The main rule is:

You should not change the main theme or content of the image in such a way that the message displayed in the image in any way gets distorted.This includes cropping and montages.

Yes, it happens all the time – but that does not make it any less questionable . You could get sued, and we don’t want that to happen, do we?

Often you need to give an editorial image a bit of retouching, a better cropping and perhaps some color adjustments. Minor adjustments like these are allowed! At Professor Hany Farid interesting home page you can see examples of unlawful image tampering, ranging from Abraham Lincoln, to Britney Spears and Sarah Palin. Some of the images at the site are funny, some are questionable and some are asking for a lawsuit.

And remember – editorial images mean editorial usage only, no commercial use! Editorial rights are licensed on a use-by-use basis. Use in an editorial manner means use relating to events that are newsworthy or of public interest and usually distributed through a legitimate mass media, presumably unbiased, which reaches an anonymous audience. For commercial use YAY offer Creative images with RF-license. This RF-license grants you permission to edit the image as much as you want, in any way you want. If you are unsure about editing or usage, feel free to e-mail us for (a free) advice!

Linda