Derivitive works of my work

[petemc]

So I'm in town earlier and I see a painting of a famous movie scene, or a famous photo of a famous person. It makes me wonder how these people get away with it. Photo-realistic copies yet paintings so its "original" work. I'm sure I saw one copy of a photo I did in this style and I just didn't know where to stand on it. Breach of copyright? Should I charge people to "use" my work in that way? I mean their work wouldn't exist if it were not for mine.

 

[pxl8]

If it's that close it will be breach of copyright. The problem with this kind of thing is a) knowing that they exist and b) being able to find and take action against the company producing them before they disappear and start again the next day under a different name.

There's an gallery/frame shop just up the road from me that have started doing canvas prints and filled their window with examples from films, disney characters, paintings, etc. and I'll bet none of them were sourced legally

 

[walls]

problematic...you can't copyright style. if you could we'd never have arty deco, bauhous, romanticism...perhaps these are extremes but essentially imitation is the highest form of flattery....rest and be thankful

a few pints of tribute to the better

 

[Yv]

hmmm, not sure about this one. I know when I used to paint, we would use existing paintings to practice, and the general rules seemd to be that you could copy a painting, as long as you didnt try and claim it to be by the original artist, because after all, the chances of a copy being identical is minimal [and as amateurs, somewhat greater than minimal ] but I suspect a painting copying a photograph is one of those shady areas of copyright that you would have to look into. I mean, take the Disney stuff, if an interior designer has a pic of Mickey mouse painted onto a kids bedroom wall, is that a copyright issue as they have been paid for doing it? :shrug:

 

[pxl8]

Painting a copy of a photo/painting/etc. is allowed if it is for private use, it's the commercial aspect that makes it illegal. So a parent painting Mickey Mouse on the wall wouldn't get into trouble. An interior designer advertising a Disney service would.

Intent is the key here.

 

[Chappers]

I seem to remember a number of years ago when Corel ( as in CorelDraw) ran a competition for the best image produced using their product.

The winner was a magnificent image of an American Indian complete with headdress, and rugged features.

It turned out that this was a copy of a well known photograph. All hell was let lose. Can't remember the final outcome, except the guy lost his prize money, and tittle. Lots of egg all round on this one.

 

[kelack]

We have the same debate for our card making, I have several stamps that are famous paintings, this link might help make sense of copyright in that matter?

http://www.madaboutcards.com/section.php/384/0

I won't post the whole text as it's very long but I find it very helpful

 

[HuntingMartians]

So I'm in town earlier and I see a painting of a famous movie scene, or a famous photo of a famous person. It makes me wonder how these people get away with it. Photo-realistic copies yet paintings so its "original" work. I'm sure I saw one copy of a photo I did in this style and I just didn't know where to stand on it. Breach of copyright? Should I charge people to "use" my work in that way? I mean their work wouldn't exist if it were not for mine.

So you are saying that a person cannot make a photo-realistic painting of a scene because you have taken an actual photo of that scene. Nope sorry don't agree with that at all. They are two very different art forms. And what if someone else came along and took a similar picture to yours? Are you saying that is also wrong.

So basically you are arguing that if some takes a photo of a builiding in a certain style then that building is now off limits to all other photographers.

 

[benneh]

So you are saying that a person cannot make a photo-realistic painting of a scene because you have taken an actual photo of that scene. Nope sorry don't agree with that at all. They are two very different art forms. And what if someone else came along and took a similar picture to yours? Are you saying that is also wrong.

So basically you are arguing that if some takes a photo of a builiding in a certain style then that building is now off limits to all other photographers.

If the painting is a firm representation of the exact shot though, location, composition, processing style etcetc. Then sure;y it's a rip-off. I can almost guarantee that if you and I were to stand in the same place and take a shot each that they would come out very differently.

 

[pxl8]

ThisPhotoGuy, I don't think Pete said that at all. As I read the question it was what happens if someone sits down with one of his photos and paints a copy of it, the same as they were doing with scenes from films, etc. From what Pete's said someone has plundered a variety of images, copied them and is selling them.

 

[M-J]

I am not 100% here, but I am sure that if an artist uses a photograph and does a painting from that photograph the two are not the same as the media used is completely different and no matter how fantastic the artist is there is always some interpretation in the final painting. Nevertheless it is a different matter altogether for someone to reproduce/print a photo onto a canvas and certainly would infringe intellectual property rights of the original photographic artist. Plus is plain darn just not right!

 

[pxl8]

The change in media doesn't matter otherwise I could read a book out loud, record it and then sell the recording. Or take a photo of a painting and then sell the photo. Copyright is protection from reproduction and it doesn't have to be an exact copy to breach that right.

 

[Toothie]

hmmm, not sure about this one. I know when I used to paint, we would use existing paintings to practice, and the general rules seemd to be that you could copy a painting, as long as you didnt try and claim it to be by the original artist, because after all, the chances of a copy being identical is minimal [and as amateurs, somewhat greater than minimal ] but I suspect a painting copying a photograph is one of those shady areas of copyright that you would have to look into. I mean, take the Disney stuff, if an interior designer has a pic of Mickey mouse painted onto a kids bedroom wall, is that a copyright issue as they have been paid for doing it? :shrug:

LL we had disney stuff painted onto the walls at work by an art class of some kind, turned out we should have paid disney for the privlidge! so when we redecorated we stuck to bright colours and shapes, safer that way!