proper photo credits

[Sarah Atkinson]

Just wandering what is the proper wording for Photo credits?

[hcstudios]

It's my understanding that it depends on who owns the copyright. But I'm not a lawyer, and don't even play one on TV....

I've seen "images © name" on sites where the copyright is retained by the photog and his/her name or company name is known. One of the big stock photo houses asks that you use "© [insert current year] StockCorporationName” on any/all credits pages when you purchase their images.

For one site where the photog wasn't known but the source was we used "Images of San Jose courtesy of:" and the source (the visitor's organization) logo.

Keep in mind that unless you have a signed copyright transfer from the photog that in the USA all copyrights remain with the photographer who took the photo, no matter what you paid for it -- so those little copyright notices are very important and may prevent any nasty letters from lawyers.