Copyright Law-Seventh Circuit Holds Product Photography Sufficiently Creative for Copyright as Derivative Works-Schrock v. Learning Curve Int’l, Inc., 586 F.3d 513 (7th Cir. 2009)

Originality stands as both a constitutional and statutory prerequisite for copyright protection.  Nevertheless, the absence of a clear definition of copyright originality in the Copyright Act and in judicial application has lead to uncertainty regarding the meaning of the term “originality” in copyright law.  Despite the ambiguity, originality endures as the very premise of copyright law and requires thorough articulation in order to establish the boundary between a truly original work and a work exhibiting only a marginal contribution by the alleged author.  In Schrock v. Learning Curve International, Inc.,  the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals examined whether inherently accurate product photographs contained the requisite amount of originality to be entitled to copyright protection as derivative works.  By concluding that derivative works are not held to a higher standard of originality than other works, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals declared that the combination of the photographer’s technical and artistic choices produced a sufficient degree of creative distance to warrant a finding of originality. . .