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Scott Nickel
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 10 July 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 132
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| Posted: 19 February 2008 at 11:22pm | IP Logged | 1
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Andrew said:
I agree with Matthew's post above: this is theft of intellectual property. Even if the buyer had paid for the commission, tracing JB's linework and passing it off as his own is dishonest, even criminal.
Any of the lawyers on the board know if this is civil suit actionable? JB ought to recoup the cost of the commission and damages.
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two questions:
Who holds the copyright to the characters depicted?
Who holds the physical artwork?
Should answer your questions about being "actionable" and "criminal."
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Tim O Neill
Byrne Robotics Security
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 10937
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| Posted: 19 February 2008 at 11:29pm | IP Logged | 2
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Highway robbery
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Michael Roberts
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 14857
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| Posted: 19 February 2008 at 11:39pm | IP Logged | 3
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two questions:
Who holds the copyright to the characters depicted?
Who holds the physical artwork?
Should answer your questions about being "actionable" and "criminal."
---
Does it? The layout and linework was plagiarized. I'm thinking of a
comparable situation with Hollywood spec scripts. Even though the
properties belong to the studios, studios will refuse to look at a spec
script without a waiver or just outright buy a spec script even though they
own the rights to a character, because if elements unique to that script
show up in later work, they leave themselves open to a lawsuit.
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John Benson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 06 May 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 1070
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| Posted: 20 February 2008 at 12:57am | IP Logged | 4
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Scott Nickel wrote:
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Who holds the copyright to the characters depicted?
Who holds the physical artwork?
Should answer your questions about being "actionable" and "criminal." |
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In musical terms then. Imagine a musician who goes into a studio to record a variation on an old song. He jazzes it up and ads in new riffs. The studio head hears it and complains about a verse in the song and sends the musican home with no pay for his work.
Two months later he hears his music on the radio. It's a recording of the music he played, although with the one verse redone with a different voice.
He still has his demo tape. Sitting in his pocket. It is a revison of old song after all.
He has no reason to complain. Right?
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Mike Murray
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 September 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 530
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| Posted: 20 February 2008 at 1:24am | IP Logged | 5
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What does the whole "_ after _" thing mean, anyway? As a fan I always considered it mean that the idea was borrowed from another artist, like the way the shot of Cyclops walking away from the X-Men with a duffel bag over his shoulder has been emulated many times. But this - this is a tracing, is it not? Is the "after" really called for here, or is it a hollow attempt to cover the "artist"'s ass?
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John Peter Britton
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 17 May 2006
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 9129
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| Posted: 20 February 2008 at 2:19am | IP Logged | 6
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Apologies from Anthony Castrillo are in the Sketch book Thread guys, i believe he is truly sorry.
Edited by John Peter Britton on 20 February 2008 at 2:19am
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133334
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| Posted: 20 February 2008 at 3:22am | IP Logged | 7
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Much to my surprise, I looked back thru my saved email, and actually found the pertinent exchanges. There was quite a bit of back and forth between Jim Warden and the customer on this one. It started out as a "fighting mad" Captain Marvel (DC) alone, no backgrounds, evolved into Cap and "Levram", went from there to the two Captain Marvels.Before the piece was finally settled upon, there was this, from Jim to me, dated 03/08/07: "Part of this is up to you though; would you rather draw a commission featuring SHAZAM and Vlarem or one featuring SHAZAM vs. Captain Marvel? (I'm sure hoping you choose the latter!) Please alter the original request for the SHAZAM commission to include a background and character of your choosing. Thanks!" I responded on the same day with: "Which version of Mar-Vell?" Jim's reply, also on the same day, was: "Your choice!" To that I emailed back: "Okay, then, let's go with the version Neal did inthe Kree/Skrull war." From Jim came: "Just to confirm, that would be this costume: LINK "This is the costume the guy prefers; he said you could do the background and interaction between the characters anyway you want (side-by-side in battle against an unseen foe, fighting each other, etc)." So there you have it. As you can see, I very specifically indicated I would prefer to do the Neal Adams version of the character, as seen in the Kree/Skrull war. There he wore the red and black costume, not the original green and white, and as yet sported no nega-bands. The reference sent was the red and black costume, drawn by Jim Starlin. The customer made no specific reference to including the nega-bands (or, for that matter, the longer hair), so I drew exactly what I said I was going to draw.In all that back-and-forth a simple "be sure to include the nega-bands" would have made all the difference, but none was forthcoming. After the peice was completed and posted, there were at first no complaints, and I sent it off to Jim. A while later Jim emailed to ask if I could add the nega-bands. I said I could, but only by using white-out, which I prefer not to do on commission pieces (hence those early pieces where I created stars by drawing countless little circles and inking around them!) There was another pause, and then the piece was declined. Jim said he would probably put it on eBay. I said if it didn't sell, I'd take it back, as it happens to be one of my personal favorites.
Bold indicates my emphasis added.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133334
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| Posted: 20 February 2008 at 3:26am | IP Logged | 8
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I can't believe he's upset about JB's slight adjustment in policy in doing another commission for him after the first refusal. Does he think JB would just keep making commissions for the same guy, and risk having him refuse them over and over again?•• There has been no "adjustment in policy". Yesterday, after his attack on Paul Greer, I finally hit threshold with Ditton's passive-aggressive crap, canceled his membership, and told Jim to accept no further commission requests from him. Then I saw this mess, which only served to confirm my decision.
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Troy Nunis
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 4598
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| Posted: 20 February 2008 at 3:53am | IP Logged | 9
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Aric Shapiro sez: >> I believe in second chances<< & >>Perhaps if he is allowed to return to the forum, he will apologize<<
From reading over Pat's "version" of what happened, he mentioned being banned back when he rejected the commision "a day later from the JBF for telling JB he was rude to me (in a thread discussing Superman's "S")." and yet we know he was back as a member and got banned again yesterday for starting trouble with Paul. It seems to me that not only did Pat have his second chance, but he failed make any effort to apologize or make things right, but instead, he continued to show that he was a jerk. And now, curiously, you seem to be aiding and abeding his efforts to somehow twist this situation into a "Bad Byrne story" instead of the "Pat is a Dick" story that it truely is. What's up with that?
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133334
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| Posted: 20 February 2008 at 3:59am | IP Logged | 10
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Ditton was not banned for rejecting the piece.
I don't recall him being banned at all, before yesterday.
Mods?
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
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| Posted: 20 February 2008 at 4:02am | IP Logged | 11
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And now, curiously, you seem to be aiding and abeding his efforts to somehow twist this situation into a "Bad Byrne story" instead of the "Pat is a Dick" story that it truely is. What's up with that?•• Well, Troy, we saw my doing FX for Wayne Osborne turned into a (totally fabricated) Bad Byrne story, and yesterday my offer to do this year's 50th commission FREE was well on its way to being turned into a Bad Byrne story ("…but the 49th and 51st customers will be disappointed…"). It's all part of the disinformation highway.
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Troy Nunis
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 4598
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| Posted: 20 February 2008 at 4:04am | IP Logged | 12
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sorry, to be clear - my reading of his statement is simply he was banned in timeframe relating to when he rejected the piece, not becuase of it (tho' he certainly left it obscure enough that people could make assumptions from it)
If he was in fact, not banned at all back then - well, at least in his mind he got his second chance and blew it.
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