Should Photographers Allow Venues to Use Their Photos for Free?

Last Updated: February 12, 2025

Photographers, you KNOW something like this has happened to you... You shoot a wedding at a beautiful, rustic venue. Throughout the day, you capture the elegance and charm of the long tables, tall archways, and bright gardens. Afterward, the venue requests your photos for their advertising. You can’t blame them… your images will probably inspire many more clients to book with them! But should you let them use your photos for free? Or should you charge and use a photography licensing agreement? 

These are big questions I see people ask over and over in the photography world! As an attorney and a photographer, I provide education and legal templates to help photographers grow profitable businesses while staying Legally Legit®!

So let’s get into it. In this blog, I am going to discuss:

1. Whether a venue is legally entitled to your photos after you’ve shot at their location

2. The advantages and disadvantages of giving free photos to venues

3. Options to protect your rights and grow your income
   

This information will help you decide how to protect your rights as a photographer while building your business.

First of all, are you legally required to share your photos with a venue?

No, Venues are NOT entitled to your photos without your permission (even if your photos feature the venue).

The U.S. Copyright Act of 1976 (Title 17) protects creative works like photography. This law gives you exclusive copyright ownership over your photographs. To make the copyright fully enforceable, you can register photos with the U.S. Copyright Office. However, a photo already has basic copyright protection as soon it hits your memory card or film! (For more on copyrights and how to protect them, check out this article.)

As the photographer, you have full control over how you distribute, reproduce, or allow others to use your photos. That is, unless you agree otherwise in a contract, photo licensing agreement, or other promise.

So before you agree to hand over your photos to a venue, consider the pros and cons. You may want to use a photo licensing agreement to control how a venue uses your photos—and get paid!

Sidenote: Similar principles apply to wedding vendors (such as florists or cake designers) who request photos from you. Read more about how to handle photo requests from vendors here: “Why You Can (and Should) Require Vendors to Pay for Your Photos.” Or check out this YouTube video: How Vendors Can Protect Their Creative Work [2024]

Advantages and Disadvantages of Allowing a Venue to Use Your Photos for Free

There are strong advantages to sharing your photos with a venue for free. For example:

• Showcasing your work to potential new clients. If a venue is popular for the type of event you shoot, your work displayed on their website or in their lobby can generate valuable referrals.

• Creating potential for a partnership with the venue. Providing photos to a venue as an act of good faith may create a long-lasting relationship. 

• Boosting your resume overall. You can highlight the venue’s marketing materials to add to your credibility.

If a venue won’t use your images unless they’re free, you may miss out on these benefits. In some cases, these benefits can provide more value over time than charging for those initial photos.

On the other hand, photos are a very valuable resource for venues! If you give beautiful photos free of charge, you may help the venue bring in massive amounts of business without a proportional benefit. Other considerations are that handing over your work for free can devalue your work and the industry, and it could set a precedent for other venues and businesses asking for free images. 

The great news is that you have multiple options when providing photos to venues, either paid or complimentary.

How to Set Up a Photography Licensing Agreement for Venues

When a venue requests photos, one option is to establish a photography licensing agreement. This is a great tool for you to have in your “small business legal toolkit.” A license agreement is a legally binding agreement between two people or entities:

1. The licensor (who grants the license and owns the asset being used); and 

2. The licensee (the buyer receiving the right to use).

You can structure a licensing agreement to promote your photography business and the venue. You can grant a license with or without a fee. Either way, a licensing agreement clearly lays out how a venue can and cannot use your images.

5 Considerations for Creating the Perfect Photography Licensing Agreement

1. Ownership of your product. Make sure the language in your photo licensing agreement establishes you as the owner of your photos—not the venue. This protects you in case a third party uses your images without permission.
   
   

2. Scope of usage. Clearly articulate what photos the venue can and cannot use. Also get clear restrictions, such as whether the venue needs to credit you or use your watermark on images.
   
   

3. Pricing. The fee for a venue to use your photo may be your full retail price. Photographers sometimes charge a discounted rate in exchange for publicity. Another option is to negotiate a non-monetary fee. For example: a venue might promote you as their #1 recommended photographer in packets to potential clients, they may link you in direct email marketing, etc.
   
   

4. Time limits. Specify how long the photo license will last. (One year is typical for photo license agreements.) Include whether the license will automatically renew after that period or if you want to reserve your right to negotiate later on.

A photo licensing agreement can be mutually beneficial to you and the venue. You can have your photos displayed, get paid for your work, and protect yourself from copyright problems. Meanwhile, the venue can showcase its location in a beautiful, stylized way in its marketing and advertising.

2 Types of Photo Licensing Agreements for Venues

There are two basic kinds of licensing agreements. These are: a non-exclusive licensing agreement and an exclusive licensing agreement. The best choice depends on your circumstances, relationship with the venue, and business goals.

Non-Exclusive Licensing Agreement

A Non-Exclusive Licensing Agreement allows another person or entity to use your photos for commercial purposes. Since the agreement is non-exclusive, they are not necessarily the only ones to have permission to use the images. This gives you the freedom to share your photos with multiple licensees for different reasons. 

You can determine the number of photos you want to include and how the venue may publish them. For example, you might only allow a venue to post your photos on a website and their social media platforms. If they want to use your images on a billboard, you would charge a higher fee, for example.

We offer a Non-Exclusive Licensing Agreement Template in The Legal Paige contract shop. It’s pre-written and reviewed by our attorneys with fully customizable legal language you can easily edit and send to venues.

       

 

Other Rewarding Ways to Collaborate with Venues as a Photographer

Besides setting up a photography license agreement, you can take other approaches to collaborate with venues that love your work. Here are two ideas:

1. Arrange for a styled shoot featuring the venue. 

One option is to suggest a styled shoot. This can be a win-win for both you and the venue. The venue gains some control over the setting, locations, and setup. You can create more stylized shots than you can in the middle of a chaotic wedding or event. The venue pays for your styled shoot and receives more tailored images.
 

2. Market your work with business cards and watermarks. 

If you allow a venue to use your photos, you could provide business cards they can make available to clients who show interest in your photos. 

You may also solidify in writing that the venue will retain any watermarks you include on photos. This prevents any confusion about who shot the photos. It also provides potential customers with another way to find your website and/or contact information.

A Tricky Situation - Venues claiming Access to your photos because of private property rights

Now here’s a tricky spin on the topic that keeps coming up in the photography industry today: What if a venue claims they have rights to your photos because you took them on their private property?

We are seeing venues claim that, because they are private property, they should get full access to all the fully edited photos you took while on site, and they can use them however they want. Many venues are even requiring the individuals booking the venue (like the couple getting married) to sign a “Private Property Photography Release Policy” indicating that the photographer must turn over all photos taken on the property. 

There are three issues to consider here: 

1. The clients do NOT own your photos, so they do NOT have the rights to grant the venue full access to your photos for their own purposes. YOU, the photographer, are the only person with whom venues can contractually agree to anything relating to your photos being used commercially. 

2. Venues that are private property may have some rights to restrict how you use photos taken on their property, but that does NOT mean they automatically have ownership or full access to your copyrighted photos. No one gets access to your copyrighted photos without your permission. 

3. Some legal sources are recommending that photographers include a property release clause in their contracts with their clients, but in my legal opinion you may be opening up a can of worms if you do this! If you require your clients to get a property release clause from the venue for their event, it may alert venues that they could possibly enforce rights, thus creating an issue that wasn’t even there in the first place. Secondly, it puts your clients in the middle of a situation they shouldn’t be involved in. This is really an issue to be worked out between the photographer and the venue when it comes up. 

If a venue demands you turn over your photos under the claim of private property rights, you have a couple of options:

1. You can negotiate an arrangement where, in exchange for photos, you receive a small fee, crediting rights, and/or preferred vendor status. 

2. You can decline the venue’s request, which may mean that you simply cannot use those specific photos you took on their property for marketing purposes (meaning neither you NOR the venue can use them).

3. You can proceed with caution and still use the photos for marketing, but be aware that the venue may take legal action. However, you may have legal defenses, such as implied consent to be on the property, duress, or the venue’s inability to prove trespass.

The Legal Paige Take: Ultimately, it’s up to YOU to decide if and how to allow a venue to use your photos.

You know your business better than anyone else. Don’t worry about what your photog friend does—everyone runs their businesses differently. You might be a better networker than they are, or have a unique photo licensing strategy. Don’t be afraid to think outside the box to create your path to success as a photographer!

No matter your approach, an exclusive licensing agreement template or non-exclusive licensing agreement template is a great legal tool to have in your back pocket!

Sources

United States Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. §§ 101–1511 (2023), available at https://www.copyright.gov/title17/.

DISCLAIMER

THIS BLOG POST IS NOT A SUBSTITUTE FOR LEGAL ADVICE. EVERY SITUATION IS DIFFERENT & IS FACT-SPECIFIC. A proper legal analysis is necessary based on your location and contract. Consult an attorney in your home state for advice regarding your contract or specific legal situation.

See our full disclaimer here.

More Free Resources from The Legal Paige

The Legal Paige Podcast: Episode 140: How to Use Licensing Agreements to Protect Your Photography Business

The Legal Paige YouTube Channel: “How Vendors Can Protect Their Creative Work [2024]”

The Legal Paige Blog: “Why You can and Should Require Vendors to Pay for Your Photos” 

The Legal Paige Blog: “The Difference Between ™ and Copyright: How to Protect Your Business”