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architecture royalties

mdler

what is the consensus on royalties on your work...

does anyone put in their contracts that the architect should recieve a fee is photos of their work are used for $$$ gain???

What about a percentage of the sale price of a project (residential) if the owner advertises it as an architect designed project???

 
Nov 29, 06 6:46 pm
dml955i

We generally buy the rights for any professional photos that we have taken. If a magazine wants to use them, they have to pay us a fee or else hire their own photographer. Good architectural photographers cost major bucks - the one we usually use costs about $10K/day. You read that correct - he's one of the best in the biz. Totally worth it. Magazine publishers and awards jurors drool over them...

Fat chance trying to get a cut of the project sale. We have residential project that we completed just over a year ago that the clients have decided to sell. If it sells for asking price, they'll make over a million bucks on the deal...

Nov 29, 06 7:00 pm  · 
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mdler

makes you want to be an architectural photographer...

Nov 29, 06 7:03 pm  · 
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stephanie

that seems weird to gain post-constuction profit on privately owned building. how would that possibly happen? it seems like that is more of a land value issue than design cred.

Nov 29, 06 7:05 pm  · 
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makesamnsure

time to switch my profession.

Nov 29, 06 8:44 pm  · 
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treekiller

(c). You should be able to charge for reproduction of images of your building since you do own the copywrite for the work of architecture- don't you?

i think architects rights go beyond the drawings to the look of the project.

aw hell, get a lawyer and sue those biotches who are raking in bank showing off your project.

Nov 29, 06 10:44 pm  · 
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SuperHeavy

there's a lot of law that already takes care of this stuff (at least layman's law via google), but don't have time to look up (only here while waiting for a 300meg psd file to save).

off the top of my head, i think images of any building taken on public ground are fair game, sculpture falls to a different category though.

and having been on the photographers side of things (no 10k a day though..), i can say that'd i'd hate to have to drop dollas just to use an image I created.

Nov 30, 06 12:16 am  · 
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Abel Oner Office

"What about a percentage of the sale price of a project if the owner advertises it as an architect designed project???"

hahaha... that's a good idea.

Nov 30, 06 11:58 am  · 
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mdler

I am being serious...you would think that as architects we would attempt to remove our heads from our asses and find other ways to proffit from our hard work

Nov 30, 06 12:51 pm  · 
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crowbert

Hmmm, lets all form the AIAA and threaten to sue granny if she decides to sell her house that we designed unless we get our cut. Its worked so well in eliminating mp3 downloading...

Since your building is presumably in public view, you cannot copyright its likeness - just like movie stars (or anyone else for that matter) cannot sue tabloids for copyright infringement when they publish their photos buying whole milk at the shop'n'go. But I'm sure you could get Brad Pitt on board with trying to make your little idea happen, as he would doubly benifit.

What is under copyright protection is the actual design of the house - not the image of the house. Go visit BoingBoing to see examples of how corporations have twisted our view of what copyright actually protects and does not protect, and how individuals have only exacerbated the problem.

Nov 30, 06 1:06 pm  · 
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e

i believe that exterior shots of buildings fall under the public domain while interior shots can only be taken with client approval.

i'm not sure where i fall on this subject. the client has purchased your sevices to design THEIR building. the contractor is hired to build THEIR building. certainly, the quality of the architect's work is a factor in how much or little or why a building is photographed, but isn't it also true that the quality of the contractor's work plays a factor too? not to mention the client's ability to pick the right architect and make right decisions during the process with the architect? an architect can design the best building in the world, but if the people building it suck, well, your design means nothing. i guess at the end of the day, it is the client's building. it bought and paid for by them.

lastly, it is all about how you write your contracts. a photographer owns his/her photograph until different rights are negotiated with his/her client. if the client wants to own the photo outright, they can negotiate that. to be sure the photographer will apply a stiff fee as they stand to make no more money off of that shot while the new owner can do that if they wish.

just a few thoughts.

Nov 30, 06 1:46 pm  · 
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Abel Oner Office

what you mean is
If mdler designs a building and then the owner says,
"buy this building, it was designed by mdler" you see that as
a possible way to make $ off of the use of your name/design in a future sale? or if your design is in the new cadilac commercial you might be elligible for $? clever idea.
i think most professional music is published under ASCAP (american society of composers, artists and publishers) which
basically makes sure that if a piece of music is used on tv or on the radio or is even performed by another artist, that those who are signed onto the original piece of music get royalties.
you can put anything into a contract you like but :
the client has purchased your sevices to design THEIR building. the contractor is hired to build THEIR building. certainly, the quality of the architect's work is a factor in how much or little or why a building is photographed, but isn't it also true that the quality of the contractor's work plays a factor too? not to mention the client's ability to pick the right architect and make right decisions during the process with the architect? an architect can design the best building in the world, but if the people building it suck, well, your design means nothing. i guess at the end of the day, it is the client's building. it bought and paid for by them. "
makes the most sense.
architecture isnt really about money anyway, money is just another material.

Nov 30, 06 3:41 pm  · 
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grid

Is it possible to write a contract where every time the building sells or gets resold the architect gets a % of the money?

Nov 30, 06 4:13 pm  · 
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e

architecture isn't about money? you are correct. i like hobbies too.

Nov 30, 06 5:05 pm  · 
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stephanie

my office charges a "vault fee" if people want us to go look for old drawings, and then we charge more if they want us to make prints of them.
but I'm talking like, old old linen drawings. and we don't do it to make money, we charge because maintaining those drawings and reproducing them is a service.
if somebody wants to remodel something, or add on to an existing building that was designed by the firm in 1908, we don't, like, sue them for design intent infringment if they wanted to go to somebody else for design work (if such happened to be the case).
or conversly, my firm bought out an architect's archives when he closed up shop, it's not like he still gets a percentage of any work we get subsequent of having his old drawings.
so i think to some extent you can make money off of your work once it is built, but it is either not much, or a one time deal.

Nov 30, 06 6:11 pm  · 
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mdler

the realestate agent will usually make more $$$ off of the sale of a home than the architect made in design fees...

Nov 30, 06 6:42 pm  · 
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silverlake

a real estate agent typically makes 6% of the sale, not necessarily more than the architect made for design fees. and thats apples and oranges anyways, because they have a completely different set of liabilities they are at risk with (bullshit like, i fell when i moved in, so the house was misrepresented by the agent) that warrants their fee.

Nov 30, 06 6:49 pm  · 
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mdler

if the house leaks 10 yrs down the road, guess who is gonna hear about it...not the real estate agent

Nov 30, 06 7:32 pm  · 
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Philarch
link

It seems the entertainment industry gets the most protection of creative property. Not exactly new, but annoying anyway.

Dec 1, 06 12:15 pm  · 
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mdler
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royalties
Dec 1, 06 12:33 pm  · 
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