Christopher Wright  wrote:
Hey, I am not a lawyer. That is up to the models lawyers to figure out what he can be sued for. It won't be the first time ths photographer has been sued. He has a long history of doing some very shady things and has lost more then his fair share of lawsuits.

I am not a lwayer either but I do know that a lawsuit filing is a public document. People might agree in a settlement to seal a case and not discuss the outcome, but even that is filed with the court many times and the court title of the settlement is public informaiton.

If you are really concerned about models and stopping this guy, I would think that your civic duty would be to name the photographer and any lawsuits associated with him. This is public information and not neccesarily an act of defamation.

At this point, innocent models still do not know who you are talking about so that they can stay away from this photographer.  Name and shame. The lawsuits are your shield of armor.

A.Fox wrote:

That'd be good for new pics but there are thousands currently on my site.

if you have all of them on cd or in your computer its simple. you can digimarc them all at once I believe. then remove the pics from your site and immediately re upload the digimarced versions. Maybe do a 24 hour shut down for maintanance.

Nu Look Styling wrote:
Sorry to bust your bubble but there are alot of escorts on mayhem, lol TFP just doesn't stand for print anymore & the term I'm a model is used so loosely. Model Escort is more like it & they seek professionals for creative images to have that advantage. $300 per massage they should have professional images.

Not sure if you read the thread but this is about models images being used by an escort serveice without the models knowledge or permission. The models in question are not escort and they are being represented as one. Many of the models images all came from the same photographer who is notorious for doing just about anything with the pics he takes in order to make a buck.

Glamour Boulevard wrote:

if you have all of them on cd or in your computer its simple. you can digimarc them all at once I believe. then remove the pics from your site and immediately re upload the digimarced versions. Maybe do a 24 hour shut down for maintanance.

Yes I know that is possible but that would take much longer than a 24 hour shut down since I am the sole owner/operator of my site. In some cases they would all have to be resized, watermarked, touched up again since I do not have the site versions for some photo sets. Thanks for the advice though.

Glamour Boulevard wrote:
I know the owners of many escort agencies here in California. Not only do they NOT buy photographs of models, they would have to be stupid to do so. I mean come ON. The girl is going to be with the client IN PERSON. If the person in the photograph is not the one that shows up they do not get paid.

I know a woman that ran two escort services and she used generic pictures of several categories and dispatched a representative of that category, rather than the girl photographed.  Clients seldom complained actually, even though the practice is deceptive.

I've photographed the same woman for her own escort service website a few times.  In fact today I photographed her nude at 8 1/2 months pregnant for her own use. 

Other than this one friend, I don't want escort photo business and do, as closely as possible, follow use of my images with a large army of informers.  Because my photographs are pretty distinctive I've never had an image used on a porn or escort site to the best of my knowledge, but I have had a bunch swiped for teenage girls' blogs.

-Don

MichaelHaynes wrote:

My confusion is this: How did selling images to an escort agency website make the photographer unethical? How is a photo promoting an escort agency not a "legitimate" modelling photo? At what point is intentionally standing in front of a camera not modelling? What exactly is your problem with those photographers? Do you have evidence of fraud? Or is it their choice of market venue that offends your sense of moral outrage?

Please educate me. I stand in profound ignorance as to how this bothers you as a photographer.

I don't find anything wrong with shooting content for these types of websites, but the model should be informed. How would you feel if your image was posted on a gay porn site or something involving necrophilia? At least give the model the option to say no.

Glamour Boulevard wrote:
I know the owners of many escort agencies here in California. Not only do they NOT buy photographs of models, they would have to be stupid to do so. I mean come ON. The girl is going to be with the client IN PERSON. If the person in the photograph is not the one that shows up they do not get paid.

Wake up Dude. You think those phoos are real. I have to check the escorts sites to remove my photos. Not once , not twice, but four times now!

You think some horny guy is going to turn a away an escort!
That is the famous bait and switch in Vegas - and the upsell - the tourist trap we call it