How to Keep Licensing Organized

Lesson 91 from: Fine Art Photography: The Complete Guide

Brooke Shaden

How to Keep Licensing Organized

Lesson 91 from: Fine Art Photography: The Complete Guide

Brooke Shaden

Lesson Info

91. How to Keep Licensing Organized

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Next Lesson: How to Prepare Files for Licensing

Lessons

Class Trailer

Yours is a Story Worth Telling

02:09

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Lesson Info

How to Keep Licensing Organized

So we're gonna talk with licensing about organization of those files, organization of the whole spreadsheet keeping track of all these things that you have to remember when you're licensing an image, which gets highly complicated, where to license your images, where you might wanna upload your pictures to and have somebody sell them for you, or that you might want to sell yourself, and then how do we price licensed images? And I'm excited to talk again about pricing, because it is something that people really struggle with, that I have often struggled with, and I wanna try to just break down what it means to price a licensed image, as much as we can. And I'm gonna tell you right up front, it's a lot more complicated than pricing a print for a gallery. So just prepare yourself mentally right now. Okay. Organization. When we're talking about organization for licensed images, I don't necessarily mean where you keep them in folders on your desktop or anything like that, or how to back them...

up. What I mean is how do you keep track of which images have gone where and for how long and for what projects and things like that? So the title of the project is good to have, as well as the title of the image that you're licensing. Who is licensing it specifically? And I mention that because there are a lot of publishing companies, for example, that work with other publishing companies and they might, you know, totally innocently, give that image to this other publishing company that they work with for this other thing that they wanna do and it's not really meant to go to that person. So who exactly is the licensee? What region are you licensing within? When I say region, I mean what country? What part of the world? For example, this book is in a language that I don't know but it's in another language. Can anybody read that? No? That's okay. It's in a language that I don't understand because I have a lived a sheltered life and I don't know languages. But this was, let's just say, it looks like maybe the Netherlands or something like that. Netherlands! It is. Okay. So this was from the Netherlands and this image was licensed for this book cover so when I created this contract, one thing that I might have said was, "do you want this image to be sold anywhere else? Are you okay with that?" The price will change based on their answer. So they might have said, "please don't sell this image to anyone else in the Netherlands." Okay? So that would be restriction by region by saying, well, I don't mind if you sell this picture to somebody else other places in the world, but not in the Netherlands because that's where we're based, that's where this book will be distributed and that's what's most important to them. Alright, so aside from region, duration. How long is the license going to last? Will this be a worldwide exclusive forever license? Or are you going to limit the duration of the license? So you might, I might tell these people in the Netherlands you can have this picture for three years with exclusivity in the Netherlands but after three years is up, I can still sell that picture to anybody else that I want in the Netherlands. Just an example of how you would use duration to limit or expand your license. And then the medium. So maybe... I'm just gonna keep holding this book instead of putting it down. Maybe if this person came to me and they said, "I want to license this image, it's for this book, I need exclusivity in the Netherlands, but also on all book covers worldwide," then that would be exclusivity by medium and that's something that we have to think about. They might say you can still make prints of it, you can still, you know, sell to bands for album art, you can do movie posters, but just not books because they want the rights to the books. Something to think about. And then price is what you'll also organize into your spreadsheet. How much did you sell for? What are the terms and conditions? And I've already showed this to you a little bit and I just wanted to run through this one more time because I think it's very important that we're really clear about organization here with licensed images. This can be an extremely difficult thing to untangle if you haven't kept track of who you're selling your images to. So I've got here the title of the image, the licensee, the amount that I sold it for, if it's exclusive or not, what the terms are, terms and conditions, how they paid, what format it's in, digital versus print, the print run of it. So if they did sell it, how many copies are out there? Things that you might want to know. I tried to make these spreadsheets with every piece of information I can think of, even if I can't even see how it's relevant right now. If I just think one day down the road I'd really like to know how many copies of this book are out there, I'm just gonna ask right up front and figure out what their print run is. The other really good thing about doing that, about asking about their print run size, is that you know then, and let's say they can't afford a really expensive license, then you might say, "you know what, if your first print run is 5000 copies, then I'll sell it to you for this print run. But if you do another print run, you'll owe me 300 more dollars," let's just say. So it's good to know the print run. Invoice, medium, what is it on? So is it a book or is it a CD or is it a movie poster? The working title, and any notes. And so we've already gone over this so I'm gonna skip right past it, but just really emphasizing how important each of these categories are.

Class Materials

Bonus Materials with Purchase

Guided Daydream & Writing Exercises Workbook (Lessons 1-11)

Creating an Original Narrative Workbook (Lessons 12-18)

Finding Your Target Audience Workbook (Lessons 19-27)

Planning Your Series Workbook (Lessons 28-34)

Set Design Workbook (Lessons 35-41)

Compositing Workflow Checklist (Lessons 42-49)

Editing Workflow Checklist (Lessons 50-55)

Location Scouting Workbook (Lessons 56-60)

Stock Image Downloads for Practice (Lessons 61-72)

Organizing Your Portfolio Workbook (Lessons 77-81)

Pricing & Editioning Your Work Workbook (Lessons 82-89)

Writing Contracts & Licensing Images Workbook (Lessons 90-98)

Gallery Best Practices (Lessons 99-106)

Pitch Package Workbook (Lessons 107-111)

Writing Your Brand Workbook (Lessons 112-117)

Marketing Workbook (Lessons 118-122)

Social Media Workbook (Lessons 123-127)

Printing Methods Checklist (Lessons 128-133)

Self Critique Workbook (Lessons 134-137)

Bonus Materials Guide

Syllabus

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Brooke Shaden

Brooke explores the darkness and light in people, and her work looks at that juxtaposition. As a self-portrait artist, she photographs herself and becomes the characters of dreams inspired by a childhood of intense imagination and fear.

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topics covered in this class

Fine Art Digital Photography

Ratings and Reviews

April S.

I tuned in for most of Brooke's lessons in this course and watched some of them more than once as they were rebroadcast. First I want to say that Brooke is a very good instructor. Her easy-going, friendly, down-to-earth, somewhat quirky manner cannot be mistaken for unprofessional. She is very prepared, she speaks well (not a bunch of hemming and hawing), she is thoughtful, she is thorough, she is very relatable and at ease, and she is definitely professional in her presentation. I really thought when I first tuned in that it would mostly be background noise while I was at work, sound to keep me company. Not because I didn't like Brooke but I really didn't think I was into fine art photography nor did I think I cared about the business side of things much. Not now anyhow. I was really wrong. Brooke sparked a deep interest in me to delve into fine art photography, to consider creating images for myself, from my imagination. In fact, I realized that this was something I'd been thinking about for a couple of years though I hadn't put a name to it (the idea of creating pre-conceived images based on my own creative goals). I gleaned many little treasures from her about image sizes, working with printers, different types of paper, selling, interacting with galleries, and so much more. I may not need all of what she taught right now because I'm definitely headed in another direction at the moment, but she planted ideas and information in my head that I know will be useful at some point. Things I may not have thought of on my own, but that seed is in my head now so when the time comes, I'll know. I'd really like to buy her course but at the moment, with the holidays right around the corner, it's not in my personal budget. I'm grateful to have caught the live and rebroadcast lessons though, and her course is on my list to own. I think it's a great reference to be consulted over and over again, not watched once and forgotten. Kudos Brooke for really putting together an excellent course.

Ron Landis

I'm retired now, but spent decades in the people and training business. Brooke is extraordinary! Even though this course is extremely well organized and she's left nothing unattended, she moves through it with friendly conversational manners and without a sense of it being stilted. It's as though we are all her friends, not students, as she shares her heart and passion with us. What a joy it is to listen to her. And what a clear, unambiguous command of her subject. Wow! She explains it with such ease using explanations and techniques that won't overwhelm artists just starting their portfolio or the Photoshop-squeamish among us; but despite its simplicity her resulting art is breathtaking and beyond original. I wish more of my professors at school were as engaging. This was by far my best buy at Creative Live yet.

Angel Ricci

When the title says comprehensive, it means comprehensive! I loved every part of this course. It's inspirational, motivating, and insightful towards creating art work. Even if you are not necessarily considering a fine art specialty, the concepts discussed in this course are applicable to many areas! I find this super useful as a videographer and photographer and look to apply all of these exercises and concepts for my personal and business work moving forward. It is lengthy, but you will not regret a single minute. Brooke Shaden is an amazing artist and educator. I recommend keeping up with her work, presentations, and any future courses that may come in the future.

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How to Keep Licensing Organized

How to Keep Licensing Organized

Lesson Info

91. How to Keep Licensing Organized

Lessons

Class Introduction

Storytelling & Ideas

Universal Symbols in Stories

Create Interactive Characters

The Story is in The Details

Giving Your Audience Feelings

Guided Daydream Exercise

Elements of Imagery

The Death Scenario

Associations with Objects

Three Writing Exercises

Connection Through Art

Break Through Imposter Syndrome

Layering Inspiration

Creating an Original Narrative

Analyze an Image

Translate Emotion into Images

Finding Parts in Images

Finding Your Target Audience

Where Do You Want Your Images to Live?

Create a Series That Targets Your Audience

Formatting Your Work

Additional Materials to Attract Clients

Which Social Media Platforms Will be Useful?

How to Make Money from Your Target Audience

Circle of Focus

The Pillars of Branding

Planning Your Photoshoot

Choose Every Element for The Series

Write a Descriptive Paragraph

Sketch Your Ideas

Choose Your Gear

How to Utilize Costumes, Props & Locations

What Tells a Story in a Series?

Set Design Overview

Color Theory

Lighting for the Scene

Props, Wardrobe & Time Period for Set Design

Locations

Subject Within the Scene

Set Design Arrangement

Fine Art Compositing

Plan The Composite Before Shooting

Checklist for Composite Shooting

Analyze Composite Mistakes

Shoot: Black Backdrop for White Clothing

Shoot: Black Backdrop for Color Clothing

Shoot: Black Backdrop for Accessories

Shoot: Miniature Scene

Editing Workflow Overview

Add Fabric to Make a Big Dress

Edit Details of Images

Add Smoke & Texture

Blend Multiple Images Into One Composite

Put Subject Into a Miniature Scenario

Location Scouting & Test Photoshoot

Self Portrait Test Shoots

Shoot for Edit

Shoot Extra Stock Images

Practice the Shoot

Introduction to Shooting Photo Series

Shoot: Vine Image

Shoot: Sand Image

Shoot: End Table Image

Shoot: Bed Image

Shoot: Wall Paper Image

Shoot: Chair Image

Shoot: Mirror Image

Shoot: Moss Image

Shoot: Tree Image

Shoot: Fish Tank Image

Shoot: Feather Image

View Photo Series for Cohesion & Advanced Compositing

Edit Multiple Images to Show Cohesion