Forum:Actor pictures

Forum: The Situation Room > Actor pictures

Over the last while, I've been creating brief actor pages in order to keep the wanted page count low. Creating these ever-so-brief pages takes me all of 45 seconds, resulting from a quick scan of their IMDb profile (name, birthdate/place, 3 or 4 appearances). I haven't exactly bothered to add biographical information. I sort of have to fulfill my guilty conscience of not having more thorough actor pages, so I present a question: Is it OK to use the screengrab of the character that the actor is portraying in order to use them within their actor page? I'm quite aware of the converse, that images of the actors cannot be used in their respective character page (we've encountered a number of situations where "that's just Kiefer Sutherland in another role or a Kiefer Sutherland promo picture, and not Kiefer Sutherland playing Jack Bauer"). So yeah, main question: is a picture of Kiefer Sutherland/Kim Raver/other actor playing Jack Bauer/Audrey Raines/other character all right to place on that actor's page?

Postscript: If you take a look at my contributions, you'll see that my image uploads are very minimal. So you'll see that it's not exactly my preference to upload more pictures than necessary. --Deege515 03:33, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

I personally don't see a problem with it. A picture of Jack Bauer is also a picture of Kiefer Sutherland, although the reverse is not true. Memory Alpha does this a lot. I'd think ideally, we'd prefer to eventually have out-of-character pics for every actor, but using a 24 screengrab as a placeholder should be fine. --Proudhug 09:25, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

See Forum:Images for more on this topic.

I'd like to bring this topic up again. I've recently begun to dislike our practice of using non-24 pictures for our actors. This seems especially inappropriate in cases like with Kett Turton whose pic is of him from another show. If we're going to show him in a screencap, doesn't it make more sense to use one from our show? This also extends to 24 crew members. A lot of the crew have made appearances in DVD special features, web specials, etc. and I think it'd be preferable to include screencaps from those things rather than IMDb pics, when possible. If no one has any objections, I'm going to start cracking down on non-24 "real person" images, and hopefully ideally we can replace the existing ones with 24 screencaps. --Proudhug 19:42, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

So let me get this right so I know for future actor pages - you dont want any pictures of actors at e.g. red carpet events/any public appearances, you only want them from 24 episodes/DVD special features? SignorSimon 15:46, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Ideally, yeah. Unless someone has any reason to object. I'm not gonna worry too much about cracking down hard or anything, but it seems to me to be a good practice to start. There may be other 24-related images available, too, such as pics from panel discussions, conventions, etc. I just think we should stick as close to 24 as possible with everything. --Proudhug 16:07, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

OK, I just thought it would be useful to know. So if we cant find images of the person from a 24 related event, we just use the image of the character? SignorSimon 16:25, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

This would be ideal, I agree. But the practical issue that comes up is, 24-related OOU pics of a ton of the minor character actors just don't exist. And there is nothing more boring or disappointing than reading the article about CharacterX and then clicking his actor page... only to find the same exact picture there. To keep it interesting, we shouldn't really shy from red-carpet pics and the like, assuming a 24-related OOU pic doesn't come up. Look at the actor pic for Matt Bushell: it's clearly not 24-related but I couldn't find a pic of Bushell "on the set" or doing 24-interviews, so why would we delete a great pic of the actor himself only to regress to recycling the same old character pic? The same can be said for a huge number of minor characters. (I have no problem with using IU pics for actor pages as placeholders, as this is generally the only option left to those people who cannot/will not upload pics when creating actor pages). – Blue Rook 03:57, 24 December 2007 (UTC)_talkcontribs

Seriously, there's nothing more boring or disappointing? The goal of Wiki 24 isn't to make things interesting, it's to be factual. Including a picture of a character on an actor page is still presenting an accurate photo of that actor, it's showing them at work, and more importantly, it's relevant to 24. Plus, the practicality of doing this is that by only using Fox images, we always know where the image came from and who the copyright holder is. It seems to me that "stealing" pics from IMDb or some other source undermines our recent efforts to properly tag and organize our image database. --Proudhug 02:58, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Crap, I didn't see this moved here. To respond, what if I made another fair-use tag exclusively for those images from IMDB. It would preclude any necessity to go and undo (and then delete) all those actor pic uploads and then recycle the same stuff again. Actor pages on wikis seem like a fair place to use pics like that, and I don't see any reason to undo all that work for any reason other than the eventuality that we get sued by an actors' guild or something. – Blue Rook 09:09, 6 January 2008 (UTC)_talkcontribs

Much like with the new stringent rules on image names, I'm not concerned with making an effort to change all of the old pics right now, mainly just throwing out a "from now on" thing. It's not something that I'm extremely worried about, but it just seems to me that, since this is a wiki about 24, it would be silly to chose a non-24-related image over an actual pic of the actor working on the show, interesting or not. I haven't been able to find any documentation of this, but I'm pretty sure this is MA's thinking on the matter, too. --Proudhug 22:14, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Ah I gotcha. Yes, I definitely agree that 24-related actor images (on the set, interviews, etc.) are better than those pics which are non-24-related. Since this is a non-retrospective policy change you're putting forward, it sits much better with me for obvious reasons, so to be clear, I'm with it 100%. I'm assuming that this means: if an actor page has a non-24-related image, it will suffice until and if a 24-related one comes along. For those which do not wind up with such a replacement image, don't you agree that a Fairuse Template would do well? If you do, I'd like to ask in advance for some ideas on the wording for it, but once we get the phrase right, I'll do plug them into those images like I have been doing with the IU screenshots. I'm thinking something like This image is a copyrighted promotional photo of an actor. As such, the copyright for it is most likely owned by the actor or their agent....– Blue Rook 08:30, 8 January 2008 (UTC)_talkcontribs

Well, I'd hoped that eventually all of the non-24 images would be removed. I'm just saying I'm not about to put forth an effort to get rid of them all right now. However, if I'm making any changes to an actor page at some point, I'll likely replace the image with one from the show while I'm in there and delete the old one. If you'd like to create a fair use template in the meantime, that's probably a good idea. I know little about copyright, however, so unfortunately, I can't provide any input into what should belong in such a template. --Proudhug 13:54, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Could not we create a fairuse tag that basically says "this image is copyrighted by its respective photographer and no infringement is intended, it is merely used to help give a greater understanding of the actor/actress on the Wiki"? Then all cast images could be tagged with this? --SignorSimon _{(talk/contribs/email)} 22:01, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Yup look ↑ at my Jan 8 post, that is the same thing. I didn't go through with it because of other projects, but also because it's risky business. See here, it's a help page from IMDB that pretty much says those pictures are licensed to them exclusively. The way I see it, having a tag or not won't make a difference, but if you make one, I'd help with the wording and in inserting it where appropriate. – Blue Rook 22:39, 30 August 2008 (UTC)_talkcontribs

From what it says on that IMDB page it doesn't sound like it's worth trying to make a tag, because however we word it, we still don't have the right to use the pictures. --SignorSimon _{(talk/contribs/email)} 08:57, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

It kinda stinks :( But generally I'm thinking that most of the actors would be happy to get more exposure, regardless of where they found it. Of course we'll pull a pic down if ever specifically asked by an agent or actor, but this has never happened (to my knowledge) and I doubt it ever will. – Blue Rook 15:44, 31 August 2008 (UTC)_talkcontribs

Just to get this straight; can we not use images of actors/crew members from 24 related events e.g. the Season 7 premiere party or anything like that? --SignorSimon _{(talk/contribs/email)} 18:23, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

If the images are released by an official 24-related source, we can. --Proudhug 19:06, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Just wanted to ask something on this topic, so thought I'd revive the same forum post: Basically, there are some stunt performers who I know did certain stunts (either through a stunt reel video they have made, confirmation by contacting them, or by speical feature footage where they are referred to by name). However, the on-screen footage of their stunt (even from the special feature) does not show their face properly or they are just a blur in the background. I wanted to put forward a kind of couple of points in favour of giving them non-24 related main pics:

1. We do have many actor pages with non-24 pics already, although you said above it's your mission to eliminate them, it wouldn't be a crazy sidestep to do this
2. In leui of no pic at all, I think it's goodto illustrate the person we are talking about, and a 24-related pic would not do that
3. Stunt people often have numerous roles throughout the series, and a good picture of what the person looks like would help editors match up names and faces quickly, with the result of identifying more roles (this exact thing happened to me yesterday with Jon Braver)

Now I know there are arguments against this, as outlined above, so I don't really know whether this would be a good or bad thing, but I thought I'd put it out there and see what people thought--Acer4666 12:17, May 20, 2011 (UTC)

I think this is definitely a bad idea. And it really comes down to a copyright thing. We know we can use Fox-owned images under "fair use" laws, but to start including exterior photos puts us in a position where we'd have to start tracking down the owners of the photos and ascertaining their permission, etc. However, I understand the importance and practicality of the endeavor you're suggesting, so what if you or someone else starts a page on their user namespace with off-site links to stuntmen photos to be used as a reference tool? --proudhug 22:46, May 22, 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, I realise now that my point number 1 isn't a point at all, as we're trying to get rid of all of the non-24 actor pics anyway. And I'll be honest, in that I really don't understand fair use law, or its applications, so erring on the side of caution seems ok.

I suppose a user namespace might not be necessary - if I make an article for a stunt performer with no pic, I can include a link in external links to imdb, or if theres no pic on imdb to their official website or wherever there is a pic of them, so anyone on the article can access a picture just a click away--Acer4666 22:59, May 22, 2011 (UTC)