Artists Using Doll Likenesses without Crediting [Mijn Schatje discussion]

I just want to address one point that has been brought up about Mijn's work - her use of vectors and Illustrator. I guess she has put up the image with the vectors to prove that what she is doing is somehow is original. Illustrator is a TOOL - and that is all. Being able to trace with a pencil does not make you an artist and being able to trace with any other tool doesn't either. I have been a graphic designer/illustrator for 13 years and I know plenty of people who's Illustrator skills would kick her ass. Bid deal - she can use a tool! That is NOT originality and does not impress anyone in the industry.

There are thousands of honest graphic designers and illustrators worldwide who take the time to work up their own ideas, develop their own style, set up their own shoots and take their own reference photos (and yes I include myself there). I guess what makes me really angry about this is that many designers who do the right thing would give anything to get the contracts with Sony and other large companies but they have missed out to this person. The companies will think twice before engaging others in the future who do similar work, if they get burnt like this. Yes I am bitter!

 

I think she might be talking about this person:
http://xxbeckyangelxx.deviantart.com...amer-125012363
not Mijn.

 

I don't see the point of this turning into a constant state of scolding the general membership about what they say to someone in other venues. Half the posts seem to be "DON'T DO THIS PEOPLE". I think the point has clearly been made.

We're not their parents and I don't believe for one minute that anyone here is being "threatening" or ridiculous. If you don't have proof of the the threats, yelling at the general population here is bs to say the least.

 

Oh dear ^^; Fail on my part if that's the case!

 

Right now the tendency is to get impatient--we worked up SO much energy and Yes! Anger! And appropriate anger, too! We got the facts, we hunted out the original images Mijn stole, we've PROVED time and time again that she's a liar, we've informed all the right people--

--and it seems that nothing has happened.

The right word there is "seems." It has only been a week. We're kind of used to things happening RIGHT! NOW! in the online world, and we forget that in the offline world things move at a much slower pace. And things have happened...

Right now, Mijn is backpedaling and concocting more stories, and pulling images...she is alarmed, if not scared. Right now doll companies are looking at their options, and owners are going to hold Monday morning meetings. Right now at least some gallery owners are wondering if it's going to be worth continuing to sell her work, and might be getting ready to contact their webmaster on Monday to pull the images from their website. Right now artists are looking at images to see if they, too, were ripped off and trying to decide what their options are.

In short, right now, like the duck that seems to OUR eyes to be serenely sitting motionless in the middle of the river, there is furious paddling going on where we can't see it.

Keep up the pressure, keep up the good work, remind doll artists and companies that they CAN use the DMCA to FORCE her stolen images off the net. Hang in there and wait to see what next week brings. It's still Sunday in most of the world. Monday is the earliest we can expect to hear anything.

 

But I do know for a fact that people have been sending angry emails to bloggers, companies, and Mijn alike. Half the comments on blogs and livelournals have been extremely emotionally charged, and I can't say I blame people. Also, the mods have been aware of angry emails this entire time. Go back a few pages and you'll find a reminder every few minutes to please stop sending angry flames to Mijn and others.

I just wanted to put a disclaimer so that I didn't find myself partially responsible for people verbally ripping into this poor girl and her fanart. I wasn't trying to "yell" or "parent" only emphasize (bold for emphasis) the detriment of continuing to post angry, sometimes harrassing sounding comments all over the open web (which even I myself was guilty of early on in this heated issue ), especially on the page of a deviant who has done nothing wrong. I know most of us will not do this, but anger is a powerful thing, and I just wanted to make sure people knew that the deviant had done nothing wrong and was only an example of Mijn's influence on even doll lovers.

 

Do keep us updated on this.

I might have missed something but who did they tell that they would take down her work and what was the reason? This is important because if any gallery is stating that they're taking down her work because they think it's plagiarizing, it would be good to have that response updated on Radiotrash's website.

 

Maybe. Maybe the whole reason she does steal is because she can't draw people.

 

Angry is appropriate and does not equal threatening. Putting pressure on and keeping pressure on, expressing disappointment, anger or disgust is the only thing that promotes action.

Clucking our tongue at members every few minutes is just ridiculous. If someone is hellbent on issuing an angry email they'll do it whether we say "DON'T" or not and it is only the person sending it that is responsible for their own words, not people here.

Also, if you find something that someone did that you don't consider wrong, the safest way to protect them is not post it in a heated thread. Because you can not control how people are going to react to it no matter how big your disclaimer is.

 

Hi, LKJ,


TOMATO wrote this on June 1:

I was surprised to see last night that the work is still up on their website, including a pipos picture that was posted on the radiotrash site.

I don't plan on bringing the issue up with the gallery staff when I visit today, because I can be a little intense sometimes... Besides that, as I'm new to this hobby, I'm not an adequate representative of the issue. But I will let you all know what I find out.

It's funny Phae_11-- every first grader knows the truth of this statement. It's the insult they hurl at each other's artwork-- I've heard my son say it dozens of time. "Trace! You traced that!"

Even they know that tracing doesn't count. It may help improve your drawings skills, but to trace another's work-- either the good old fashioned way, or with a vector program, doesn't somehow make it your own original work.

It's ridiculous that she is falling back on such an argument, and it must be very, very insulting to those who do graphic design for a living.

 

Ah, thanks! I must have missed that! If it's still there, maybe Tomato can be informed. However, the gallery might be doing their own investigation so they might take a little more time to take down the art. A good idea would be to go again next week to see if it's up (and if it is, someone might one to contact them again, not to demand they take the art down, but just to ask so that the gallery knows that people are taking the issue seriously and hasn't forgotten).

Anyways, wanted to say thanks for going to see for yourself in person and for your calm approach.

 

I didn't contact her to be all like, OMG YOU'RE STEALINGTAKEITDOWN. I just said hey there, nice artwork, I saw you like Mijn, did you know... That's all. It's important I think to let as many people know as possible. It's why I volunteered to be the one to do anything, so no one would go and be mean to this poor kid. I hate seeing that crap and it does our argument no good at all.

Edit: She replied thanking me profusely for letting her know, also. She had no idea and was glad to be informed.

 

Etienne, I think you make an important point. After going through the comparisons between her drawings and the originals it's clear that when she has to draw a body part not shown in the original, she does it poorly. One arm will look fine (the traced one), while the other looks rubbery. Check out the portion of the left arm that was covered by the sleeve in the original-- it looks like a deboned chicken. Or a flipper.


http://radiotrash.org/temp/t/narae3.jpg


And if you remove the most critical portion of each drawing-- the face, the part of the drawings most exclaimed over by critics--you are left with a collection of pastel doodles that even I could draw. And I most definitely am not an artist.

 

Also if you look at the parts of a head that she didn't trace. It ballons out.
Which doesn't for sure mean she can't draw. It just means she's got a poor sense of anatomy.
Or her natural style of drawing would be more cartoony, abstract and rubbery.

Just trying to give an alternate view to her "talent" and within her own style she may very well be highly talented. But if she can't make money off of it then maybe it isn't worth it to her. Doesn't make what she chose to do right but. Its just another thought towards her as an artist.

 

But we can't know what her own drawing style is, can we, considering that images in her drawings have been shown to be traced, or derived from Dover clip art (as in the swallows, cherries, etc.)? We can only go by what she's presented us with, and what she hasn't. She may have talent as a collage artist (lots of talent!), but that is not how she has defined herself. That appelation would give credit to others, and she has been adamant that her work is original. She has claimed that the wide-eyed, doll-like faces in these compositions sprung entirely from her amazingly fertile imagination. This has also been the thrust of magazine articles about her work. They've been all about the beautiful, striking faces, not the small portions she seems to have created originally.

Even if her natural style is cartoony, abstract and rubbery, at the level in which she is playing (up to $1700 per print, contracts with Sony, etc.) she should have the technical skill to interpolate a small portion of an arm in the same style as the rest of the body she's stolen. That she appears to be unable to do this says volumes about her talent, IMO.

 

I've been following this for a bit and I was worried that it would simply go on as a long rant that would go on and on and that nothing -real- would get done. I'm very proud and happy to see that people who know how to deal with this kinda think stepped up and contacted people who know how to deal with this. I feel bad that I couldn't have been one of them. I really wasn't sure how to go about it or what to do -_-

I will cruelly admit that I hope the actions this community has taken will haunt her for a long time, and hopefully damage her career enough for her to get her act together. I can't believe how much money she was making off this too. ridiculous! If she liked bjds enough to steal art of them and work with it she shoulda just bought a few of her own from the start -before- she took out the shovel and started digging her grave (if that's been answered already I appologize, I admit to not having read every single post in this thread orz)

I haven't harassed anyone or her about this issue either. I didn't wanna make us look like evil witches and devils.

going back to the shadows now to see what happens next >_>

 

Template for contacting magazines, art-blogs and gallery owners.

Dear X

I am writing concerning the artist operating as "Mijn Schatje" whose works have appeared in your Y.

Schatje, as chronicled on this site http://radiotrash.org/mijn/ has evidently vector-traced up to 95% of each of her images without obtaining permission from the original image owners, nor obtaining the appropriate licensing. The faces are entirely vector-traced with minimal manipulation, again, from privately owned and published, copyrighted photos without obtaining license or permission. Further vector tracing was done to obtain poses (Audrey Kawasaki) and animal images (copyrighted photos).

You should be aware that using copyrighted material even with manipulation is a violation of the DMCA and the owner of said photo can use the DMCA to block your site from major search engines as well as demanding you remove said image.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely

Your Name Here

 

I bumped into this on Google Search:
http://shoppingcartdisco.com/?p=1791



GattinaDumpling says in the comments:

 

Are we positive that the faces are Vector Traced (as in, the specific artistic mathod)? Did we ever come to the solid conclusion? I'm sure it's on one of the pages that flew by me one day. Coming home to this thread is like


This is a very good template. *High Five*

 

I remember seeing, on a page somewhere (way back there), someone had re-posted a screenshot that Schatje had posted of a work-in-progress that included all the paths she'd used when vector-tracing one of her pieces.