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The Copyright Office describes two routes to work made for hire. The first is a work prepared by an employee within the scope of employment. The second is a specially ordered or commissioned work that falls within one of nine enumerated categories, such as a contribution to a collective work, a part of an audiovisual work, a translation, a supplementary work, a compilation, an instructional text, a test, answer material for a test or an atlas, and that is covered by a signed written instrument.

Logos, brochures and most advertising graphics do not sit in those nine categories. Calling a design contract a work-for-hire agreement therefore does not, by itself, move ownership. What works is a written assignment of copyright from the designer to the client, signed, and ideally triggered on final payment. Ask for the same assignment from any freelancer the studio brings in, because ownership passes down the chain or it does not pass at all.

The Copyright Office has been publishing on this since its registration guidance for works containing material generated by artificial intelligence appeared in the Federal Register on 16 March 2023, followed by the copyrightability part of its report on copyright and artificial intelligence on 29 January 2025, after more than ten thousand public comments. The through-line is human authorship: material a human did not author is treated differently from material they did.

For a design engagement, that has practical consequences. If AI-generated material is used in artwork you intend to register, the application has to account for it, and what is protectable is the human contribution. Ask your designer to tell you where generative tools were used and to keep the working files that show human authorship. If a mark or an illustration is commercially important, get the position checked before it goes on packaging.

Exported files are not the same as ownership of the work. A complete handover is the layered working files, every export format you will realistically need, a list of fonts with their licence status, any linked images with their sources, and colour values for both screen and print. Without the working files, the next change means paying somebody to redraw what you already bought.

Studios sometimes retain working files as a commercial lever, and that is a negotiation to have before the project, not after. If the studio will not release them, at least agree what happens if they cease trading. Also agree portfolio rights explicitly: most designers want to show the work, and most clients are happy for them to, but confidential or unreleased work needs a date attached.