This article is general information about copyright as of September 2026, not legal advice. For a specific contract or dispute, talk to a copyright attorney in your country.
Copyright is the legal right to copy, share, display, and change an original work. It usually belongs to the person who created the work, from the moment the file is saved. So you need the owner’s permission to repost, print, or retouch an image you did not create. Other people need yours to use your images.
What Changed in Copyright for Photographers in 2026?
This guide builds on Copyrightlaws.com’s six facts for sharing online content, updated for 2026 and written for photographers and retouchers, to complement Lesson 7.2: Sharing Your Retouching Work Online of our video course Beauty Retouching for Beginners.
The rules describe U.S. law unless a section names another country.
| Change | What happened | What it means for you |
|---|---|---|
| Registration fees | On July 14, 2026, the U.S. Copyright Office sent Congress a new fee schedule. Group registration of up to 750 photos goes from $55 to $85. | The fee is set to rise in mid-November 2026 unless Congress blocks it, so register your finished work before then to pay less. U.S. Copyright Office – Proposed Fee Schedule |
| AI-only images | On March 2, 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear Thaler v. Perlmutter. Works made entirely by AI still get no copyright. | An image made entirely by AI gets no copyright in the U.S., so you cannot stop others from copying it, while your own photos and hands-on retouching stay protected: copyright requires a human author. Finnegan, Leaving Human Authorship Requirement Intact |
| AI-enhanced photos | In May 2026, artist Ankit Sahni sued the Copyright Office for refusing to register an AI-edited image, made from his own photo with an AI style app. | A federal judge is now weighing how much human work an AI-edited photo needs to qualify for copyright, so keep your layered PSDs as a record of your own edits whenever you retouch with AI tools. Mondaq |
| Embedding | On August 27, 2026, the Fifth Circuit (a federal appeals court) rejected the “server test” used for embedded images in the western U.S. | Embedding law now differs by region. The rule used in the western U.S. under which a website that embeds an image stored on someone else’s server is not treated as displaying it. A plain link to the original is still the safest way to share someone else’s image. Loeb & Loeb LLP |
| AI edits | In June 2026, a Dutch political party agreed to pay damages to court illustrator Petra Urban for altering her drawing with AI. | Altering another artist’s image with AI and publishing it without consent can cost you damages, as a Dutch political party found when it agreed to pay damages to a court illustrator for changing her drawing. Copyrightlaws.com |
| Public domain | In April 2026, a New York gallery offered AI-colorized prints of Ansel Adams’ 1941 Moonrise and called it public domain. The Adams Trust objected. | Even when an old photo is in the public domain, selling your version of it can still bring objections. The Art Newspaper, Petapixel |
Copyright Facts You Should Know
1. Copyright Starts the Moment You Save the File
A work is protected once it is fixed, meaning saved in a lasting form such as a memory card, a drive, or a print.
Registration, the official record of your claim with the U.S. Copyright Office, matters when you enforce your rights. For U.S. works, you need a registration, or a refusal, before you can sue in federal court. With a timely registration, you can also claim statutory damages, which are amounts set by law so you do not have to prove lost income. The range is $750 to $30,000 per work, and up to $150,000 per work for willful copying (copying the person knew was not allowed). To claim statutory damages and your attorney’s fees, register before the infringement starts or within three months of first publishing the image.
Protecting your work: register your images in batches. One group application covers up to 750 photos for $55 today, about 7 cents per photo at the maximum, so filing before the proposed $85 fee starts in November 2026 will cost you less.
Using someone else’s work: a photo you find online with no ©, watermark, or caption is still protected. You may not use it just because you found it on Pinterest, in a Google search, or in a model’s tagged posts.
2. Copyright Lasts for Decades
In the U.S., copyright generally lasts for the creator’s life plus 70 years. Work made for hire (see fact 4) is protected for 95 years from publication or 120 years from creation, whichever ends first.
Protecting your work: your images stay protected for 70 years after your death. For valuable works, list them in your estate plan (the documents that say who inherits your property) and name the person who will manage the rights.
Using someone else’s work: a 20-year-old beauty campaign or a 1990s magazine cover is still protected. Retouching a vintage cover for a “then and now” reel needs the owner’s permission, just like a new image.
3. Public Domain Means Free to Use
A work in the public domain has no copyright, so anyone may use it. Works enter the public domain when their term ends. Some were never protected, for example, photos taken by U.S. federal employees on the job.
Check the status with evidence. In April 2026, Danziger Gallery offered AI-colorized prints of Ansel Adams’ 1941 photo Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico. The gallery’s founder later said a copyright lawyer had confirmed the photo is in the public domain. The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust objected to the use of Adams’ name and reputation without consent. Public domain is a copyright status only. Questions about a photographer’s name, credit, and reputation are separate.
Protecting your work: if you restore a public-domain image, such as a 1920s studio portrait, the original stays free for everyone. A restoration that only returns the image to its original look gives you little or no new copyright.
Using someone else’s work: “no author listed” or “it’s everywhere online” does not mean public domain. Treat the image as protected until you can confirm otherwise.
4. The Creator Owns the Copyright
The person who creates a work owns it in most cases, with the exception of work made for hire. That means work an employee creates as part of the job, or certain commissioned work covered by a signed agreement. In those cases, the employer or client owns the copyright. An owner can also sign the copyright over to someone else in writing.
Protecting your work: as a freelance photographer shooting for a brand, you keep the copyright unless you sign it away. The brand gets a license: permission, best put in writing, to use the images in agreed places for an agreed period of time. Name the channels and the term in every quote; each added use can increase the price.
Using someone else’s work: as a retoucher, the files you work on usually belong to the photographer, and the brand has a license to use them. You add your own work when you retouch, but the file still contains the photographer’s original image. To show it in your portfolio, you need the photographer’s permission, and often the client’s as well. Campaign images under embargo (a date before which no one may publish them) stay private until the client explicitly approves it. If you are a staff retoucher, your employer owns your retouched files.
5. Fair Use is a Defense Argued in Court, Not a Permission
Under the U.S. fair use rule, you may use a protected work without permission for limited purposes. These include criticism, commentary, news reporting, and teaching. Judges weigh four factors, including the purpose of the use and its effect on the market for the original. Only a court can decide whether a use was fair.
The leading case for photographers is Andy Warhol Foundation v. Goldsmith. In May 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 7 to 2 against the Warhol Foundation. The Foundation had licensed a Warhol image based on Lynn Goldsmith’s 1981 photo of Prince for a magazine cover. The Court found that the license served substantially the same purpose as her photo, so it was not fair use. A new style alone was not enough.
Protecting your work: since that ruling, you stand on firmer ground when a brand or artist restyles your photo for the same commercial purpose.
Using someone else’s work: a short critique that shows a famous campaign image to comment on its retouching has a stronger fair use argument than a promo reel, where you use the same image to sell your services. Canada, the U.K., and Australia use fair dealing instead: a narrower rule under which you may use a work without permission only for listed purposes, such as research, criticism, or news reporting. Most of Europe has only specific exceptions.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I show retouched client images in my portfolio?
Only with written approval from the photographer and, for commercial work, the client, and only after any embargo date.
Do I have to register my photos to own the copyright?
No. You own it once the file is saved. For work first published in the U.S., you need registration to sue in U.S. federal court, and a timely registration is required to claim statutory damages.
Are AI-generated images protected by copyright?
Not in the U.S. when they are made entirely by AI. Your own photos and creative edits inside an AI-assisted image remain yours.
What can I do if someone uses my photos without permission?
Save screenshots and links as evidence, then send a DMCA takedown notice (a formal request under U.S. law to remove content that uses your work without permission) to the platform or host. To find other copies, run a reverse image search: upload your photo to Google Lens or TinEye to see where else it appears online. To recover money, use the Copyright Claims Board or a copyright attorney.
Sources & Resources to Follow
- Copyrightlaws.com, “Sharing and Republishing Online Content: 6 Tips for Copyright Compliance” (updated July 3, 2026): https://copyrightlaws.com/sharing-republishing-online-content/
- Copyrightlaws.com, “Copyright and Generative AI: 2026 Quarterly Update Two” (September 23, 2026): https://copyrightlaws.com/copyright-and-generative-ai-2026-quarterly-update-two/
- U.S. Copyright Office, Copyright Office Fee Study 2026: https://www.copyright.gov/rulemaking/feestudy2026/
- U.S. Copyright Office, Circular 42, Copyright Registration of Photographs: https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ42.pdf
- U.S. Copyright Office, Group Registration for Published Photographs: https://www.copyright.gov/eco/help/group/grpph.html
- Copyright Claims Board, About the CCB: https://ccb.gov/about/
- Copyright Alliance, summary of the Copyright Office AI report, Part 2: https://copyrightalliance.org/ai-report-part-2-copyrightability/
- Finnegan, on the Supreme Court declining Thaler v. Perlmutter (March 2026): https://www.finnegan.com/en/insights/ip-updates/supreme-court-declines-to-hear-thaler-v-perlmutter-leaving-human-authorship-requirement-intact.html
- Davis Wright Tremaine, on Emmerich Newspapers v. Particle Media (September 2026): https://www.dwt.com/insights/2026/09/fifth-circuit-explores-whether-urls-are-cmi
- The Art Newspaper, on the AI-colorized Moonrise prints (May 2026): https://theartnewspaper.com/2026/05/27/ansel-adams-photograph-ai-colourised-danziger-aipad-controversy
- 17 U.S.C. § 1202, Integrity of copyright management information: https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid%3AUSC-prelim-title17-section1202&num=0&edition=prelim
- Creative Commons, Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 license deed: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/deed
- Professional Photographers of America, Copyright Claims Board FAQ: https://www.ppa.com/articles/copyright-update-faqs-about-the-smalls-claims-process-and-the-copyright-claims-board
This article is general information about copyright as of September 2026, not legal advice. For a specific contract or dispute, talk to a copyright attorney in your country.