The Marine veteran lives in Wauchula, commutes to Tampa for his full-time job as a firefighter with Tampa Fire Rescue and also works at South Bay Hospital on his days off.
“I was stressed out a lot,” says Justin Battles.
So he picked up a camera. A Canon P2 to be exact.
And something clicked.
His photography, of landscapes and sunsets, lightning storms and eagles, was, in a word, amazing.
“I loved it,” says Battles, whose lone training came taking a black-and-white photography course in high school.
“I was a farmer in New Hampshire and then went into the Marines. I never picked up a camera again other than to take family pictures.
For Battles, the stress relief of taking pictures became even more important on Nov. 9, 2011, just a short while after he picked up the camera.
His son, Nick Battles, was following in the family tradition by going through Marine boot camp at Parris Island. On the last day of boot camp, he suffered a freak accident. He became a quadriplegic after being injured during the pugil stick exercise.
Helping care for Nick took a lot of time and energy, which in turn created even more of a need for an outlet, and so the photography became better and better.
He started posting the pictures on his Facebook page. And the more he posted, the larger his following.
Having covered Justin and his son for several years now, I followed him on Facebook and watched his work blossom.
The stunningly crisp photographs, often color-enhanced, have an otherworldly quality. His nature shots, of the eagles he sees on his long rides to work or at parks near his home, are Nat Geo worthy.
A photographer myself, I admired the beauty of his work, especially the lightning shots.
Many others have taken notice of Battles’ work, some good, some very bad, the latter highlighting one of the dark corners of the Internet, where ideas and artwork are heisted.
The good was very good.
Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn used Battles’ stills and a time-lapse video he made during his State of the City speech.
For Battles, that experience was mutually rewarding.
“I was grateful to the city for all the help they gave my son,” he says.
There have been contests he’s won. And the occasional sale of a print. And the growing thrill of sharing his work, on which he placed a watermark to identify it as his own.
But in the past few days, Battles experienced a far less-rewarding experience.
“I heard from a friend who was looking at a website and saw one of my pictures,” says Battles. Only the picture wasn’t credited to him.
A man whose Facebook page said he was from France was claiming to have taken it.
That prompted a vigorous campaign by Battles’ friends to shame the guy into revoking his claim. That was accompanied by volleys of complaints to Instagram, urging the social media site to take action, which it ultimately did, eventually removing the man’s page.
That was not the end of the battle for Battles though. Soon his friends found others doing the same thing, often cropping out the watermarks Battles placed on the photos.
He is not alone. Though the Broadway puppet show Avenue Q famously sang that “The Internet is for Porn,” it is also for piracy. An individual’s hard-earned talent and skill can be easily pilfered with the click of a mouse, stored away to be rebranded, reused or otherwise repurposed.
There is, however a remedy of sorts, one that Battles has been considering.
Applying for a copyright.
“There is definitely a problem if people are taking his photographs and copying them,” says Jim Lake, an attorney with Thomas and LoCicero, a Tampa firm specializing in intellectual property rights.
“It is particularly egregious,” says Lake, “to crop out indications he owns the photos. It shows they are trying to hide the evidence.”
Watermarking photographs is a good stem, says Lake, but it is just a “middle ground” when it comes to protecting your rights.
Lake suggests registering photographs with the U.S. Copyright Office.
All that is required is a nominal fee and filling out a two-page form, says Lake.
“It is not very time-consuming,” he says, cautioning that anyone filling out the form be very careful.
What Lake told me next surprised me, and, given how many photos of sunsets and birds I post online (though nearly all paling in comparison to Battles’ work) something to really think about.
If you don’t register, you can’t sue.
But if you do register, you can.
And it might turn out to be worth your time and effort.
Lake said that you don’t have to prove actual damages, just that the photograph was yours.
If so, a judge can put a smile on your face, awarding you anywhere from $700 to $30,000.
“There are a lot of factors involved,” says Lake. “Judges have the discretion of going lower, as low as $200, he says.
The opposite is also true.
“If a judge finds willful infringement and blatant copying, there could be an award of $150,000,” says Lake.
Ca-Ching!
“I want to do this,” says Battles.
It’s not monetary. He’s been giving his work away to family and friends for years now.
But it is a matter of principal.
“That guy is a piece of crap,” says Battles. “Stealing is wrong.”
Friday night, Battles was back at it, posting five more sunset shots from one of his favorite spots.
“Sunset tonight from Hardee Lakes Park,” he wrote on his Facebook page. “The shot through the trees might be a bit redundant but I really dig the perspective.”
He’ll dig it even more knowing that he doesn’t have to worry about someone else digging it up and planting it somewhere else.
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The Pentagon announced the death of a Marine last week in support of Operation Inherent Resolve.
Lance Cpl. Sean P. Neal, 19, of Riverside, California, died Oct. 23 in Baghdad, Iraq, from a non-combat related incident. The incident is under investigation.
He was assigned to 2nd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, Special Purpose Marine Air Ground Task Force-Crisis Response-Central Command, whose headquarters element deploys from Camp Pendleton, California.
There have now been two U.S. troop deaths in support of Operation Inherent Resolve, the nation’s newest conflict.
There have been 2,339 U.S. troop deaths in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.