A question of ethics?

[elena7seas]

I have just started to post my pictures to a website (Smugmug) so that I can share with friends and Cruise Critic cyber-friends more easily. My galleries are all unlisted, so that I have to give friends a URL for them to access my photos.

 

Most of the time my pictures have no people in them, but from time to time my shots of the ships I sail on have other cruisers in them. Is it unethical to post these pictures?

 

I am not really concerned about the people in foreign cities that get caught in my streetscape photographs, because they'll probably never see my photos, but I feel uneasy about posting shots of people on cruise ships on a site like Cruise Critic. Has there been any discussion about this?

[rjm1cc]

Since you are not charging for the pictures you do not need permission from the people to post.

The only reason I can see not to post the picture is that the pose or background might be embarrassing.

[pierces]

As was said before, as long as your photos don't portray the person in an embarrassing or compromising situation and you are willing to remove the photo if the person were to contact you and request it, there is no restriction on the quiet, semi-private use you are making of the photos.

 

The only real restrictive situation is if you were to sell prints in a gallery or sell the image to a company to use in an ad.

 

Dave

[elena7seas]

Thanks very much for your replies. Certainly I will be respectful in my choice of photos to post.

 

All of my work with respect to published photographs has been in the area of children in public schools, where I always have to get parental releases for all children who MIGHT be in the photographs to be taken (I am not the photographer in these situations), so I just wanted to check that I would not be breaking any norms or codes in this area.

[IPA region 30 member]

If a person is in a public place, the supreme court has pretty much said that no one has the expectation of privacy... Post away...

[pilotdane]

This does lead to an interesting sport. When watching television or commercials shot live on the street keep an eye out for the people with their faces blurred. They are the ones that did not sign the release form.

[calgarygary]

This thread reminds me of the time that I was banned for posting on the DIS dining boards. A frequent poster there was offended by mis-behaving children in a restaurant and took a picture of a young boy (12ish) scratching his a**. Although I could sympathize with someone having their dinner ruined, I was horrified that an adult, much less a teacher, would post a picture of a child in an embarassing act. My resulting posts led to my being banned as well as one of her defenders.

 

ps - at least the DISboards removed the offending post, but as most of us know, once something is posted online, it can never really be removed from cyberspace.

[Coracii]

If a person is in a public place, the supreme court has pretty much said that no one has the expectation of privacy... Post away...

 

It can get a little bit more complicated since technically a cruise ship is private property not public, but I highly doubt that anyone would raise a fuss over a photo taken while they were on vacation unless the photo showed questionable circumstances. If any of the photos I take while on vacation are even remotely questionable I either crop them or don't post them anywhere.

[Aplmac]

If a person is in a public place,

the supreme court has pretty much said that no one has the expectation of privacy... Post away...

If I'm right...the legal terminology for that is being "in the public domain"

and unless you are benefitting monetarily from their image (sold to a magazine or suchlike)

background people haven't much say.

 

.

[Coracii]

A very good one page PDF document covering the rights of photographers to shoot can be found at http://www.krages.com/ThePhotographersRight.pdf and printed out. I have a miniature version laminated in my bag, but to this point have never had a need for it. Reality is that most of what you hear in the news about privacy laws relating to photography isn't necessarily the truth, though there are definitely some rules that must be followed.