Publicity photograph of Frances Helm (left) and Pernell Roberts as, respectively, Mary Margaret and Sidney Lindauer. This was used to promote their live theatrical performances of their own fictional characters in the 1972 play Welcome Home (named "Edmund Hartmann's touching comedy-drama"), performed in Ivanhoe Theatre.

Source: Item from eBay.com, front, back

Date: The first preview show was Tuesday, December 5, 1972. Grand opening was Thursday, December 7, 1972. Use in Sun-Times article of December 31, 1972.

Author: Gold/Wilson Public Relations. Photograph by Marc Hauser of "Hot Molasses Studio"

At the time of release, permissions of using this photo was granted to the third-party media for editorial uses only. However, this photo was released during the Copyright Act of 1909 and lacks copyright notice, as indicated in all versions of this file, which the 1909 Act required prior to the Copyright Act of 1976 and the Berne Convention Implementation Act of 1988. No efforts to correct this omission were made.

All versions of and other unscanned portions of the back of this photo do not display the copyright notice. This photo was released under the Copyright Act of 1909, and, under the 1909 Act, the copyright notice was required and must contain three elements:

1. The symbol © (letter C in a circle); the word “Copyright”; or the abbreviation “Copr.”
2. "The year of first publication. If the work is a derivative work or a compilation incorporating previously published material, the year date of first publication of the derivative work or compilation is sufficient. Examples of derivative works are translations or dramatizations; an example of a compilation is an anthology. The year may be omitted when a pictorial, graphic, or sculptural work, with accompanying textual matter, if any, is reproduced in or on greeting cards, postcards, stationery, jewelry, dolls, toys, or useful articles."

   This was not required for copyrighted photos published before 1978 under Copyright Act 1909, and omission of date may have been irrelevant to such works. However, Copyright Act of 1976 came into effect and then has applied to copyrighted materials published before 1978. Year has become required for works published before 1978. Consequently, pre-1973 copyrighted photos without a year of copyright and registration and required mandatory deposit into the Copyright Office lost copyright protection and then fell already into the public domain.

3. The name of the copyright owner, an abbreviation by which the name can be recognized, or a generally known alternative designation of owner.

   Example © 2007 Jane Doe.

See http://www.copyright.gov/history/1909act.pdf for older rules that apply to pre-1978 works without required notice. See more at Appendix A of the Copyright Act of 1976: http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92appa.pdf.

Film production expert Eve Light Honthaner in The Complete Film Production Handbook, (Focal Press, 2001 p. 211.):

Publicity photos (star headshots) have traditionally not been copyrighted. Since they are disseminated to the public, they are generally considered public domain, and therefore clearance by the studio that produced them is not necessary.

The Professional Photographer's Legal Handbook By Nancy E. Wolff, Allworth Communications, 2007, p. 55:

There is a vast body of photographs, including but not limited to publicity stills, that have no notice as to who may have created them.

Creative Clearance-Publicity photos archive copy at the Wayback Machine"

Publicity Photos (star headshots) older publicity stills have usually not been copyrighted and since they have been disseminated to the public, they are generally considered public domain and therefore there is no necessity to clear them with the studio that produced them (if you can even determine who did).

This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published in the United States between 1929 and 1977, inclusive, without a copyright notice. For further explanation, see Commons:Hirtle chart as well as a detailed definition of "publication" for public art. Note that it may still be copyrighted in jurisdictions that do not apply the rule of the shorter term for US works (depending on the date of the author's death), such as Canada (50 p.m.a.), Mainland China (50 p.m.a., not Hong Kong or Macao), Germany (70 p.m.a.), Mexico (100 p.m.a.), Switzerland (70 p.m.a.), and other countries with individual treaties. العربية ∙ беларуская (тарашкевіца) ∙ čeština ∙ Deutsch ∙ Ελληνικά ∙ English ∙ español ∙ français ∙ Bahasa Indonesia ∙ italiano ∙ 日本語 ∙ 한국어 ∙ македонски ∙ Nederlands ∙ português ∙ русский ∙ sicilianu ∙ slovenščina ∙ ไทย ∙ Tiếng Việt ∙ 中文（简体） ∙ 中文（繁體） ∙ +/−