You there, with the camera, the seamless white background and the subject you’re prepared to shoot — halt! Or at least stop to ponder the reality that Amazon has apparently been granted a patent for taking photos of stuff against a white background.

The patent is simply called Studio arrangement, and features in-depth plans for specific lighting placement as well as a certain kind of raised platform nine feet from the backdrop to place subjects on, notes The Verge.

Of course, this whole thing brings up the question of how, or if Amazon could even go after anyone infringing on the patent, because a photo doesn’t come with all the information about how it was set up.

And yet, it’s still kind of an eye-opener that a company can even file for a patent on something that’s been a common method of photography for a very, very long time. Amazon filed for the patent in November 2011, which isn’t exactly the dawn of time so far as the industry is concerned.

So maybe don’t take any photos of your lighting set-up if it’s exactly what Amazon has in the patent and then go around bragging that you violated a patent? Or just have a chuckle over the fact that Amazon had the gumption to patent something so incredibly common in the first place.

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