Author Topic: Distant cars in commercial image? (Read 3366 times)

dragonblade · « **on:** September 13, 2023, 05:33 »

I have an aerial image of a town shot with a wide angle lens. And in this photograph, there are several parked cars but they are very distant and impossible to read the license plate numbers. It is possible that a car expert may be able to identify some of the brands or models of the cars without zooming in though some people may struggle to do this. Would such an image be suitable for commercial usage in Adobe Stock?

There is also a brand name visible on a supermarket in the photo but it is barely visible due to the distance. I'm planning to clone the brand name out but that is probably overkill. You would be able to identify the brand name if you zoomed in to the photo.

I know in the past, stock agencies would normally accept photographs of cities etc for commercial usage if it was a wide shot (showing a city skyline etc and everything is distant.) However, these current warnings about logos etc on the AS submit page has made me extra cautious and I don't want to take any chances.

I could also add that there are some old historical B&W photographs displayed on the wall of the supermarket that are possibly in the public domain. Though once again, they are extremely distant and hard to identify as photographs. Though a local would probably be able to recognise them as photographs.

pangamedia · « **Reply #1 on:** September 13, 2023, 15:05 »

Unless you remove all things you brought up yourself it is editorial.. Does not matter if it is "distant" or not

SuperPhoto · « **Reply #2 on:** September 13, 2023, 15:29 »

Quote from: dragonblade on September 13, 2023, 05:33

I have an aerial image of a town shot with a wide angle lens. And in this photograph, there are several parked cars but they are very distant and impossible to read the license plate numbers. It is possible that a car expert may be able to identify some of the brands or models of the cars without zooming in though some people may struggle to do this. Would such an image be suitable for commercial usage in Adobe Stock?

There is also a brand name visible on a supermarket in the photo but it is barely visible due to the distance. I'm planning to clone the brand name out but that is probably overkill. You would be able to identify the brand name if you zoomed in to the photo.

I know in the past, stock agencies would normally accept photographs of cities etc for commercial usage if it was a wide shot (showing a city skyline etc and everything is distant.) However, these current warnings about logos etc on the AS submit page has made me extra cautious and I don't want to take any chances.

I could also add that there are some old historical B&W photographs displayed on the wall of the supermarket that are possibly in the public domain. Though once again, they are extremely distant and hard to identify as photographs. Though a local would probably be able to recognise them as photographs.

My experience is 'generally speaking' if they just look like "generic cars" - then usually it is fine for commercial use. If however - you say could easily identify the brand (i.e., say a row of lambourghinis), or easily identify license plates, street names, business establishments, etc - then yes, that would become editorial footage.

dragonblade · « **Reply #3 on:** September 13, 2023, 17:31 »

Quote from: pangamedia on September 13, 2023, 15:05

Unless you remove all things you brought up yourself it is editorial.. Does not matter if it is "distant" or not

Distance can make a difference - at least with buildings. It's well known that stock agencies can accept city images as commercial if the buildings are part of a wider view (if everything appears distant.) Though I wasn't sure if the same applies to cars. Of course it also depends on the stock agency's discretion.

In the past, Ive had two city images accepted as commercial. All the buildings appeared distant in those particular images and there were no cars visible. One of those photos has sold 12 times on AS.

dragonblade · « **Reply #4 on:** September 13, 2023, 17:48 »

Quote from: SuperPhoto on September 13, 2023, 15:29

My experience is 'generally speaking' if they just look like "generic cars" - then usually it is fine for commercial use. If however - you say could easily identify the brand (i.e., say a row of lambourghinis), or easily identify license plates, street names, business establishments, etc - then yes, that would become editorial footage.

I do see a variety of car types in the image. One of them looks like a four wheel drive. I confess that I'm not a car expert so there could be a possibility that some people may be able to identify some of the brands despite the distant view. It's impossible to read the license plate numbers - they're too far away for that.

I don't think street names would be an issue. I have a street name sign accepted as commercial. Regardless, no street name signs would be readable in this photo.

Maybe I'll play it safe and submit this photo as editorial. Though I seriously doubt it would be accepted as illustrative editorial on AS because it doesn't focus specifically on a particular building, brand or product. It's a wide aerial view that shows a bunch of different buildings and an oval / sports field.

Oh and by the way, if anyone is interested, the photo was taken with a kite and not a drone. There are a small number of people out there that take aerial photographs with kites - definitely a minority. Obviously, drone photography is more common place but people have been doing kite aerial photography for over 100 years. In fact, some of the earliest aerial photographs were taken with kites and balloons. Just a bit of trivia.

pangamedia · « **Reply #5 on:** September 13, 2023, 19:08 »

Quote from: dragonblade on September 13, 2023, 17:31

Quote from: pangamedia on September 13, 2023, 15:05
Unless you remove all things you brought up yourself it is editorial.. Does not matter if it is "distant" or not

Distance can make a difference - at least with buildings. It's well known that stock agencies can accept city images as commercial if the buildings are part of a wider view (if everything appears distant.) Though I wasn't sure if the same applies to cars. Of course it also depends on the stock agency's discretion.

In the past, Ive had two city images accepted as commercial. All the buildings appeared distant in those particular images and there were no cars visible. One of those photos has sold 12 times on AS.

Being sold is not an argument, having city images accepted neither. It is not the agencies problem but your problem if something goes wrong so they happily accept and sell your images. (Yes they do control your images put they did not put all there energy and time into it to do so.)

1) It is possible that a car expert may be able to identify some of the brands or models of the cars without zooming in though some people may struggle to do this.
--> without zooming in you can identify the brands of the cars, that might be a problem (with zooming in probably some trademarks visible on the cars)

2) There is also a brand name visible on a supermarket in the photo but it is barely visible due to the distance. I'm planning to clone the brand name out but that is probably overkill. You would be able to identify the brand name if you zoomed in to the photo.
--> No it's not overkill, it's what you should do if you do not want to sell it editorial. E.g. in commercial photos no logo and trademarks can be visible. Does not matter if you have to zoom in or not.

3) I know in the past, stock agencies would normally accept photographs of cities etc for commercial usage if it was a wide shot (showing a city skyline etc and everything is distant.) However, these current warnings about logos etc on the AS submit page has made me extra cautious and I don't want to take any chances.
--> Yes in photos where the city is in the background, e.g. landscape photos you normally cannot see any logos etc. We haven't seen the photo but from the description it sounds to me that the buildings are not at an huge distance from your camera so trademarks are visible in your photo

4) I could also add that there are some old historical B&W photographs displayed on the wall of the supermarket that are possibly in the public domain.
--> possibly does not sound very convincing to me. Although I don't know anything about those photos. Brands are being shown in the photos, photo's also have copyright so I would say just clone them out to be sure instead of relying on an assumption that those images are possible in the public domain.

dragonblade · « **Reply #6 on:** September 13, 2023, 23:47 »

Quote from: pangamedia on September 13, 2023, 19:08

3) I know in the past, stock agencies would normally accept photographs of cities etc for commercial usage if it was a wide shot (showing a city skyline etc and everything is distant.) However, these current warnings about logos etc on the AS submit page has made me extra cautious and I don't want to take any chances.
--> Yes in photos where the city is in the background, e.g. landscape photos you normally cannot see any logos etc.

And also in photographs where a city is the main subject but with a wide view (as in a city skyline.) Agencies have been known to reject city images for commercial usage where the frame is dominated by one or two (or three) buildings - especially if the building design is protected by copyright. But they are more likely to accept a much wider view which reveals many buildings - in other words a distant city view (for commercial use.)

Quote from: pangamedia on September 13, 2023, 19:08

We haven't seen the photo but from the description it sounds to me that the buildings are not at an huge distance from your camera so trademarks are visible in your photo

As I mentioned above, it's an aerial image shot with a wide angle lens so the distance is quite considerable. The camera would be roughly about 200 feet in the air more or less.

Quote from: pangamedia on September 13, 2023, 19:08

4) I could also add that there are some old historical B&W photographs displayed on the wall of the supermarket that are possibly in the public domain.
--> possibly does not sound very convincing to me.

At a rough guess, I'd say the B&W photographs may have been taken in the early 1900s or possibly earlier or later. I'll have to take a visit to this supermarket again and see if I can find dates among the captions on these vintage photographs.

Quote from: pangamedia on September 13, 2023, 19:08

photo's also have copyright

In many cases yes, photographs do have copyright. An exception to this is where copyright has expired 70 years after the death of the photographer.

Regardless, like I said above, ive changed my mind about submitting this photo as commercial. I'll mark it as editorial and see how it goes.

Vinit · « **Reply #7 on:** September 14, 2023, 02:04 »

I do Vectors only and got over 1000 Dollars ... and I don't know if I should be happy or not.
For now, the money is a nice bonus, of course. But training AI with my stuff, so AI gets better and better and replaces me in some years... I don't know.
And also - if AI gets better, Stock Agencies won't be necessary too, or am I seeing this wrong? Who buys photos if you can do everything by yourself by just typing some words into a program.

yuriy · « **Reply #8 on:** September 14, 2023, 07:18 »

that's my process too. if it's going to take me forever to clone out a bunch of logos and remove people i just make it editorial. that said i've submitted photos with "distant cars" and people who were not easily identifiable expecting a reject but they were accepted. some agencies are more lenient than others.

dragonblade · « **Reply #9 on:** September 14, 2023, 22:32 »

Quote from: yuriy_t2 on September 14, 2023, 07:18

that's my process too. if it's going to take me forever to clone out a bunch of logos and remove people i just make it editorial.

Yea that's a good approach. With this particular image, it wouldn't have taken me much time to clone out the brand name and I was considering doing it.

Quote from: yuriy_t2 on September 14, 2023, 07:18

that said i've submitted photos with "distant cars" and people who were not easily identifiable expecting a reject but they were accepted. some agencies are more lenient than others.

I could have submitted this one as commercial but that warning on the AS submit page and all these recent reports of blocked accounts put me off the idea. Better to be safe than sorry I guess.

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Author Topic: Distant cars in commercial image? (Read 3366 times)

dragonblade

pangamedia

SuperPhoto

dragonblade

dragonblade

pangamedia

dragonblade

Vinit

yuriy

dragonblade

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