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Robert Shepherd
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 March 2014
Location: United States
Posts: 1268
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| Posted: 31 March 2018 at 1:03am | IP Logged | 1
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So according to Neal's thinking, I suppose one might as well cut-and-paste since that is the easiest way of getting the look you need. It's a method used a lot in ad agencies, but only for creating comps, not for finished published works.
Greg Land, imo, is the worse of the worse. He doesn't use reference, he doesn't swipe other artists panels, he traces previous work done by other artists, and the kicker of course, from the same industry. If i were buy comics today, I would put his books back on the shelf.
Or, even if I trace. Suddenly I'm as good as JB (never gonna happen) and I can start tracing from his vast library of previous work to make my own, right? Neal says its ok, eh?
For me, another consideration that qualifies photo reference as photo reference is - is the illustration take out of context of the reference? The more out of context the reference-to-illustration shows the better.
Edited by Robert Shepherd on 31 March 2018 at 1:04am
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Robert Bradley
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 September 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 4881
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| Posted: 31 March 2018 at 4:38am | IP Logged | 2
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To me, reference is the answer for questions like "What does this particular car look like?" or "What does this building or city look like?" or "How does the human body look in a certain position?"
Reference is a tool to help you through the creative process, not do the creative process for you. There is a huge difference between using models and reference photos to improve your drawings, it's anther thing entirely when Greg Land traces porn pictures or other artists work to make his own job easier. One is using the tools available to create something new, one is being lazy and unprofessional.
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Mitch Denoyer
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 21 September 2006
Posts: 141
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| Posted: 31 March 2018 at 1:45pm | IP Logged | 3
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“The two works are not from the same source, because one is the source.”
Let me be clear. By “same source” I mean the same artist. I read a story once about a company that turned a Norman Rockwell painting into one of those awful “collectible” statuettes. The Rockwell estate sued and lost. It seems you can get away with keeping the idea of an image as long as the medium is changed and the characters depicted are not copyrighted. I’m sure the guy in the photo is not a copyrighted character, and the work was changed from a photo to a drawing. I’m not saying it is ethical, but there you go.
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Robert Shepherd
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 March 2014
Location: United States
Posts: 1268
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| Posted: 31 March 2018 at 8:38pm | IP Logged | 4
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"...medium is changed and the characters depicted are not copyrighted."
Ok, that sounds like it could be true based on past stories I've heard. BUT there is that chap who copied Buscema's work for pieces in a museum...I don't remember his name, but it was discussed in these forums. It was a change of medium, check, but it was a copyrighted character (Marvel's version of Mephisto). So how does that artist get away with that?
Retorical question. I don't expect an answer. Or the answer is, he shouldn't but he does.
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16502
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| Posted: 31 March 2018 at 11:48pm | IP Logged | 5
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Mitch Denoyer wrote:
| ...It seems you can get away with keeping the idea of an image as long as the medium is changed and the characters depicted are not copyrighted. I’m sure the guy in the photo is not a copyrighted character, and the work was changed from a photo to a drawing... |
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Okay, I don't know the specifics of the Rockwell case, but by law a creative work is copyrighted the moment it is created in a reproducible format. When you pay to "copyright" something, you are actually paying to register that copyright, it is already copyrighted for free.
From Copyright.gov: "...Your work is under copyright protection the moment it is created and fixed in a tangible form that it is perceptible either directly or with the aid of a machine or device...."
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16502
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| Posted: 01 April 2018 at 12:01am | IP Logged | 6
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Mitch Denoyer wrote:
| ...I read a story once about a company that turned a Norman Rockwell painting into one of those awful “collectible” statuettes. The Rockwell estate sued and lost.. |
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Is this the case you refer to above?: LINK.
If so, it was not the estate that brought the matter to court, and it was not because the artwork was not copyrighted, but over terms of a licensed agreement:
The SATURDAY EVENING POST COMPANY and the Curtis Publishing
Company, Plaintiffs-Appellees,
v.
RUMBLESEAT PRESS, INC., Defendant-Appellant
Edited by Matt Hawes on 01 April 2018 at 12:01am
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
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| Posted: 01 April 2018 at 12:09am | IP Logged | 7
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Robert Shepard wrote:
| ...Ok, that sounds like it could be true based on past stories I've heard. BUT there is that chap who copied Buscema's work for pieces in a museum...I don't remember his name, but it was discussed in these forums. It was a change of medium, check, but it was a copyrighted character (Marvel's version of Mephisto).... |
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The issue at hand in that case is whether or not it is legally considered a "transformative" work.
The following link is to a video discussing a matter where one YouTube personality was threatening another YouTube use over critical review videos about his work. The user "YourMovieSucksDOTorg" was not directly involved, but knew both parties and created a video explaining some of the specifics to the law in terms of copyright (his own channel having fought and won some copyright claims against it in the past). It is a good video at explaining transformative works and how the law applies:
LINK!
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Matt Reed
Byrne Robotics Security
Robotmod
Joined: 16 April 2004
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| Posted: 01 April 2018 at 1:47am | IP Logged | 8
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I'm no expert, 'natch, but when the feet, head and fingers (particularly the fingers) are exactly like those of the photo, then it's tracing and not "reference". All artists have to refer to real-life images to get an angle of a building just right or a particular model of a specific car or what a steak looks like on a plate. But this? The fingers are in the exact same position from the original image to the one doctored to look like Batman. They don't need to be that way to convey "Batman". They are because they were traced. That's far different from using the original photo as reference to how the human body would look in that position.
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Matt Reed
Byrne Robotics Security
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| Posted: 01 April 2018 at 1:49am | IP Logged | 9
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Hell, looking at it more closely, even the musculature is traced down to the exact same bulges in the abdomen. That's not "reference". That's tracing or what many call swiping. It's no better than Lichenstein, although all he did was blow up individual panels and call them original art so Land is doing marginally more than just that.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
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| Posted: 01 April 2018 at 6:44am | IP Logged | 10
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Couple of things I've noticed over the years/decades:Some fans are so eager to find "swipes" that they will stretch the definition beyond all human comprehension. SOMEtimes, guys, two drawings will be very similar because the information being conveyed in those drawings is very similar. There are, after all, a finite number of some scene/poses. And, hey, it's particularly absurd when the scenes are the SAME scene! Also, there are many who assume the artists doing the "swipes" have access to all the same material they have seen themselves. Sometimes, yes. But very often, no. (A sort of example: when I did "Terror in a Tiny Town" on "reviewer" called it an uncredited copy of "The Tunnel Under the World", a science fiction story I had not, at that time, read. In fact, my "source" was a Jack Kirby cover of Doom looming over the FF in Latveria. "What if you did that, but real?" asked a friend.) Looking around for what people consider swipes I found myself listed as an "offended" because of the Gladiator vs FF cover I duplicated as Superman vs the Legion. News flash: one cannot plagiarize from oneself, and one cannot swipe from oneself. Important to remember: "swipe" means steal.
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Andy Mokler
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 January 2006
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Posts: 2799
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| Posted: 21 February 2019 at 3:07pm | IP Logged | 11
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On the topic of swipes/homages there is a FB page dedicated to only that. Rob Liefeld's name often come up for obvious reasons but recently JB and George Perez's names have been used to try and illustrate that even the greats have swiped at times.
Now, many to most of the examples I've seen offered are simply homages and flashbacks. With JB in particular, when he uses earlier work from Kirby or Adams or whoever, he re-draws the scene similarly but not trace it. Which for some reason, people don't understand is an homage.
The only one that I have a question about from JB is the Iron Fist re-draw of Deadman from Strange Adventures. This does not seem like an homage to me as it's got no relation to the original.
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John Byrne
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| Posted: 21 February 2019 at 3:25pm | IP Logged | 12
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Deadman?
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