Artists Using Doll Likenesses without Crediting [Mijn Schatje discussion]

I definately think someone should make an Youtube slide show of the overlays and her images- this would be very useful. Anyone want to do it or shall I ask I have a Youtube account anyway...?

 

I wonder if Mijn Schatje will be able to aks Youtube to take a slide show like that down, because she didn't give permission to let you use her work. We say she's an art thief, but so far nothing has been settled in court and just because we say so does not mean she cannot wave around her copyrights to her work.

Still I'd say go ahead. Maybe then she'll know how it feels to have her work taken. At least she'll be credited for her work.

 

For those of you whose pictures were stolen, you can use the DMCA in your favor to get all the sites carrying Mijn's collages dropped from Google, MSN and Yahoo searches.

http://www.google.com/dmca.html

http://info.yahoo.com/legal/us/yahoo/utos/utos-173.html

http://www.microsoft.com/info/cpyrtInfrg.htm

This will cut into her business, and the business of those who carry or post her work.

 

Edit: Please don't contact the artist on etsy any more, it seems she was genuinely unaware that using other people's photos is generally frowned on and is doing all she can to make things right. She also mentioned that she received threatening, abusive messages - PLEASE DO NOT contact her to harass her any more!

 

Oh no! I hope she responds favourably...! If that's one of Milkeye's pictures, then it suggests she's been taking photos from the internet and using them in her works too... I think there's a widespread feeling that "if it's on the internet, I'm entitled to it."

By the by, was Barbara Canepa contacted? It says on Radiotrash's site that Mijn had permission, and I think I saw on Mijn's facebook page that she claims her and Canepa are friends. Is this really the case...? I wonder if she really *did* get permission...? I'm a big fan of Barbara's work (and her dolls)... I really really hope Mijn's comments are legit...!

P.S. Radiotrash... thanks for putting the site together...! Everyone has been working so hard ^_^/

 

& some more proof
http://i307.photobucket.com/albums/nn292/crimsonsoda/lishe.jpg
http://i307.photobucket.com/albums/nn292/crimsonsoda/sleepingshiwoo.jpg

I think Barbara Canepa and Mijn are friends. Mijn is mentioned or linked on her blog if I am not mistakened.

 

It says in the etsy profile that she is a collage artist, which is what makes her partially different from Mijn.

 

Yes, but it is as the topic title says: Artists Using Doll Likenesses without Crediting.

She has no crediting of bjd companies in her profile or art descriptions, unless I missed reading it.

 

Sorry, I am not sure if she has the account here.
That's my personal thought because she sent me a couple of e-mails after I write my comments here very soon so I thought she might see this forum.
Otherwise, she didn't know what I wrote here.

Anyway~~It's not 100% sure so please don't be confused and sorry If I made people confused ^^

Good day
Denny

 

She's not only using photos of Asian bjd's but also the faces of the porcelain art dolls made by Martina Bychkova.

 

Mods...please move to old thread if needed.....thanks.....


This one is Luts-Delf Sleeping head Soony!.......



http://www.etsy.com/view_transaction.php?transaction_id=16577476

I found this interesting on Esty too.........

What’s the fair use defense?
The fair use defense is a way to defend an allegation of copyright infringement. In essence it’s a way of saying “yes, I infringed, but I have an excuse.” The fair use defense rests on the theory that an individual should be excused due to public policy reasons such as the copying benefits society due to educational purposes or if the copying is considered commentary, criticism, news reporting or scholarly reports. If the copying is for commercial use (if an artist copies and sells the work), this fact weighs against the finding of fair use.

Many artists use the fair use defense as a loophole to copy. This is not wise. Artistic uses are not explicitly protected by fair use. The fair use defense is complicated and difficult to prove.

May I use a tiny bit of someone else’s work in my work?
In some cases, that court will permit copying, even without conducting a fair use defense analysis, if the amount copied is extremely small (de minimis). The theory is that this type of copying does not rise to the level to constitute infringement. A court may examine whether an average audience would recognize an appropriation as a qualitatively and quantitatively significant portion of the copyright holder’s work as a whole. Just like with fair use, there is no bright line test for determining a de minimis use.

What is copyright infringement?
Generally, copyright infringement occurs when a copyrighted work is reproduced, distributed, performed, publicly displayed, or made into a derivative work without the permission of the copyright owner. Someone may infringe even without making any money.

xen

 

Maybe we should keep this new artist in the old thread, since this one is specifically abou Mijn Schatje.

 

Sorry to go back a few pages, but as for the discussion of how Mijn traces in Illustrator...
I found a video that shows a time lapse of someone making a vector image from a photograph: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhNyTS0KgYQ
There are actually a ton of these speed vectoring videos on youtube. Not surprisingly, most have nasty comments about how it's nothing more than tracing. But at least these 'artists' are being upfront about their methods.

To explain, all the lines/dots you see popping up in neon colors are 'paths' that they're drawing, and you can then fill closed paths with colors or gradients (you can pick up the colors directly from the photo below very easily.) The points on the paths can be moved/manipulated freely at any time, all together or individually, in order to change the shape or location of the path. The paths can be selectively lifted in order to copy certain parts to new documents (as mentioned, so that she can reuse the same parts of her drawings in other pieces, over and over again.) It's hard to verbalize... but hopefully seeing it done makes things a little clearer.

I'd guess she's not using live trace--the paths that result from it are usually more work to clean up than they're worth. And using the brush tool with a tablet, you can outline photographs extremely fast. Most of the speed tracing vids I saw said it took them 7~10 hours to 'ink' and 'color' full faces and hair. Since the features on dolls are already so simplified, I'm sure it takes her even less time.

 

oh man, not Etsy sellers as well

don't people know anything about copyright? this leads me to wonder how many other people out there are doing the exact same thing. i mean, i see a lot of people doing vectors of anime screenshots and stuff and claiming it as their own, so i guess people think it's okay to do the same for doll photography too.

 

I've just contacted the Etsy seller; apparently she found the images on deviantART and got permission there - she didn't realise that the "artists" she'd borrowed from were infringing copyright in turn. She's replied very promptly:

 

I think this is really important. Also, if you are an artists you can contact Facebook and Mayspace very easily and tell them that you feel she is using your images and you do not want her too. It is easy do I highly recomend it. Remember though you have to be one of the artist or company in order to do this, if not it has no bearing and the images will remain.

 

Further to the Etsy seller situation, she's told me the following:

She has indeed closed her shop, and is very upset about the whole thing. Could people please stop sending her angry messages? I have suggested to her that when she reopens her shop with new work, she gives full credits beneath each item description.

She's not on a par with Schatje - she's genuinely sorry and has acted straight away to try and put things right, so let's cut her a little slack?

 

She has been contacted. Mjin kept emailing us telling us supposedly what Barbara wanted (to remove her dolls and blog link from the page) because she apparantly doesn't speak English well. We have someone who contacted her in French though and I suggested to Mjin that Barbara could email us in any language she was comfortable in and we'd translate but that I wanted to hear directly from her and not through Mjin and there hasn't been any word since from either.

 

Just wanted to pop in here and sing radiotrash's praises - and all those who worked so hard on breaking this. Well done. Seriously well done!!!!