headsup on artist's rights

[aimeekitty]

Link to Drawn.CA (which has links to all relevant information.

So. basically, some shady company (probably in china), grabbed a bunch of 72 dpi illustrations off the internet (and interviews and text, etc...) and slapped them together into a big artbook. (WITHOUT PERMISSION of course) and has been selling these books... they're actually in stores. The artists who had their work stolen are having a very hard time finding any solid information on the company who made the book, or getting any legal recourse.

As a little added information, I've had this happen to me to, not with my artwork but with my doll photos. More than once they've been taken for use in a book or stickers or bags or whatever. (and I'm just a casual doll photographer! I'm sure more accomplished folks get stolen even more often!)

Makes you want to take all your work down, huh? I won't, but I might seriously reconsider the size of the watermark on my images. :\ I've NEVER been a fan of big watermarks, I don't like to mar the artwork and irritate the viewer like that, but this is just ridiculous. I'll have to give it some thought.

Comments

[kaijou-akai.livejournal.com]

I agree with the above comments, a watermark placed directly over the artwork is the safest route to go. I usually make my watermark about 10-15% opacity and adjust the layer said watermark is on to either "Overlay" or "Multiply" (Makes the artwork easy to see, while the watermark is still visible enough).