Using references: Does it matter?

#101

Perhaps but there is a trap in that, assume for example you would like a few changes (nothing unusual in that either), different angle, different lighting set up, different this, different that, if you said artist is only capable of working over the top of another picture you’ve got a problem.

That is so true. I’ve witnessed it firsthand at some of the places I’ve worked. POGs can easily paint themselves into a corner, if they lack the foundamentals. It can go from bad to worse, when Google is temporarily unavailable because the network is down. :slight_smile:

#102

Just what is ‘improper’ use of reference, aside from blatant plagiarism? Who says there’s anything wrong with doing all the painting over or tracing in the world, if the artist is using their own reference, and represents their techniques honestly? These are the distinctions we need to be very careful of.

…Something like that Linda Bergkvist thread that got turned into a 10-page flame war, you mean? :curious:

Salubri3, BlackKeri, great points!

In particular this bit:

I do that all the time! I draw a detailed sketch, then go photo-hunting and piece together chunks of things that match up with what I’m doing, and other chunks of things that help with the lighting, often mashed together in several layers on top of each other, mixed together, and sometimes bits of it match well enough that people would probably say I traced it, with a direct comparison… what do I do with that? What do I even call that? Showing all the photos used would take a while.

#103

Hi guys,

Lunatique has posted this as a Sticky in the Art Theories / Techniques forum:

Regarding the use of references
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=166&t=461830

Please feel free to link people to this post when this issue comes up.

Clearly everyone has a different idea about using references, but I think the key thing to remember is not to lie about what you do.

#104

Neat, Rebecca!

What will go in that thread? More links to important posts that have been made on the subject? Examples of what to do/what not to do?

Maybe it would be a good idea for Lunatique to copy his post in full into that sticky thread? His points (and those of the other mods) could use a highlight of their own. And maybe then the sticky post could be closed or some such to keep the discussion over here instead of cluttering up the sticky space that could be saved for the more official stuff? Just kicking around ideas.

#105

Hello All,

I’m new at this. Please forgive the stupid question.

I’ve read through “most” of this thread and I can’t find an answer.

I am a digital textile printer. Recently I began to make silk shawls and offer them for sale. I create the graphics in photoshop and then I print them directly on fabric.

I’ve visited Artrenewal several times and have d-loaded many images of the Old Master paintings. I take these images, change the colors, add backgrounds and other elements, mix them all together and create collages that I print on the fabrics.

90% of the “reference” images are NOT mine and I am more than happy to admit that. My only contribution is combining all the different images in to something that I consider attractive.

The “end result” as I gather from this thread should NOT therefor be considered mine. Alright, I don’t have a bit of problem with that because I WANT people to see that I am using paintings from the Old Masters with a “new twist” per say. I certainly will not/have not claimed to have painted the Mona Lisa.

But how do I find out who owns the “licences” to these images so that I can use them in my shawls for sale?

Some of the images I’ve used were bought from CD’s that I mail ordered. Nothing about copyrights was mentioned.

I want to do what’s right and I really enjoy using Old Master images because I love them so I want to keep using them.

Frankly, I’m not “good enough” at painting/drawing to create anything on my own so I would like to legally use paintings that I like and incorporate them in to things I want to sell.

Please don’t throw tomatoes at me for this post. I’m geniune in wanting to educate myself.

#106

Hey there Leah. :slight_smile: I think the idea is to direct people here to this thread for discussion - the Sticky thread in Art Theories is indeed a closed thread.

If stuff comes up, we'll add to that Sticky thread - I think the idea being that it's not a hard and fast rule that the moderators lay down as 'law' - but an open discussion.

The main hard and fast rule is - whatever you do - [u]be up front about it in your Gallery submission description, and describe your process to anyone that asks.[/u] Someone with nothing to hide has nothing to be defensive about.

Again, it's a good thing to use reference - it's a bad thing to use ref. and hide it. I hope that's the main thing that becomes clear from this whole discussion.

Please help the mods by educating others about this - there’s no need for flame wars or witchhunts. It’s just a matter of asking a person about their methods politely, and giving the artist a chance to respond. It’s an open forum, at best neither a place for empty praise nor witchhunts.

Regarding using multiple refs: I don’t see what is so hard about putting together a collage of the most referenced images and posting that as a link. Surely people familiar with PS should be able to do this without too much trouble? You don’t have to post every single image you used, but if you did use reference, then post that which you relied on the most.

Cheers

#107

exactly Rebecca one should not hide anything (except horrible murders and vicious pencile abuse)

#108

Would it be worth considering some sort of code to go with image title - so category is immediately apparent?

eg

SA - Single photo (in comp), Aligned (painting following photo ref)
MA(5) - Multiple photos, Aligned, 2-5 pix used

Could also have other thresholds if considered necessary / useful?

SU - Single photo, Unaligned
MU(10) - Multiple photos, Unaligned, 6-10 pix used (say)

EL - External (to computer, ie RW), Live model / Still life
EPa - External, Photo (taped to monitor say), aligned

NR - No Refs (of any sort)

etc

Am sure you ppl could come up with better classifications - but if the final system (if idea considered viable) was based on a Dewey type classification, then as new categories were thought of / loopholes fixed etc - they could be added fairly easily ?

Anyway, just a thought :slight_smile:

pp

#109

woosh this idea gives me creeps…dunno why but it does…

#110

I found this out today:

Joe Quesada, Marvel Comics editor in chief, talks about the use of Computer Graphicsto the aid in the creation of comic book backgrounds.

The program is called Sketchup, and the artist is usually tasked to DRAW OVER the computer generated backdrop.

Check it out:
http://www.newsarama.com/NewJoeFridays/NewJoeFridays34.html
http://www.sketchup.com/
-R

#111

If it hasn’t been mentioned yet, the art of painting over photos is sometimes called Photo Illustration. If the main subject of a digital piece is a worked over photo it should be called a Photo-Illustration, IMO.

As far as reference qua reference (not as an underpainting), reference is good. There is infinitly more info in what is being referenced then you can ever gain in your head.—IMO

#112

Good question, April! Welcome to the forums, go ahead and ask whatever you like!

In this particular case I don’t think that these would be ‘reference’ images, but copied and edited ones, since you’re not painting something that looks like the mona lisa, you’re copying it and using it in a sort of collage.

As for the copyright issue-- don’t worry about it!! By US law, if the painting was made before 1923, it’s under the Public Domain and free to use any way you like. I daresay most of the Old Masters fall in this category-- they are, after all, Old.

This page outlines US law on the expiration of copyright and the passage of works into the Public Domain: http://www.copyright.cornell.edu/training/Hirtle_Public_Domain.htm

If THAT were a crime, there’d be no hope for the world.

Also I don't think 3D images you made yourself count as 'reference' per se, and they're certainly not photos... although again, there would be copyright issues in using someone else's.

Woops, guess I missed that, or maybe I saw it too soon and that wasn’t showing up yet.

Ahh okay… Here’s another question though-- how bad is it to be naughty and screencap pics people don’t want spread around (like from a model portfolio website, or whatever) and use that for reference, even if the result is unrecognizable? That complicates things a bit-- are we just not allowed to use such images at all? What if we just have the page displaying the image up on another monitor or window and eyeball it from there? Is there a copyright issue in displaying the image here as a reference? Ow! Complicated!

#113

Gnarly,

Wow, thank you so much for that bit of info regarding the copyrights!

You have NO idea how much that means to me because I love the Old Master paintings and being able to use them stress-free is wonderful.

Thank you for the link, I’m on it now.

#114

But how do I find out who owns the “licences” to these images so that I can use them in my shawls for sale?

Hehe, just call me the invisible poster… :slight_smile:
I posted about this on page 6, but there was no reaction. Is it that people care more about what others think is right and wrong, than who actually wins what in court? If so I find that strange - the law is after all the base that ethics stand on, and courts are the battlegrounds where law is defined. I mean, what Tom Dick and Harry think can’t be as important as what the judge says, right?

Here’s another question though-- how bad is it to be naughty and screencap pics people don’t want spread around (like from a model portfolio website, or whatever) and use that for reference, even if the result is unrecognizable?

Well let’s see, here are those 4 factors the courts look at, from page 6.

  1. Are you making money from the resulting work?
  2. Is the work documentary or fiction?
  3. How much of the ‘heart’ of the original has been copied?
  4. Is your copy stealing market-share from the original? (apparently the most important factor)

Since you’re not giving enough detail about the hypothetical situation there’s no answer in this case. Except to say that if the copy is really ‘unrecognizable’ from the original, you should stand a pretty good chance of winning a suit (in fact how can you be sued in the first place if no one can recognize it?).

#115

I think you did a good job covering all the bases on page 6. Anything else added would be personal cases which would incorporate mixtures of a,b and c. I can’t add anything fundamentally new to what you have stated. I’m also not a copyright lawyer.

I am an illustrator and personally do not know any illustrators that do not use a “googled” image or two from time to time in there work. It is an unspoken reality in the industry. That may be why it is not addressed in the image creation process descriptions on this site.

Ultimately we all need to be fair. If you think you’re stealing you probably are.

#116

About two years ago I asked a man who was an artist to write some arabic words for me in calligraphic form. Words like “heart” “love” etc. I was designing t-shirts and I needed the Arabic words to base the design around. I don’t write Arabic or else I would have done it myself.

So I had this man write one word for me just for starters. He was a “friend of a friend” of mine and I was aquainted with his wife. He had planned to charge me the equivalent of $80 per word which I thought was a bit excessive but nevermind. The deal was that I would just purchase the written word out-right and that would have/should have been the end of it.

I took the word, stretched it, colored it, twisted it, textured it, added half a dozen filters, added a background, etc. etc… You get the point.

It was really nice when I finished and the client approved and commissioned me to do more. So I took the finished image to the calligraphy guy and showed it to him. He was unfamiliar with anything computer-related so I figured he’d get a kick out of seeing the completed image.

He didn’t recognize it.
He had to be told WHERE the original word was within the image because I made it in such a way as to force the person looking at it to really focus.

The result was that he ended up wanting a pecentage of any of the sales that the image generated…His wife ended up calling me saying that her husband was an artist and he needed to get royalties from his work, and that his name had to be mentioned etc. etc. She kept me on the phone for at least 40 minutes chewing my brain.

I canned the deal and never used the image. I just got someone else to write the Arabic words in freehand with a pen, end of story.

I am still in communication with these people to a certain degree. I prefer to remain diplomatic with everyone that I deal with. But this incident was a bit much. His wife is trying so hard to promote his work that she probably keeps the restaurant napkins he’s doodled on. His work is pretty darn good I have to admit.

The funny thing is that this happened almost two years ago and this man’s art has never been promoted yet. He refuses to sell his paintings because he thinks that whoever buys them won’t appreciate them, then he says that if he does sell them, he wants to retain the rights incase he wants to use the image in the future for something else, then he will not show you where his signature appears on his work because he says the person looking at it should be able to see where he signed. And finally, he refuses to give a price for his paintings because he says no one will pay him what they are worth.

His wife is actively trying to find someone to promote his work and cannot understand why no one wants to deal with her. Oh, and he will not allow anyone to photograph his images (except me for some strange reason but I never have) because he thinks people will use the images behind his back. So if any dealer is interested in viewing his work, they have to go to his house. He will not allow a CD to be made with thumbnails to send anyone.

Maybe this post went off on a tangent but I find it so bizzare that I thought people would like to read it and possibly comment on it.

#117

Sorry, Steven-- I should have been more specific. I was mainly worried about the legality of displaying reference photos that were found in sites that explicitly state that their content is not to be copied, to the point that right-clicking and other such methods of saving the images have been disabled, and you must screencap the picture or something of that sort in order to show people elsewhere what you were using.

There’s also the matter of practice sketching-- like in the anatomy threads for instance, say you wanted to copy a more modern painting or photo for practice… I think in that case it’s all fine as long as you state the purpose and cite the reference, and don’t use the result in anything commercial, but there’s still the question in my last paragraph when the source is finicky.

Also, I think that overall people DO worry somewhat more about what people think than whether they’re going to be sued. Especially lately, with so many folks confusing the issue by running around insulting people for using methods they don’t consider ‘proper’. Nobody wants to end up with a bad reputation, whether it has any basis in reality or not.

This is where contracts become all-important. If the deal was in writing, a certain amount of money to purchase the image, period, the artist CANNOT show up later and say ‘oh by the way, I demand royalties’. They just can’t. If it’s all just an oral agreement… well that makes things a little harder, but if it went to court, the fact that the work was paid for and clearly not stolen, with no contract up front explicitly specifying royalties… well, it would leave the artist with nothing at all to stand on. Something to remember for people on either side of the issue!

#118

Just a little notice. The copyright is based on the law in the country where the infringement was made. There are some differences depending on where in the world you are.

#119

legality of displaying reference photos that were found in sites that explicitly state content is not to be copied, and you must screencap the picture to show people elsewhere what you were using.

Ah, I see, sorry.
Well, I’m thinking it doesn’t matter what warnings a photographer puts on his website, or how hard he makes it to Save As, the law still applies the same way. That is, he has the same protection as any other artist. And so displaying this photo on another website should be just as good/bad as any other. I mean, any photo you post online that isn’t taken by you, usually is someone else’s copyright. And that is exactly the same situation.
Especially if the image was properly credited, I think it would have to be considered ‘fair use’. (Of course if the photographer demands its removal, it’s only polite to do so.)

Especially lately, with so many folks confusing the issue by running around insulting people

Yes I agree. We must try to clear things up a bit.

The copyright is based on the law in the country where the infringement was made. There are some differences depending on where in the world you are.

Very true, and an excellent point.
The good news is, recently it seems the EU and USA copyright laws have moved closer together so to speak. That probably represents the majority of members here.
The bad news is, if the offender is in certain other parts of the world, the victim may very well be SOOL. It’s important to recognize this, so that if our own work gets ripped by someone from these places, we don’t spend time, money and vital energy striving for justice where none can be had. Just let it go. :slight_smile:

#120

I was wondering what are the moderators thoughts on using personal references? Some members may not feel comfortable with posting personal photos, and as a result, may get comments like “you’re overpainting your own photos, etc”. Myself, I have no problem showing any refs to the moderators, personal or not. However, I wouldn’t want to post a personal reference for the whole public to see (this was the case with my recent work, my bro didn’t want me to upload the reference photo… I wouldn’t mind showing it to the mods, mind you).

So yeah, I would definitely like to see the mods opinions on this matter (or anyone else for that matter).