Copyright in a photograph of a red bus travelling over a black and white Westminster Bridge

What copyright protection do photographs of common scenes have in the UK and how far does that protection extend? These are the questions the Patents County Court recently considered.

Judge Birss QC made some important and, at times, surprising findings when considering whether the claimant's photograph was original (i.e. whether copyright subsisted) and whether the defendants' photograph took a substantial part of that photograph (i.e. whether the copyright was infringed). His decision suggests protection for these kinds of photographs may be greater than previously thought.

Facts

The claimant took a picture of a red bus crossing Westminster Bridge from a deliberately chosen location and manipulated it using Photoshop, to produce a contrast appearance of a red bus against a black and white background. The photographer spent about 80 hours producing the image. The defendants created a photograph which was intended to take the same general form as the claimant's but which had some significant differences in appearance. The parties had been involved in an earlier dispute so it was no surprise that the claimant alleged that the defendants' image infringed the copyright in its image.

Click here to read the complete article

Lawyers Adam Rendle, Niri Shanmuganathan