Copyright with a closed company.

[XG332]

I have dug out some pictures of me as a young lad, i was interested in the costs of reprints so i tried to find the company.
It turns out they went into administration 2 years ago and are no more.

Where does this leave me regarding getting my own reprints of the pictures?

Oli

[Simpo Two]

XG332 said:

I have dug out some pictures of me as a young lad, i was interested in the costs of reprints so i tried to find the company. It turns out they went into administration 2 years ago and are no more.

Where does this leave me regarding getting my own reprints of the pictures?

I presume these photos were taken by the company concerned? If so I think copyright dies with the company - but where are the negatives?

[XG332]

They must have kept the master copies and we got a set of proofs and the selected prints.

[tog]

Can you find the administrators? There must have been some sort of sale of assets, and their archive and intellectual properties (the copyright) could well have been sold off to the highest bidder.

[tinman0]

tog said:

Can you find the administrators? There must have been some sort of sale of assets, and their archive and intellectual properties (the copyright) could well have been sold off to the highest bidder.

If not, then contact the Official Receiver as the (unsold) property of a dead company belongs to the Crown iirc. But you should be able to find the original administrator.

[Simpo Two]

I suspect all the negatives would have been labelled as 'rubbish' and skipped.

In my experience people who clear out companies are not very sensitive - I had a smart little POS unit in a nearby hairdressers. On the back it said 'Please do not throw this away, it took time and effort to make. If you no longer want it please call xxxx and I will collect it'. A month later the salon went bust - I went to visit and it had been completely stripped and the unit binned.

[tinman0]

Simpo Two said:

I suspect all the negatives would have been labelled as 'rubbish' and skipped.

Surely the copyright lives on in a published magazine? I've dealt with administrators before, actually buying IP, and they are more than happy to cut an invoice for something if it's not already sold - that is their job after all.

[Simpo Two]

I guessed perhaps wrongly that this was a portrait photo company, not a publishing company.

[tinman0]

Simpo Two said:

I guessed perhaps wrongly that this was a portrait photo company, not a publishing company.

Yeah, fair point. My fault.

[XG332]

tinman0 said:

Simpo Two said:

I guessed perhaps wrongly that this was a portrait photo company, not a publishing company.

Yeah, fair point. My fault.

It is a portrait company