Modelling Agencies Editing and Proofreading Services

A booking confirmation says the model is engaged for "one day, campaign usage." Six months later, the same images appear in a national television advertisement and on billboards in three countries, and the model's agency discovers this by seeing the campaign, not by being told about it. "Campaign usage" meant, to the client, however the campaign eventually used the images; it meant, to the model, the specific print materials discussed at the booking. Both parties can point to the same three words and describe a completely different agreement.

We edit what modelling agencies and their clients produce to define what a booking actually licenses — booking confirmations and usage rights terms, test shoot and portfolio agreements, comp card and submission material, day rate and overtime terms, image approval and release documentation, and the correspondence clarifying a usage dispute after the fact. Our editors work on the sentence that determines how far a set of images is allowed to travel.

The specific usage grant is what a booking confirmation is actually for, and its failure is a category description broad enough to be read as covering almost any use the client later decides to make. Campaign usage describes a type of engagement; it does not specify which markets, which media, or for how long. We work through these so usage is defined by medium, territory and duration explicitly — print only, digital and print, broadcast included; national or global; six months or in perpetuity — rather than a general phrase, since a model paid for a specific, limited usage has a legitimate claim to additional payment for usage beyond it, and that claim depends entirely on the original grant being specific enough to show the boundary was crossed; so any option to extend or expand usage is stated with its own separate fee structure agreed in advance, given that a client's decision six months later to run a print campaign as a broadcast one is a new usage requiring a new agreement, not an automatic extension of the old one; so the booking confirmation states call time, expected working hours and the overtime rate specifically, because "a day's work" varies enormously and a model arriving at 6am with no stated end time has no basis to know when overtime begins; so image approval rights, if any, are stated explicitly — who can select final images, whether the model has any approval or veto — rather than assumed by either party; so exclusivity terms, if the booking includes them, state specifically which competing brands or categories are restricted and for how long; and so any dispute over usage is resolved by comparing the actual images used against the actual grant on file, rather than against each party's recollection of what "campaign usage" was meant to cover. Confirmations written this way mean both sides know exactly what was licensed.

Everything you send is treated in confidence, including booking details, contracts and client information. We are editors rather than talent agents, entertainment lawyers or licensing specialists, and we offer no view on usage rights, contract terms or payment disputes. What we can do is make sure the grant states exactly what was agreed.