used are taken and owned by myself, this is as it is illegal to take ownership of other people's wok as it is in a way stealing, to ensure that I am not charged I will take my own photos and I will also ensure that my images are copyright protected, this is going to be done by declaring them as my own and I will release the images publicly with watermarks to ensure that no one can take credit for my work.

Right to publish is when the model gives consent for the images to be used by myself and released into the public, this is done as some people may not give consent to the images being released to the public or used on social media, so I will ensure that the models fill in a consent form to the release of these images publicly.

I will also have to consider the commercial aspect to my photos, as if i sell my photos, or intend on doing so, my models must be given consent and agree to whether they are to receive a sum of the generated profits, so I will agree to a contract with them and make them fill one out as they may say they do not want anything but may change their mind later, so a legal document would give evidence against any claims they give.

Without proper consent I will not be able to take shots of private property, this protects the public from people taking shots of their houses as that is violating their privacy, it also addresses for places such as police stations and court rooms. If you wish to take shots you must first get permission by the owners filling out a location release form which grants them access to the property and allow it to be featured in shots. 

There are also ethical issues involved with photography mostly to do with taking shots of the public and how you present something through your shots. This is as you are forcing ideas upon the public through your photography and are documenting the things you take shots of. So it is important that you do not misrepresent anything in a negative way. As I am meeting the theme ' Beautiful Doncaster' I will be giving positive ideas about Doncaster so will not be misrepresenting anything about it in a negative manner. Moreover, it is not actually illegal to take photos of people in public, however it is an ethical issue do to most of the public not wanting to be in photos with most actively avoiding the camera, so I will ensure i stay away from the general public or if I am I will grant them the opportunity to move out of a shot and definitely not move up close to take photograph of their face.

Moreover, I need to consider that while legally I can shoot in public and take shots of people, it can be considered unethical to do so without consent.  A commonly known example of someone that does this is Bruce Gilden, an American photographer who takes shots of people in New York, however as he wants to capture the natural expressions and motions of people, he takes shots quickly and unexpectedly without the consent of the people. This is morally incorrect and can be considered creepy to some users which means that he will need to be very careful as to who he takes photographs of and the manner in which he does it as people may misinterpret his actions.