Why Creatives Must Know Their Worth – Photographer/Director Amy Schromm #308

In this episode of The Screen Lawyer Podcast, Pete Salsich talks with Amy Schromm, a St. Louis and Nashville-based photographer and director, about the business and legal side of creative work. Amy shares her journey from agency life to running her own production studio, how the pandemic reshaped her career, and why she now champions fair pricing and copyright ownership for creatives. She and Pete dive into contracts, licensing vs. work-for-hire, and how AI is changing the landscape of creative rights.

Website: www.amyschromm.com

Instagram: @amyschromm

Original Theme Song composed by Brent Johnson of Coolfire Studios.
Podcast sponsored by Capes Sokol.

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Transcript

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So it's not unusual for creative people to start their business a certain way and then get an opportunity to really level up to a larger client base, much bigger projects. But they deal with a lot of different issues moving from point A to point B. We're going to talk about that today with my guest, Amy Schromm. Amy, welcome. Thank you. It's so good to be here. Yeah. We looking forward to it. Stick around folks. Hey there. Welcome to the Screen Lawyer Podcast. I'm Pete Salsich, The Screen Lawyer. And today I'm joined by my guest, Amy Schromm, a photographer, director or creator based in Saint Louis but also in Nashville, who has a really interesting story to tell about where she's been and where she's going. Amy, welcome to the program. Hi, Pete. So great to be here. Yeah. Thank you, I appreciate it. You and I have had some interesting conversations, in the fairly recent past and sort of an ongoing basis about things that you've, done in your career and then things that you're looking to do next. And I want to kind of get into that and let our audience find out all about you and more about Amy Schromm. So give us a little background. What tell us about your professional career so far and what you're working on. Yeah. So I am a photographer director. I've kind of worn a lot of hats. Can do a lot of things. I started in the advertising agency, so I started in the Pre-press department. So, I'm very technical, so I understand when you're shooting for, for print, for billboards, that type of thing. I understand the printing process. Work my way up. At the advertising agency, and to producing assisting back in that day to kind of the creative world when it came to photography was a little bit like, I don't want to sound mean, but a little bit like the depiction of photographers. You kind of have to get in there and sure, you know, do what's needed for the brands and for the client. But I worked in-house at an agency for, nine years. So I really, understand internal workflows when it comes to advertising agencies and marketing agencies. And then after nine years, I started, started my own thing. So I started freelancing, started partnering with other agencies, other production companies, etc., etc. and, you know, we hit 2020 and then my work kind of molded into a lot of beverage brands because I was, lucky enough to have a studio downtown and me a beverage stylist and my set stylist will be just us three. They're delivering us the product, we're shooting it, we're sending it remotely. So then I started getting more into that world. So I feel very grateful. In 2020, I was able to actually get more clients, which is not something everybody could say, right? Right. I was wondering when you said the beverage industry, if that's just because since everybody had to stay home, they were buying a lot more beverages. I do remember that. That's exactly right. Pandemic. So that's definitely right. Tequila sales when, wine sales and up. Right. So so obviously the during the pandemic, you were able to do certain things in part because of the facilities that you had and the team that you had, you were able to actually get busier. But after after a sort of 2022 when things started coming back, how did your business change or evolve? Yeah, it's always evolving. And I feel like as a creative in my spot, there's not one right career path. That is, we don't we don't have a book that's like, okay, now this is next or this is next. So that's very, very. Yeah. So everything every job is completely different. So I could get hired by a production company, out of LA or in New York, and I'm shooting a Peyton Manning billboard, and, you know, they're handling everything internally, and I'm just in front of Peyton Manning. You get five seconds to shoot the billboard. So in that, in that setting. So let me let me just ask you. So just, because we talk a lot about in the podcast, you know, talking about the different, contractual structures that they all come together on. Any given production. Right? So, and in your work and whether it's, a still photography campaign or a print campaign or a combination print and video or whatever it might be, there's typically somebody, some entity, a production company, whatever, that's sort of in charge of the overall deliverable to the client. Correct. And then there are teams that are built by that production company. So you might be hired on a job like that to come in and you've got this particular part of the production. That's your responsibility, your professionalism. You would have an agreement that, you know, between you and the production company typically. Right. And you would just do that work. Is that is that sort of that category? That's correct. Yeah. And and have like that there's a lot of different, layers. So from there, my estimates going to the production company, the production company is going to the agency. The agency is going to the client. Interesting. Okay. And but for those I still have my post-production resources, so I still have a team underneath me. So I am still hiring freelancers. Right. So I'm still hiring retoucher that they have, you know, the, the color profiles for all of the brands assets. So in every scenario, there are a lot of different legal matters that I need to know. But it can it always looks different, right? Yeah. No, you that's a really good point that you just made. And it's something that we've talked about a lot here also is like, for example, if you if your contract with the production company, let's go in the order the brand may ultimately decide it wants to own the rights, the output, the copyrights, everything to the finished product. It it communicates that ownership requirement to the agency. The agency engages the production company to put the whole thing together on a basis where it's going to be work for hire, and it's going to travel through ultimately up to the brand. The production company hires you for your piece. You've that contract likely has work for hire language so that it can follow up. And then you hire your team of freelancers, and you need to make sure that that same rights structure is in your agreements as as they move all the way forward. Correct. However, in all those scenarios, I have always held on to that copyright. Okay. So yeah, that's interesting. So dictated by paperwork that yeah, in my paperwork that I've sent to the production companies, it says, okay, you want to buy this out. So meaning you don't want to have to say, is this going to be point of sale? Is this going to be in a store. Is it's going to be on web. This is going to be on a billboard. This is going to be one, two, three, five years. You want this these images for an an unlimited amount of time. And so we kind of use right complete on any kind of use. And so if they want those, the brand is making money off of that IP that those photos. And so I am holding on to the copyright. But they're getting, they're buying the usage for forever. But it still is in Schrems. Copy. Yeah. Right. Right. But now you're you're licensing me. I'm, I'm seeing a shift at time. So I think that's a really good time to talk about this. Yeah. No, that's good. And I didn't mean to cut you off there, but I want to submit. I want to submit like a certain point. So that structure that you're good because I gave you that example before where it's just work for hire all the way through. But you're right. And particularly I think this comes up more and more in photography often than almost any other part of this creative group, where it's more standard for photographers, particularly professionals like yourselves, who are you are really established that you own the copyright and then you're licensing various types of usage in various territories. Time. You may have engaged models that have agreed to certain usage over time. I mean, there could be any number of structures for participants that depend on the nature of the ultimate usage. And so you hold on to the copyright, but you grant whatever these rights are based on whatever they want, and then I would imagine there's various pricing tiers, right? There's certain hours of 12 months. If you want to renew, it's just send me a check for this much and then written notice. Or here's an unlimited use, whatever. But it's always with you granting a license to them, but you retain the copyright. So but you said that starting to change to 5054, which is why I'm here, because I will fight for what? Photographers, especially those up and coming photographers. Good. That's. I think that's good advice. Yeah. Yeah. What was your question? I'm. Well. So so how does. But you mentioned that that's starting to change. I'm seeing you're seeing that shift. Yeah. So tell me about that shift. I think in, you know, I think there was a scare in the market and before I, there's a lot of different things that have happened in industry. I mean, even look in LA and it's I feel, I feel like, there's films coming back there, but the industry as a whole is massively shifting. Right? And we have to move with the times. But we also have to keep in place certain legal structures that protect us and our, our creative IP. So we're in this really big shift, and I don't feel like anybody really has the answer right now. So, I am seeing that 2024 was a hard year. A lot of production companies came out for that. 2025 beginning was slow and I travel all the time. So it's it's I'm getting and I tell people, if my colleagues in Saint Louis, it's not a Saint Louis thing, this is a, this is that industry thing. I am seeing an upsurge now of productions, which is very exciting because from listening to your podcast, it makes me wonder when you were talking, you were talking about AI and copyright laws and stuff like that. I think that people don't want to mess with it right now. Does that make sense? Thank you very much. I kind of standstill like, oh, I is going to take all of our jobs, right? Well, I'm using AI and workflows for like a director's pictures and stuff like that. I think there's a lot of usage for that down the road, but it's not there and it's not there yet, and it's definitely not there. In legal terms. Yeah. Right. So you're absolutely right about that. I mean, I think, yeah, you know, we're we're waiting to see, they're beginning to be a little bit of movement on some of these lawsuits that have been filed around AP, or really more around the training and using copyrighted images. But there's also beginning to get some slow clarity on, like, for example, how much I can you use in something and still create a copyright that can be licensed to someone else? And you're right, I think there's probably a lot of fear. But also I tunity and people ultimately in that situation, they figure out how to deal with the uncertainty by putting it in the contract language. In other words, we're going to put some risk on you or we're gonna put some risk on us because of this uncertainty. But a good contract can do that. Correct. And I'm I'm learning more and more the power of of the details. Devil's in the details. Yes. But even talking to the brand, this brand owner, I'm working with right now, you know, even talking to him, that is a conversation of they want to own the copyright, you know? So I'm. I'm hand-holding brands as well. Sure. But off the conversation of, I don't know what's going to happen with I if I hold the copyright, honestly, your your brand's IP could be more, more protected. Right. Like not more. But I mean, I think that's really that's really interesting. And I haven't heard anybody that kind of in that way because, you know, so much for, for 100 years of production, let's just say and copyrights been around longer than that. But this the basic business model has depended on there being one copyright owner that controlled where the finished work went, to whom it went, how much money came in, and then they paid back everybody that they made promises to pay some some version of that. Right. And so and up until now, that was the primary thing. And so that's why we either had work for higher language or for example, in, in, the photography world, often this is very important or any of the video production world, you want portfolio rights, you know. Yes. I'm going to say to the brand, this Peyton Manning billboard, I can't even though I took the picture, even though I may own the copyright, I can't use Peyton Manning for anything else. I can't use that for anything else. But I need the ability to show that as a as a part of my portfolio to show my work. In other words, hire me the next person that can be achieved in the contract. Either whether you hold the copyright or you assign it to get that license back, but you need that written license back in order to achieve the same thing. And you're mentioning now maybe you're owning it might actually protect it more than if it goes out in the brand and somebody there morphs it into something different. Interesting. Yeah, I haven't seen that. But you might be right. Yeah. I mean, I'm just thinking of the future of the brand if I don't, if I'm giving away this copyright, are the images protected? And that's something I'm kind of brainstorming to. That's something to talk to you about. Like, can Ai now take my images of this beer and luxury brand and replicate it for the competitor? I don't know right now. Well, we know Ai can do it. It's capable. That's legally. It's not legally sort of, permissible for some other brand to effectively use someone else's stuff. But how to protect and enforce that. And for a smaller business like yourself, do you want to be in the position of the one writing the cease and desist letters, or do you want the brand? My guess is that most of the time the brand thinks, hey, that's what I hired you all for. Right. I they don't have a separate copyright Enforcement division. Oh right. So maybe you're right. Maybe it comes back on, on creators like yourselves to have a better protocol for filing copyright registrations, enforcing cease and desist letters or things like that. I hadn't really thought about that, but you you might be absolutely right in your in your industry. Yeah. And I think it's protecting the brand as well. And so talking to the owner of the brand it kind of I mean he was he's very understandable. So that kind of lit a light in his version too was like oh okay I can see your point in that way. Yeah. But I always say it's levers. So, you know, when you're estimating something, there's so many variables. So there's exclusive. So if a brand comes to you with a job and I always try to get some sort of budget, you know, because we're always triple bidding - it's a competitive market, right? I don't want to scare you with the numbers, but I also don't want to underbid. Like, I know the value of these things. Right? So you have a brand, you've talked about the brand, and we've been referring to it as the understood, ultimate purchaser of your services. But Amy Schromm has a brand share, right? I mean, and you and part of your brand is I'm the one you hire when you have a really big, important job. And therefore these are my terms. Right. That's isn't that kind of part of the struggle that you have to to sometimes say no, even though you kind of like the work, but they're not willing to pay you what it's worth. Right. And upholding the quality behind if my name is on something. Right. So there's a lot of different factors there. So. Okay. You're going to hire me. I come with sometimes a team. So. Right. And, you know, there's certain ways for things to be done is the production design there is the wardrobe there. You know, there's a lot of things to look at and I will I will myself make sure it's done if nobody else will. That's how much I care about my brand and my name on things. But as soon as you start to bid bigger and bigger jobs, you need to make sure that you are accounting for those expenses that you're going to follow. What? And put them into your. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So the levers that I'm talking about, it's you know if a brand has. Okay. But we only have this much what we do for this much that is much okay is exclusive or this non-exclusive right. But they have their contract and my shooting this code, I can sell it to other people. Or do you really just want it for yourself? Right. And this is something that photographers need to understand, you know, is it one, two, three, five years? Is this local Saint Louis, is this regional Midwest? Is this United States, is this national global? And the thing is, they're hiring you for your eye, for your creative, for your expertise, and, and they are making profit off of what you are creating. And that's the purpose there. They are elevating. And so so it does not make sense to just give everything away when there's it's actually multiplying their value, you know. Absolutely. Yeah I really try to educate photographers or even other production companies that are like, hey, can you do it for this much? Right? Who is doing a billboard of a property, you know, freaking dog for this? Much like from $1 billion company? Like, I talk about this all the time. I actually made a Instagram post and I said, who is saying yes to this? I got a call. Celebrity shoot with the high end dog brand. Amy, can you shoot this? We know you can do it. This is the budget and my job to that, right? I'm like, I need a Digitech. I need a team. I need my retouchers. I know the, history of this brand who is saying yes. And so I actually made a post on Instagram and I said, guys, we have to I know we're scared of the industry right now. People are just working. They're so grateful to get the work but we need to be a little bit more transparent about what industry standard is for, for pricing. Yeah. And I had so many creatives say, thank you so much. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Yeah. Like my competitors, they were saying, thank you so much because I know I'm making more money sometimes from the mom pop business down the street. Right. Than this billion dollar brand that's calling me. And so that's what I was seeing in early 2025. I was yeah, yeah thank goodness. But well that's what I'm saying. And I think you, I loved you sort of describing how you, you even have gone out to a little bit to make it a mission of yours. Right? Part of it is, you know, you want to know who's saying this because you want to find out. I think it may be a little bit like, am I still right? Like, is the whole world changed? Or. Yeah. No, actually I'm not right. This is still the way things need to be done. And you're you're an advocate and I love that. And I appreciate you taking the time to, talk us through. We could we could probably, I know there's hours more we could get into, but I want to. I know you got to sign me up, and I'm got to go. No. That's good. No, I love it. It because I think it I think it it takes, professionals to, understand the business, understand the best it can, you know, how copyright works. Ai, things are changing, etc. but ultimately, if you understand the value you work and the necessity why they hire you, for example, then you need to understand the terms and stick to them the best you can. And, I think that's terrific. I want to ask you another question. Completely. You mentioned earlier that you had listened to the podcast before, which, first of all, thank you, everybody. Welcome. Everybody in the world be like Amy. So but I did this question that I always ask, my guest or try to remember to always ask my guests at the towards the end of our chat. And that is What's on your screen? And you may know that sometimes that like what are you watching on TV at the end of the night? What's your favorite movie? What are you working on right now? What's on your phone that you can't stop with? On what? What's on your what's on Amy Schromm’s screen? A lot of things, but my head is really in the creative of this current project I'm working on, which is very, European. Italian. I'm trying to immerse myself in the Midwest in Italian culture. Good. Because as I'm just, I want I want to fly to Italy and live there. Right? Yeah. But that's currently it's currently just Italian inspiration. And isn't it amazing headed for this client right now. What do you do? You do you do you does that take you to let you know, Sicily culture on YouTube and just follow wherever it goes? Oh, yeah. So on YouTube, I watch the old films. I have a lot of different tabs open, but, yeah, that's a good question. Well, yeah. And I think that's great. You know, sometimes people will say, oh, here's a movie or whatever, but more and more people are saying, I'm on YouTube. It's really fascinating. Somebody, recently said that they read that something like 45% of, everybody in the United States gets watches YouTube from their primary source of where they get now, within that, there's a million different things you can watch. But I've heard people say, here's how I learn how to get better as a musician. Here's how I get it for you. I get inspiration for my next creativity because there's this now, this universe on a screen that gives me access to all these other versions of that. And I that's that's pretty wild. I think that's pretty cool. Yeah. And there's something about short, short formatted films or like little, like 10 to 15, 20 minutes that we're kind of in this culture of consuming things quickly, you know, absolutely kind of speaks to that. Absolutely. Well, Amy, listen, this has been fantastic. Thank you very much for taking the time to join us in the podcast today. I'm really interested to hear how things progress. I hope you'll let us know when you're in Italy and whether or not you're, you know, having visitors. But, it sounds really cool. And I'm excited about the, you know, the particularly the, the your approach to protecting certainly your brand, but also educating your profession. And I do think that that's there's a leadership role. Not everybody wants to do it. But your insistence on doing it will certainly, in my view, help your business, but also is, a nice guide for others who may want to figure out, well, how can how can I do that? How can I get into this world? Absolutely. That's really cool. I appreciate you sharing that with us. Absolutely. And if I can say one last thing. Sure. The more, the more I've just been kind of digging in to advertising marketing agencies, production companies. That's one way of looking, working. But I want everybody to feel very hopeful that brands are doing well. Right. So brands, we're all working for the same thing. And that is telling the brand story. Right. And so it may look different. There might be a different way to kind of approach it. And we're all figuring it out. Yeah. But we're really here to tell impactful brand stories and upholding that. So that's really well said. And you're right. And that and that's not going away. No that's not going away. The way the the way the money flows. The way the contracts flow, the way the, the rights structure changes might. But the basic principle is brands will need to continue to tell their stories, perhaps even more than they ever have before. And the million. And that's where Amy Schromm comes in as a storyteller for brands. Is that a good I, I love that. All right. Good. Well you can I'll license that to you so you can use that. Perfect. Thank you. You're welcome. Amy, thanks so much. And folks, if you've enjoyed this, conversation today, I hope you have. Please check out Amy. How can people find you? Yeah, you can find me, on Instagram. Amy Schromm, just my name or, my website, www.AmySchromm.com. All right. And we will put that in the liner notes and make sure people can find you. And folks, if you've enjoyed this column Amy. Sure. I'm dot com. Let's say that again everybody. Amy's Rom-com. Folks, if you've enjoyed this today, check us out. Wherever you get your podcasts, you can find and follow us where everywhere podcasts exist. And if you like what you see on YouTube, hit that like and subscribe button right down somewhere down there. And, follow us. So you'll always get the latest episode and you can always find us at TheScreenLawyer.com. Amy, thanks again. Thank you so much. Thank you. Take care everybody.