How-To: Hiring a Photo Editor
Topic: Outsourcing
Time Investment: 5 Minutes
Suggested Product: Photo Editor Contract
Hiring a photo editor can help increase your profit margin, maximize your time, and help grow your photography business. As always, here at TheLawTog we want to help ensure that you are legally protected, so check out these tips below.
First, determine their status – independent contractor versus employee.
Second, provide yourself a budget line item for the photo editor.
Third, use an Independent Contractor or Employee Contract bundle including:
- Main Services Agreement – sets expectations, outlines the independent contractor or employee relationship (payment, arrival, deadlines, etc.).
- Non-Solicitation of Clients – prevents editor from soliciting your clients for commercial gain.
- Non-Disclosure Agreement – protects your proprietary and confidential information.
- Intellectual Property Acknowledgement – conveys copyright from the photo editor to your business – so you can OWN and legally sell the photographs. You also run the risk of co-authorship and shared copyright.
We recommend using all of the above (you can snag our bundle here) but, at a minimum, you need the Intellectual Property Acknowledgement so you can own the photographs in their final product.
We also have an article about the legalities of outsourcing editing which you can read here.
