Protecting name, image, likeness, voice, and digital-replica rights
U2U Law advises performers, creators, rights holders, estates, productions, brands, and technology companies on California publicity rights, consent, licensing, AI clauses, synthetic performances, digital replicas, and related disputes.
California right-of-publicity and digital-replica counsel
A person’s identity can have independent commercial value beyond copyright ownership in a photo, recording, or video. California Civil Code section 3344 addresses knowing commercial uses of another person’s name, voice, signature, photograph, or likeness without prior consent, subject to statutory requirements and exceptions. California has also enacted provisions directed to digital replicas in performance agreements and uses involving deceased personalities. Contracts should distinguish ordinary editing and promotion from synthetic, substituted, or materially altered performances.
Publicity-right and digital-replica services
Consent and license drafting
Identity elements, approved uses, context, media, territory, term, exclusivity, edits, promotion, sublicensing, compensation, approval, and revocation.
Performer and creator agreement review
Digital-replica descriptions, synthetic voice or likeness, scans, training, substitution, future projects, compensation, representation, and post-term use.
Production and brand clearances
Appearance releases, archival materials, endorsements, product use, fictional and nonfictional works, advertising, merchandising, and promotional campaigns.
Estate and deceased-personality rights
Control, consent, licensing, registrations or successor records, expressive works, commercial uses, digital replicas, and enforcement strategy.
Technology and AI transactions
Training data, model outputs, prompts, source material, synthetic media, warranties, indemnities, takedowns, provenance, records, and allocation of compliance responsibility.
Enforcement and defense
Unauthorized commercial use, scope-of-consent disputes, expired licenses, misleading endorsement implications, digital replicas, takedowns, injunction requests, and damages claims.
Issues that should be addressed before signing or releasing content
- Which identity elements are covered: name, signature, photograph, likeness, voice, performance, motion data, biometric features, avatar, or synthetic output.
- Whether the proposed use is advertising, merchandising, entertainment, news, commentary, parody, internal development, model training, or another context.
- Whether consent is specific enough as to project, use, duration, territory, media, editing, substitution, and new or derivative performances.
- Whether the person had legal counsel, union representation, or other representation relevant to a digital-replica clause.
- Who may approve or refuse a synthetic use, how approval is documented, and what happens when material changes are proposed.
- How compensation, reuse fees, residual-like payments, revenue shares, credit, accounting, audit, and post-term uses operate.
- Whether a use also implicates copyright, trademark, false endorsement, privacy, contract, defamation, unfair competition, or platform remedies.
- What evidence should be preserved, including agreements, versions, prompts, model information, files, metadata, approvals, releases, campaign records, and distribution history.
How U2U Law approaches the matter
- Identify the person, identity elements, content, technology, commercial context, parties, jurisdictions, agreements, and existing consents.
- Compare the proposed or challenged use with the exact license scope, statutory elements, exceptions, and related intellectual-property rights.
- For transactions, draft a specific authorization and operational controls rather than relying only on broad future-media language.
- For disputes, preserve evidence, document distribution and damages, evaluate urgent relief, and select contractual, statutory, platform, or litigation remedies.
- Coordinate rights records so productions, brands, platforms, estates, and licensees can later prove what was authorized and on what conditions.
Connected entertainment, business, and IP services
Entertainment lawEntertainment contractsFilm & televisionMusic lawCreators & influencersPublicity & digital replicasMinor performersEntertainment disputesBusiness & IP counsel
Frequently asked questions
What is California’s right of publicity?
California provides statutory protection against certain knowing, unauthorized commercial uses of another person’s name, voice, signature, photograph, or likeness. A claim depends on the statutory elements, facts, consent, use, and applicable defenses or exceptions.
What is a digital replica?
California legislation uses defined concepts for highly realistic computer-generated representations of a person’s voice or visual likeness in specified contexts. Contract drafting should use the applicable legal definition and also describe the actual technology and proposed use.
Does owning a video give the owner unlimited rights to a performer’s likeness?
Not necessarily. Copyright ownership, contractual consent, publicity rights, union or guild obligations, privacy, advertising law, and the license’s scope may be separate questions.
Can an old release authorize a new AI use?
It depends on the language, parties, context, governing law, statutory rules, and the new use. Older future-media clauses should not automatically be assumed to resolve synthetic-performance and digital-replica questions.
Official legal resources
- California Civil Code section 3344
- Governor of California: Performer Digital-Likeness Laws
- California Labor Commissioner: Talent Agency Rules
- U.S. Copyright Office: Copyright and Artificial Intelligence
This page provides general information, not legal advice. Outcomes and available remedies depend on the agreement, facts, parties, forum, and applicable law. Prior matters do not predict future results.
Discuss your California entertainment matter
Call (424) 600-7167 or send U2U Law a confidential consultation request.
