Once again, another DeviantArt member has told me that he/she has used my work for his/her own purpose. Because I am a professional photographer, in most circumstances it is not practical for me to give away my work.

Before you use my work, please learn what protection a copyright provides.

United States copyright laws allow for “fair use” of a copyrighted work. However, “fair use” is much narrower than most people think (hint: it doesn’t mean “It’s fair usage for me to use someone else’s work however I choose if I claim it’s art.”

Fair use is also very dynamic, and the proliferation of digital media has greatly affected the legal interpretation of fair use. However, there are sufficient statutes and legal precedents for us to know, in most instances, where the boundary is between “fair use” and "copyright infringement.”

Fair use allows for copyrighted work to be reproduced without permission from the copyright owner in these instances:

• Criticism
• Comment
• News reporting
• Teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use)
• Scholarship
• Research

(This list was extracted from the Wikipedia article “fair use,” which provides a clear and useful explanation of the topic and how it works in the United States.)

Please note that “derivative works” isn’t included as a fair use. The owner of the copyright has the exclusive right to make derivative works (any type of new version of the original image, such as a drawing, painting, or statue).

So if you need photos for your creative pursuit, please take your own, don’t take mine without permission.