A Notice to Photography Clubs and Teachers about Using Our Tutorials
One of the most common email requests that I get are from those heading up local photography clubs asking if they are able to use our tutorials in their newsletters or classes.
I get these emails on such a regular basis that I thought I’d write a post outlining how our content can be used by these groups.
While the written content on DPS is protected by copyright we do give permission to local photography clubs and schools to use our tutorials for educational purposes under some circumstances and conditions (outlined below).
- Content may not be reproduced online on another website – ie you may use it in your club or school if you print it out for members/students or even to email it out – but not to publish on your site.
- Credit must be given to the author – please include their name and bio line and a crediting link/url to their site if they have one in their bio.
- Credit must be given to Digital Photography School. Please include a line to the effect of ‘Source: www.digital-photography-school.com’ or ‘first published on www.digital-photography-school.com’
- Please don’t reproduce pictures without checking copyright – this one is trickier – at DPS we use a lot of Creative Commons licence images which you’d be able to use also if you credit the photographer. But if the images don’t have a link to where you can check the copyright they may well be copyright protected and only for use on DPS (some photographers only allow us to use them). To be safe you’d be best not to use the images in our articles or supply your own.
- Our Tutorials may not be used for commercial purposes – please don’t sell them or use them as the basis for a paid course. If in doubt please contact us.
- Fair Use – please don’t reproduce large quantities of our tutorials. We’re happy for you to reproduce a few for educational purposes but don’t take it too far and do hundreds!
Our goal with this policy is to share the knowledge and make the learning happening on DPS go further – but also to give credit where credit is due and not have our site and it’s contributors exploited. Again – if in doubt, feel free to email us via our contact form.


11 Responses to “A Notice to Photography Clubs and Teachers about Using Our Tutorials” - Add Yours
October 5th, 2009 at 8:47 am
That is a fair and reasonable set of restrictions…. Let me saw thanks from all of us for the work you put into the tutorials, and thanks for letting us share them!
October 5th, 2009 at 11:24 am
lol…I’m not sure how many times my Speed Photography tutorial has been reproduced across the web. I know of about 10 sites…I’m sure there are quite a few more.
October 5th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
I think that I have always followed or at least tried to follow the rules you have here on my site. Your content is great and I always try to make sure people follow my links back to your terrific site, which should only drive more traffic to you. As a teacher I don’t want to see wonderful resources like yours dry up because of content scraping. Keep up the great work.
October 5th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
Thanks very much. I’m just starting a photography club at my school and I hope it is successful. I’ve been using dPs for about 6 months, and I have learned sooo much from it. Thanks.
October 6th, 2009 at 6:19 pm
This may just be the only website I would pay a membership fee to access. As a fund raiser, why not sell content. Have some sort of corporate membership that allows access and download of the tutorials for a annual fee?
October 8th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
gturner – while that is a good idea, I doubt it would be cost-effective in terms of the time and resoureces required to set that up, and the limited income because people have internet access pretty much everywhere nowadays, so not alot of requirement for a downloadable copy to harddrive.
What I think would be a good idea, is a book of the most popular/best/unique/whatever posts/tutorials. Yes an actual physical book. But I’m guessing that would have copyright problems in terms of original photos and content? Plus a bit risky in terms of getting costs/returns. However, I think alot of people would purchase it.
October 9th, 2009 at 2:18 am
I appreciate this. I am teaching some basic photography to our homeschool co-op and I wondered if I could use some of your tutorials in my lessons. This clarifies what I may and may not do.
October 9th, 2009 at 5:18 am
Thank you very much for this post. I teach several classes at the Green Valley (Arizona) Camera Club and find that you’re descriptions and explanations are easy for my students to understand. I do give the website credit so that my students can come here to get additional information.
October 9th, 2009 at 11:04 am
I love your tutorials. As a recent graduate of a local college with a degree in photography, I find your tutorials to be very clear and well written. I am starting to tutor some friends and plan on sending links to your tutorials to the participant and highly encourage them to join your site. Thank you for providing such a wonderful resource.
October 9th, 2009 at 11:56 am
i was just about to ask for permission to use your articles to share with some of my students. what I do is I read your articles every now and then and try to produce the same image then i share it to my friends and of course i tell them i read it from your site. i just want to congratulate you guys for sharing with us your articles and creative inputs. i know you will continue help us get updated with the latest trends in digital photography. keep up the good work and tnx again for sharing…
October 12th, 2009 at 6:45 pm
I just want to say thank you very much for all your hard work. Your content has helped me become a better photographer, every time I need to know something different/unusual there it appears on your weekly Photography Tips. I usually print out the occasional tutorial and carry them with me, you should now have quite a few new members joined over the past few weeks, having seen my printouts they wanted to know where they could get the same help. Please keep up the excellent work, I haven’t found another site as helpful.
Leave a Reply