Like octopuscats, I am an architect who began in fine arts, & I agree with his/her recommendations.
However, it is undeniable that devious_dev raises a significant concern - one that transcends 3D modeling. So, yes, wise to invest in an experienced lawyer’s opinion, & keep a record of that; if trouble arises, the mere fact that you were doing your best to act responsibly, seeking professional guidance in the law, as well as in this forum, would count in your favor. Both with a judge &, simply, among other artists & design professionals, it would seem like a good-faith effort, not so?
Experienced lawyers will also point out that the entire spectrum of patent/copyright/license/proxy protections is a nightmare of needless (or corrupt) complexity, contradiction & loopholes for evasion of simple ownership.
Consider the years of debate about EULA’s - why can we own a book, & not software?
Or, how did Steve Jobs get away with swiping Napster to “create” iTunes?
Or, for that matter, swiping the lower-case “i” from Compaq Computer?
Did Andy Warhol “steal” the “concept” of Marilyn Monroe when he made his multiple-image “portrait” of her?
Etc.
I’d also like to second Romanji’s simple encouragement to just act on your talent, form your concept, your vision, or whatever comes to you as authentically yours, as a design goal, & go for it.
With or without the F#*!, of course…
It’s complicated, hence why it should be left to us, lawyers to advice our client’s what is or not protected by law. Of course even for us lawyers our knowledge extends as far as national law in most cases and each country has a different form of contract law. Even inside EU where EU law is prevalent. A forum is not the place to get a proper legal advice.
But in summary, no ownership is not required to create a contract and thus a license. Contracts can be created for a variety of reasons and purposes. They have different forms, written, verbal, electronic etc. They have limitations for example in EU and in my country you cannot exclude liability for loss of property or life out of the usage of a product. Etc Etc.
I am practicing 10 years law with specialization is Maritime law , in Greece, which has notoriously complex contracts so I speak out of experience.
Maybe in your contrary a contract or a license may require ownership , although that to me it sounds extremely limiting , I have seen weirder things when I was studying UK law.
NO. That is not infringement. The models from Daz fall under the Creative Commons Licence … anything you create with the model ( render) is your to do as you see fit! It is your creation. If on the other hand you were to try and the sell the mesh, that would be in direct infringement of their licence! I worked with Daz for many years, and there are THOUSANDS of renders out there and on DAZ the sell renders of work using DAZ meshes, but only the renders! You can however create a morph target for their meshes, and then sell that through Renderosity or your own site and that is perfectly legal to do so, as it only requires the buyer to own the original mesh, which you do NOT provide. I hope this clarifies your questions.
Some reference material:
And if you are creating 3D models. Your agreement changes and the above articles would be a little more applicable.
And the interactive license is here:
What I would do is simple – “be your own creative, and do your own work.” Reference the work of other artists whose work and style you like, then sit down with your mouse and your pencil and make something that is truly yours. You’ll stay well clear of any legal troubles, and you’ll be contributing to the ever-growing body of original art that exists in this world.
You can’t copyright something as common as the proportions of a human body. So go on ahead.
Most people don’t know what they’re talking about if they think otherwise.
Now, copying a character tit for tat is different. (keyword character and not body type)
I think you missed the point. First, you are not a copyright lawyer so you factually can’t know what you are talking about. And you are in no position to tell anyone else that they don’t. Because if you were a copyright lawyer the first thing you would say is that you can not advise this person over the internet via a thread with ambiguous information at best.
To even post a thread here with the OP topic is all by itself a paradox.
Copyright infringement is a legal term. It is not a philosophical or ethics concept or moral question.
The best advice anyone can give is to point the way to source material and articles on the subject by universities and other reputable sources who have to deal with these issues - and the lawyers who ply this trade - on a daily basis.
That coupled with the source material on the license is all that is needed.
Form there the OP can make his own moral judgement based on the facts and the actual work in front of him on his screen.
That is really the end of the story.
First off you don’t know what I do or know outside this forum.
You cannot not copyright something that occurs in nature, such as the human body. That’s a fact.
And since he just wanted to reference the proportions, he’s in the clear.
Now, if he wanted to copy the face and textures exactly, then he would be going in the red zone.
But since he’s just referencing the body, he’s fine.
If he wanted to match the face exactly(which is a difficult thing to do anything, so if you were to give it a try, I would say give it a little of your own spin because I doubt you can match it exactly and you would be fine), then it gets more blurry and can fall into different laws. But it would still be difficult thing to get sued in court for until someone shows them this thread.
If anyone is curious about the whys and wherefores of (US) copyright law, and by extension the various treaties that apply throughout the world, www.copyright.gov is an excellent resource. While they are very careful to say, “we’re not lawyers,” there is a great deal of pragmatic information there.
My personal opinion in this case is that an attempt to “copy” someone else’s style and character-composition, in a literal sense that might raise fears of “infringement,” (a) is actually going to be harder to do than to exercise your own “inspired creativity,” and (b) will produce a less-pleasing, “it seems awkward and forced,” result. Whereas, if you study the work, notice what pleases you about it and what attracts you to it, and then sit down to draw your own character with your own pen, you will add something to it that wasn’t there before. And it will be good. It will be yours. Sure, the inspiration might be obvious, but that’s “the sincerest form of flattery.”
If you plan to publish the work commercially, then you ought to engage a qualified intellectual-property attorney as a matter of course. (“Legal expenses” are deductible, both for corporations and for individuals in the USA.) Get that lawyer to write a letter on his or her letterhead, and keep that letter forever. That’s called, “due diligence.” (Or, “covering your ass.”) If someone challenges you, you can pull out that letter and show the judge that you did respect the law, pro-actively.
You may have noticed I repeatedly claim I’m “morally justified”. This is because there’s just no difference between how I made this model and how I [or other artists] make models using 3dsk or similar references. In fact, I honestly feel like this model in particular is more original than models made using 3dsk references and the like, because I went the extra step and created my own references.
Surely, this means there’s absolutely no problem with the creation process itself, as it is the same modeling technique legitimately used by millions of other artists. Thus, I definitely couldn’t be legitimately accused of stealing someone else’s 3d model. What could I be accused of then? The only thing left is to accuse me of stealing the character design.
However, that wouldn’t make sense either, for as I’ve stated many times before, the basic body proportions are the only qualities I’ve replicated and no one owns the human figure. This made the base body type similar, but nothing else. In conclusion, the information I “copied” is too generic to define a character. Textures, rig, head, hair, everything is my own original creation and quite distinct.
The law is particularly ineffective on this issue. For example, a person could claim copyright on a painting that’s clearly based on the Mona Lisa, even if the differences are extremely minor. The law is not about what is morally right, it’s about what falls within its definitions and loopholes.
I did actually post this question on a law forum before posting it here, and they basically said that it ultimately depends on who can afford more attorneys. Funny, but true. Theoretically, if it looks vaguely similar and they can afford enough lawyers to keep on bugging me, and have the malice to do so, then they will most likely win.
My opinion is I don’t think it is a matter of opinion…lol
I know people get offended if you challenge their knowledge. And I am not going to speak to anyone directly on this point because in the last 14 years I have seen this subject come up time and time again on the forums. And it goes the same way every time.
At first I also felt the need to speak my opinion on the particular use case. Because I am very well versed in the law, having read it over many many times. And also having had to be challenged on it in a few different professional situations. But over the years I decided this is not the correct approach.
Mainly because these threads always go the same way. The self-professed experts in copyright law come out of the woodwork to give their “professional” opinion. Then people argue with each other over their understanding of the law and the use case. And it goes nowhere.
So here is the deal. This is a legal question as I said before. And if you are not a copyright lawyer you can not speak to this definitively. It does not matter what the person said they will or not do, nor the expressed context. There is absolutely no definitive legal yes or no possible.
And I guarantee you, no one who has spoken here is qualified as a copyright lawyer. Because if you were, you would know that the very first thing you would never do - ever - is come to a thread like this and give someone an anonymous “go on ahead”.
And it does not matter how many times you have been to court or been around law or even well versed in the law. Or any other personal experience or association. If you missed the above point, then you completely missed the most basic thing about law. And in particular copyright law.
Legality has to do with binding contracts, both the letter and the spirit of the law, as well as the exact evidence in a case, and a study and comparison to other court decisions. Most of these issues get settled out of court due to the fact that there have already been decisions that would most likely favor one or the other side.
So the primary thing missing here is evidence. There is no evidence. Only hearsay and voiced intent.
It could never go into a legal question until evidence was presented and it could be compared to the legal binding contracts and other cases.
So this is why I have said, that the best thing to do is to study up on it by yourself. You look at the laws and the contracts you are bound by and you make your own decision what to do. There are countless articles and references and even the law itself that can be studied.
No one here can say… yes or no either way to the OP question.
“Is this copyright infringement?”.
Opinions yes. References yes.
But definitive yes or no? Not possible.
I agree with you. Ultimately, it’d depend on the specific details of the case and the evidence presented.
I made this thread precisely to study the problem. In particular, I want to see what fellow artists think. My opinion is that there’s no distinction between the creation process behind this particular model and any other model created through box modeling, and that the reference properties I replicated on my model are too generic to justify “character design plagiarism”.
The problem here is whether it’s “safe” to use my model commercially or not. It’s my own original creation and I conclude it’s my right to do so if I wanted. The only way to even say it’s a “copy” is if you strip it of almost all of its characteristics and overlay body meshes in a complete vacuum after some transformations. At this level I can legitimately claim you’re intentionally trying to make my model look like someone else’s in order to conclude it’s a copy. I’m being paranoid.
Also, it’s not like there’s anyone complaining. I simply don’t want to run the risk of being in the wrong, but from what I see here it seems to be always possible for artists to claim other artists have plagiarized their work based on near-arbitrary grounds.
Absolutely. It is a very slippery slope. I think a better topic would have been, not “is this copyright infringement?” But rather, “What is your opinion and experience (professional or otherwise) with the general guidelines of copyright law in relation to using reference material?”.
It is a longer topic title but it could be shortened and explained. And without divulging the particulars. The issue here is everyone wants to try and be an expert, a moral authority or a encourage wanton reckless abandon.
It is clear from the articles written on this subject by universities that deal with this all the time that it is a very complex issue with many parts.
One does however beg the question. That if you were paranoid, why did you post a thread here explaining that you were basically using Daz assets as reference models to make your own?
I think the wiser approach would have been to google it and research it. And you would have found that the first thing that would have to happen is that someone would have to have a good reason to suspect you were doing this. Regardless of if it was legal or illegal. They’d first have to see your model and compare it to a Daz asset. And it would have to be pretty close for them to do that. Or someone would have to snitch on you (assuming it was illegal).
Then to go further, they’d have to prove, not only did you have access to the models, but get a court order to search your computer to prove that not only did you have access to the material, but you used it. Or get a witness to say they saw you do it.
So you see you are a long way from “being caught.”. But you just saved them the trouble (if it did turn out to be illegal) by simply giving them all the evidence they need right here.
Nothing wrong with discussing this subject but I think it really matters how you frame it in the first place to give it a more general opinion-based platform.
I am no lawyer, but I know a thing or two about law, and would warn against underestimating lawyers’ abilities to reinterpret law or use some facet of it against you in some capacity.
EDIT: irrelevant link removed. I heard GTA or another game was sued by the military for incorporation of their SUV design, but I didn’t find the right article now.
Plagiarism, copyright infringement, artistic license, free use… it all depends on Who is on the other side of the courtroom. Hell, even free speech can no longer be a valid defense nowdays!
I’m paranoid about the fact being precise at reproducing a general human body shape I liked and using that for a commercial product is forbidden, not about hiding it. If it is forbidden then that greatly hinders my artistic freedom and I just can’t do it professionally. If hiding I used Daz models as a reference were the issue I’d just have to spend a few hours or even minutes changing the proportions and no one in the world would be able to tell. Instead, you can clearly tell I don’t want to do that because I simply like the body shape I have and want to use it.
This thread is a consequence of my utter inability to see how this is any different from using 3dsk references. Would it change anything to photograph a live model instead? How? Would it change anything to do it by memory? The creation process would be exactly the same regardless of what pictures I’m looking at while doing it.
The reason I decided to make this thread here, on a Blender forum, was that I have the intention of remaking my work depending on the arguments I see. If I conclude it’s dangerous or wrong I’ll simply remake it. Right now however I just don’t agree with anyone on why this would be “plagiarism”. Possibly the best observation I’ve seen here regarding what could be a problem with this is @kilon’s point regarding fair use.
All 3d models have a certain format that holds the vertex data, normal data, uv data. (vertex data of model is unique to each mesh. verts are saved as a list of vector positions ) If the verts dont line up or the vert count is different then its impossible to follow through with a copyright violation, but if say u did the body different and left the legs as they were the party infringed on can easily check this data, and it would be irrefutable u violated copyright laws. Just know that the closer it looks to the actual model it will put a spotlight on your from the haters. You could blatantly use a character that is copyright, and no one will say shit as long as the model is of poor quality.
Also an idea can have copyright laws protecting it, its called Intellectual Property. Say u made a tetris style game, but changed the look of the prices, but all mechanics were the same including all the puzzle shapes, even if u made your own code this may be infringement. Id think u would need to make different shapes even if the look of the shapes was original.