Reinvention was the theme of BAPLA FOCUS 2019

Over 100 BAPLA members, picture buyers and industry suppliers gathered for this year’s edition of BAPLA FOCUS in the London Docklands. The new venue proved popular, with plenty of room, both for conference sessions and for mingling over refreshments.

Leading industry legal experts Jonathan Lockwood (VP, Corporate Counsel, Getty Images), Anthony Misquitta (General Counsel, V&A), and Anna Skurczynska (Founder and Director, Open Plan Law) discussed the impact of the EU Copyright Directive. Arguments were made that the directive offers online licensing opportunities for rights holders while meaning little real change in the copyright situation for photographs of out of copyright works, and possibly we should be pressing the UK government to adopt the full directive.

In a new departure for BAPLA - and with the support of Sarah Wells, freelance media researcher and Jacqui Wald, editorial director, Camera Press, and Andrea Stern, visual content consultant - we conducted an interactive workshop. This asked participants to evaluate the skills needed in the industry today and how to obtain them.

Interactive Workshop ©BAPLA
Interactive Workshop ©BAPLA

This generated interesting suggestions for knowledge-building, including a proposal that BAPLA should facilitate a conversation between agencies and publishers over licensing rights.

Benjamin Beavan and Georgi Kadrev ©BAPLA
Benjamin Beavan and Georgi Kadrev ©BAPLA

Key speakers gave a glimpse into their working lives: Sara Rumens, Features Picture Editor for the Times posed the question: is editorial dead?

Matthew Maran introduced us to his unusual wildlife project, shooting pictures of foxes in the streets around his London home.

Benjamin Beavan, Senior Global Development Manager, Getty Images and Georgi Kadrev, Co-founder & CEO, Imagga looked at how artificial intelligence is being applied to image search and capture, metadata and more.

The final panel offered advice on creativity in business with Emma Alexander (Mother Bran), Patrick Towell (Golant Media) and Patrick McCrea (Artiq) discussing how businesses with a purpose are changing the creative landscape, with the creative industries being recognised for the scale of their contribution to the economy.

Many thanks to our sponsors

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Header picture: Matthew Maran ©BAPLA