Copyright Infringement

benstanbury · 05-02-2007, 23:10

Hi,

If I manipulate an image a lot would it infringe copyright? Say for example, I had a colour photo of an actor or actress, I turned it black and white, changed the colour of the background, uped the thresh hold etc etc would I infringe copyright if it looked nothing like the orginal picture?

Thanks

namllihs · 05-02-2007, 23:19

Yes

benstanbury · 05-02-2007, 23:32

Thanks. I guess what Im asking then is, if you manipulated a photo to such a point that it would be fair to say it only bore little resembalence to the photo would you still be infringing copyright.

I found a picture of a toy robot, and applied the live paint filter in Illustrator, made the background bright yellow, changed all the colours and I guess you wouldnt be able to say 'thats looks like this photo'.

fionaB · 05-02-2007, 23:38

if u took the pic then there is no infringement...... but doing ANYTHING to someone elses image without their permission no matter what the outcome is infringement

Fi

benstanbury · 05-02-2007, 23:55

OK thanks for the info

Les Meehan · 06-02-2007, 01:04

Several years ago, maybe still now I don't know, photo and graphics students were mind-controlled by the absurd concept of the 'found' image that they could use for themselves and claim it as their own. I always felt this 'found' image thing to be an acronym for 'theft'. Theft of someone else's hard work and talent by those without the latter and incapable of the former.

Do yourself and every other creative person a favour and just create your own stuff from scratch, it is so much more rewarding in the long run.

Regards

Les

**Markulous** · 06-02-2007, 08:48

Look at it this way: when you're rich and famoous (like we're all going to be!) you won't have people coming out of the woodwork trying to claim compensation for using what they claim to be their image!

Joseph McGarraghy · 06-02-2007, 23:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Les Meehan

Several years ago, maybe still now I don't know, photo and graphics students were mind-controlled by the absurd concept of the 'found' image that they could use for themselves and claim it as their own. I always felt this 'found' image thing to be an acronym for 'theft'. Theft of someone else's hard work and talent by those without the latter and incapable of the former.

Do yourself and every other creative person a favour and just create your own stuff from scratch, it is so much more rewarding in the long run.

Regards

Les

Thanks for that Les.

benstanbury · 10-02-2007, 14:47

Well that told me ...

Obviously a touchy subject.

orangepeel · 10-02-2007, 15:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by benstanbury

Obviously a touchy subject.

what do you expect? You ask a bunch of content creators if they mind their work being ripped off and got a response - rather measured imo.

Sadly IPR (Intellectual Property Rights) has gotten itself a really dirty image due to the RIAA, MPAA and the big media companies forays into DRM and their habit of litigate first, check facts later. Their methods of protecting their copyright has actually harmed the consumer and made it easier and more convienient to simply steal their content. This has a knock on effect to the rest of us. Namely being a generation of users who don't actually see the original content creator as having legitimate rights.

But, at least you asked

Most wouldn't bother.

Rob Barron · 13-02-2007, 20:26

The point here is simple: if you are manipulating someone else's image, you are already breaching copyright anyway so anything else is immaterial. The fact you might get it (very easily) to a point where it no longer represents the original in any way is of no consequence whatsoever. The moment you change someone's work without their permission, you are in breach of the law.

Indeed, I would be MORE angry (and thus, if this was upscaled to a professional level, more likely to take legal action) about someone changing my work than I would someone using my work in its original condition.

Simple rule: if you didn't take it, don't touch it, don't claim its yours and don't publish it without acknowledging the copyright holder.

Cheers,
Rob

namllihs · 13-02-2007, 20:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by benstanbury

Well that told me ...

Obviously a touchy subject.

It is something I did not really think about, until last November. During the cross country league season I submitted a few shots from each meet the league's website, a few days after submitting shots for the second meet, one of my shots turned up on an athletics website, they had simply copied my image from the authorised website and used it. I can tell you that it is not a nice feeling, especiall as the shot had been poorly cropped to fit their format. I immediatly e.mailed the offending website asking for the to take down the image or give me an acknowledgement. They apologised saying that they were not aware that it was a commercial image (what utter B*****ks) but did offer to pay me for the use of image and gave me an acknowledgement.
This was over 3 months ago and it still angers me that people will treat your work in this way.
Anyway I hope this never happens to you.

abirkill · 13-02-2007, 20:56

You can use Flickr's advanced search to find images that people don't mind being modified and used for non-commercial purposes, as long as you give attribution - I used one when pimping Dave's car in the gallery recently.

If you're not planning on using the modified image commercially, and just want a type of image rather than a specific image, it's a very easy way to get a 'stock' image to play with legally.

14-02-2007, 09:31	#14 (permalink)
orangepeel Forum Regular Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Edinburgh Posts: 1,475