Musical video production
<p>I paid a video man to film a lady dancer and myself in a hotel dancing to my new music to be released. I wrote the lyrics, composed, recorded and sang it myself. He signed a contract with the hotel but there was no contract signed between us because he was my friend. After the shoot, he posted the video clips on Instagram and snapchat without my consent. I question why he didn't discuss it with me first. He said he owns the right to post any of the video without my permission. Who owns the copyright and what can I do. I assume I retain copyright to at least the music.</p>

<p>From  <a href="https://fairuse.stanford.edu/overview/faqs/copyright-ownership/#:%7E:text=Copyrights%20are%20generally%20owned%20by,the%20employer%20owns%20the%20copyright." rel="nofollow noreferrer">Stanford Fair Use</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>What are the exceptions to the rule that the creator of a work owns the copyright?</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>Copyrights are generally owned by the people who create the works of expression, with some important exceptions:</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>If a work is created by an employee in the course of his or her
employment, the employer owns the copyright.</p>
<p>If the work is created by an independent contractor and the
independent contractor signs a written agreement stating that the work
shall be “made for hire,” the commissioning person or organization
owns the copyright only if the work is (1) a part of a larger literary
work, such as an article in a magazine or a poem or story in an
anthology; (2) part of a motion picture or other audiovisual work,
such as a screenplay; (3) a translation; (4) a supplementary work such
as an afterword, an introduction, chart, editorial note, bibliography,
appendix or index; (5) a compilation; (6) an instructional text; (7) a
test or answer material for a test; or (8) an atlas. Works that don’t
fall within one of these eight categories constitute works made for
hire only if created by an employee within the scope of his or her
employment.</p>
<p>If the creator has sold the entire copyright, the purchasing business
or person becomes the copyright owner.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It would appear that by failing to gain a written agreement that the work was &quot;made for hire&quot; you have lost the rights to it.</p>

<h2>You own the copyright under Australian law</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>The owner of any copyright in a sound recording or a film is normally the person/s who made it. The 'maker' of a sound recording is the owner of the master recording, but where the recording is of a live performance, the performers are also ‘makers’. The 'maker' of a film is the person who undertook the arrangements necessary for the making of the film.</p>
<p>However, for commissioned sound recordings and films, the default position is that the copyright is owned by the commissioning party. The rules for first ownership of copyright in sound recordings and films can, as in the case of works, be varied by contract.</p>
</blockquote>
<p><em>The Australian Government’s <a href="https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/sites/default/files/short_guide_to_copyright.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Short Guide to Copyright</a> p.8</em></p>
<p>You state that you paid the video man - that means you commissioned the film and that makes you the copyright owner baring any other agreement to the contrary. You have a verbal contract and, presuming you did not discuss copyright, there is no “agreement to the contrary”.</p>
<p>If you still consider him a friend, you can ask him to take the videos down. If you don’t, you can just sue him for damages.</p>

copyright australia human-rights music