SOMETIMES artists can be just as bad as lawyers when it comes to protecting their art.

deathsia
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Experienced Writer
Topic title: SOMETIMES I feel that artists can be just as bad as lawyers when it comes to protecting their art.(Seriously, wtf? makes making a topic title rather hard if i’m so fucking limited in how much I can type!)
 
And what I mean by that is in the context of them feeling like or doing the following:
 
  1. So paranoid someone is going to steal their artwork that ANY EDIT WHATSO EVER is cause for them to demand a takedown on said websites.
     
  2. Wants to make a profit so badly no matter what that is doesn’t matter if its a dedicated fan of their artwork or not and will demand takedowns in order to make sure they secure said profit.
     
  3. Paywalls every single piece of artwork they release and posts cropped versions on websites to promote their own website and/or work.
     
     
    Now, while I can FULLY UNDERSTAND the motives of each one of these situations and/or reasons. When you look at them from not an “independent artist” point of view but from a point of view we often perceive big businesses like Hasbro who send C&D orders to creators canceling great projects such as “Fighting is Magic” and such:
     
    Suddenly these people look less like those trying to protect their work and more like the big corporates trying to protect their profits and IPs no matter whose creativity they stomp into the ground.
     
    My point?
     
    I feel that those of us who are fans of an artist’s work should not have our creativity stomped into the ground because the artist is trying to “Protect their IP or profits” as long as credit is given to them where it is due. Whether it be a coloring job or a detailed edit of their work.
     
    As a writer of 15+ years I can personally vouch for the fact that public opinion of you work, be it negative or positive can be a huge motivator to keep you going and continue to be creative. Sure, they can publish their edits on another site but whose to say they won’t shut them down there too? There are only so many popular art sites online and you can bet these popular artists are on nearly every single one of them.
     
    Having your creativity stomped into the ground or removed from a site can be a huge demotivator and sometimes deprive us of a future talent that may have brought us some AMAZING artwork in the future. :)
     
    Thoughts? Opinions?
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@deathsia  
The paywall makes sense: the artists have to eat, after all. However, I do agree about the edits. Wanting to ban trivial text change edits is understandable, but “no edits ever” policies usually lead to trivial text changes and other troll edits being the only edits that get made anyway and hosted on sites that don’t care about copyright. Protecting against brand dilution only stops the quality edits and collage-makers and the edit trolls are undeterred.
Stoopedhooy
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Gave it a read.
 
Some people dislike when the message/idea of their works is being changed and twisted with no consent.  
Like, let’s say, you have a futanari or maybe male character and make an nsfw work with them, suddenly some people come around and demand no-penis edits, someone delivers a choppy single-line-vagina edit - and people love it much more than your futanari/male version you put so much work in.  
In such case edits can devalue your original art you wanted to share with people.
 
So basically it can hurt an artist on personal level too. Turns out edits may stomp original artist’s creativity in the ground just as well. How surprising, right?
deathsia
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Experienced Writer
@Stoopedhooy
 
While you have a fair point, its still unfair to the creative person who performed the edit. After all, many of our current day artists started as as little more than those “Evil art edit publishers who kill the original artist’s inspiration” as you seem to view them.
 
Don’t believe me? Fine, don’t believe me but its the truth even if some of these popular artists will NEVER ADMIT IT.
d1ckbitch
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@deathsia
 
Making a poll about that would be an interesting idea.
 
About the art protection situation, I think it eased a bit compared to the 2000’s where lot of pictures had copyrights warnings / threads written directly on it, some artists going as far as preventing people from saving their pictures. The Patreon business plan, where things are often made public after a while, may have helped with that. Less control on content needed.
 
Edits can be difficult to accept for an artist, it may be considered as if someone corrected your work because it wasn’t as perfect as you thought it was, or it may lead to include content you don’t really endorse in your own picture. Or sometimes, the edit is a positive thing for everybody, but it’s only one of the possible outcomes
deathsia
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Experienced Writer
@d1ckbitch
 
And that’s why crediting the original artist plus linking to their work while crediting yourself for the edit is so important, because then people who see the edit will go: “Well, it wasn’t the original artist but this edit is <insert opinion here>” If morons can’t tell the difference or notice that the work is an edit then its not the editor’s nor the original artist’s fault of that.
d1ckbitch
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@deathsia  
Proper credit attribution is a step in the right direction, but doesn’t solves everything ; it’s still understandable for an artist to feel uncomfortable seeing, depending of the situation, someone else using their work for promoting their own views on something (fetishes, politics etc) and getting exposure for it
 
If the edit is to be published to a large audience, best thing is to ask the artist first, I guess
deathsia
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Experienced Writer
@d1ckbitch
 
If an artist is so insecure of their skill that an edit of their work that improves or changes it in someway is enough to upset them, then they need to take a step back and reconsider their hobby because all it will take is one decent flame that picks at every single one of their weak points to kill any and all inspiration they have in that case.
d1ckbitch
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@deathsia  
We artists are a sensitive and insecure bunch lmao. that’s how things are.
 
Edits for improving/correction are only a particular edit case. And it’s still pointing a flaw in the original work, which count as a negative feedback; depending of the artist’s personality, it may still hurt a bit, despite it not being the primary intention. It’s really about respecting a person’s feelings…
 
Depends how you would introduce it to the artist. If you talk to them, says there may be a way to do a particular detail better, and offer a Red Line Fix if they seems open to suggestion, it would be more welcome than if they wake up one morning and discover a variation of their own work somebody thought would look better
Stoopedhooy
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While you have a fair point, its still unfair to the creative person who performed the edit. After all, many of our current day artists started as as little more than those “Evil art edit publishers who kill the original artist’s inspiration” as you seem to view them.
Don’t believe me? Fine, don’t believe me but its the truth even if some of these popular artists will NEVER ADMIT IT.
 
Dat sounds kinda paranoid not gonna lie, no offense. Are you feeling salty someone didn’t like your edit or something?
 
Besides, most artists I knew and know never did edits of someone else’s arts. So that is a bit of a weak argument that “no edits” dnp hurts beginners. Why edit someone else’s works when you can start making your own and get recognition for that? :)
 
If an artist is so insecure of their skill that an edit of their work that improves or changes it in someway is enough to upset them, then they need to take a step back and reconsider their hobby…
 
You basically say “fuck artists’ feelings”, yet you care about feelings of editors, that is a weird POV you have here. Sounds very personal at this point.
deathsia
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Not a Llama - Happy April Fools Day!

Experienced Writer
Dat sounds kinda paranoid not gonna lie, no offense. Are you feeling salty someone didn’t like your edit or something?
Besides, most artists I knew and know never did edits of someone else’s arts. So that is a bit of a weak argument that “no edits” dnp hurts beginners. Why edit someone else’s works when you can start making your own and get recognition for that? :)
 
Because they may not feel confident enough or feel skilled enough to draw something from scratch? Don’t ask me, I’m not an artist. But I’ve only done a fair few edits in which case the artist didn’t have a problem with my coloring job/edit. But in many cases I’ve seen an edit that was well done, comical, better than the original, or not that well done even that got taken down even though they harmed no one.
 
I’ve seen artists in the past start out by doing edits and coloring jobs I won’t name names out of respect for them and plus most of them don’t even publish pony works.
 
You basically say “fuck artists’ feelings”, yet you care about feelings of editors, that is a weird POV you have here. Sounds very personal at this point.
 
If your hope is to make this thread look like a “personal vendetta for my own benefit” then give up and stop now because its not.
 
Secondly, it sounds like YOU’RE making this personal.
 
Thirdly, I will not repeat my reply to @d1ckbitch to you but I will say that an artist should feel flattered instead of offended that someone would enjoy their work so much that they would perform an edit or coloring job. The act of demanding a takedown, insulting, or calling the person in question who person the edit an “art thief” despite them giving you full credit is equivalent to taking that stick figure drawing that kid who looks up to you handed you, and crumbling it in front of them.
 
It often leaves the editor in question going: What the fuck did I do wrong? Since most of the time, an edit or coloring job is done because the person in question is a fan of the artist’s work and wants to show their appreciation or express their creativity in hopes of impressing the artist.
 
I mean if its a troll edit or someone attempting to steal credit for the original artwork by changing a few things, then by all means, demand a takedown.
Ciaran
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友情は魔法だ
If you want to edit, trace, or color someone else’s work, go ahead. But before you publicly share it make sure the artist is ok with those being publicly shared.
 
In particular, if an artist asks that people not edit their work, whether that is a general notice on their portfolio, or via a DNP notice, or via a direct request from the artist to the editor, then the editor should please not publicly share edits of that artist’s work.
 
And if an artist is periodically ok with edits of their work being publicly shared, but asks that people ask their permission before editing their work, then editors should please ask ask that artist’s permission before publicly sharing edits of their work.
 
Same goes for editors - we have editors who do not want edits of their edits shared by others, or ask that editors ask their permission before sharing edits their edits.
 
2LDR: It’s really easy - if you want to edit, trace, or color someone else’s work in private - go ahead. No one can stop you. But before publicly sharing please it do the legwork to make sure the artist is reasonably ok with edits of their work, and maybe even ask their permission before you share it, and take care of any requests, acknowledgements, or licensing the artist requests of editors before you publicly share edits of their work.
 
Protip: If you are publicly sharing an edit to replicate something the artist had posted behind a paywall, or to pre-empt something that the artist was working on as a reward for their supporters, then that’s never going to be ok.
deathsia
Daring Do Dakimakura - Attended a Derpibooru panel at a MLP convention
Not a Llama - Happy April Fools Day!

Experienced Writer
@Stoopedhooy
 
Okay its clear now that no matter what I say, you’re just going to twist it to make it look negative so I’m done talking to you since your opinion and thoughts on this matter obviously can’t be swayed and you’re just going to continue to twist what I say to make me look like the villain in this discussion so your opinion looks like the “Good guy defending artists everywhere” and mine looks like “The evil jealous editor who wants to make troll edits and get away with it”.
 
What? Thought I wouldn’t catch on? Anyways, I’m done with you. Having your own opinion is fine but twisting other’s words is just petty.
 
 
@Ciaran
 
If you want to edit, trace, or color someone else’s work, go ahead. But before you publicly share it make sure the artist is ok with those being publicly shared.
 
While I don’t perform edits or coloring jobs often, I do try to contact the artist first before I even begin. If I don’t get a response I’ll just do the edit or coloring job and publish it while hoping for the best. Though its only happened once, even though I got no contact from the artist when I asked them, they demanded a take down in less than 24hrs of the edit being uploaded and yeah, I was a little upset over it since they ignored me until it was relevant to them but I got over it months ago.
 
Protip: If you are publicly sharing an edit to replicate something the artist had posted behind a paywall, or to pre-empt something that the artist was working on as a reward for their supporters, then that’s never going to be ok.
 
While I have NEVER done that (intentionally as far as I know), I do agree that publishing an edit of someone’s work which was paywalled(even though I dislike artists who paywall most of their content) is rude and should not be done.
 
 
@d1ckbitch
 
I wish more artists would share your point of view and encourage creativity instead of discouraging it. I get that each artists has personal reasons for why they don’t want edits or coloring jobs of their work but I wish it didn’t come at the expense of a fan’s creativity.
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If this is going to have the possibility for productive discussion, we should first attempt to enumerate the categories of edits. The following is my provisional list: please let me know if it is inaccurate or incomplete.
 
  • Colorization: you colored another artist’s B&W art. Easy to credit as artist:somepony else and colorist:you  
  • Corrective (detail) edit: the original image had a layer glitch that you corrected or the artist screwed a pony’s legs on backward and you fixed that. Here’s one where we can expect some artists to take it personally  
  • Text edit: generally, the lowest-value and lowest-effort edits. Commonly misused for trolling and political mouthpieces.  
  • Tracing: uses body poses and facial expressions from other artists. Can range anywhere from a straight trace that’s barely more than a color filter and altered text to a collage of many bodies mixed with different heads.  
  • Redraw: technically not an edit, but a similarly derivative work that should be included on this list. Although the poses and overall composition are expected to be similar to the original, it’s not traced. Think of them as “same picture, different drawing style”  
  • Collage: the source images are used as ingredients in the final product. The composition and message of the collage may have little or nothing to do with the meanings of its constituent images.
     
     
    @d1ckbitch  
@deathsia I think it eased a bit compared to the 2000’s where lot of pictures had copyrights warnings / threads written directly on it, some artists going as far as preventing people from saving their pictures. The Patreon business plan, where things are often made public after a while, may have helped with that. Less control on content needed.
 
That was also back in the days when every fan work had an 8-page copyright disclaimer about how “I don’t own any of these characters and no copyright infringement is intended” followed by “HOW DARE YOU DOWNLOAD OR EDIT MY WORK”. I used to download images straight out of my browser cache when they disabled right-clicking.
Stoopedhooy
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@deathsia
 
Bruh, no one is twisting anything.  
You are pretty aggressive and negative yourself, as an “experienced writer” you should know that writing words in all caps and ranting about them evil sellout corporate artists caring only about money and stomping on fans is pretty generalizing, if not demeaning and insulting.  
For the record, I love my fans a lot, they help me in many ways.
 
…but I will say that an artist should feel flattered instead of offended that someone would enjoy their work so much that they would perform an edit or coloring job…
 
As an “experienced writer” you should know all about intellectual property and how no one has to bend over for you. Such acceptance of fans’ creativity is a luxury, not the innate right everyone has. Even site admins owning this place respect artists’ wishes regarding their content. And maybe pick your words better yourself if you are so sensitive to what others tell you. You are setting the tone yourself for the reply you are about to receive.
deathsia
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Experienced Writer
@Stoopedhooy
 
Okay, I’ll take the bait, if only to point out the following:
 
While writing fanfiction and drawing share many similarities, they are VASTLY DIFFERENT fields of creativity. What may constitute as an “okay edit” for a writer’s story by a fan is vastly different to a piece of artwork. Hell, in most cases, I don’t care if someone does a full on edit of one of my fanfics as long as I am given credit since they often fix many of my spelling and grammar mistakes.
 
But taking my entire fanfic and adding one or two chapters to it and/or changing many parts is a problem as its easy for them to claim its their work and get away with it since its just words and much harder to claim ownership of. So naturally writer’s are valid in being more protective of their work.
 
With art, its OBVIOUS who the original artist is to their dedicated fans who know their art style so an art thief is 10x less likely to get away with pulling off and edit, claiming it as their own, and get away with it. That said, this is why art edits shouldn’t be viewed as a threat to an artist’s original vision since the time and effort it would take to perform such a detailed edit as to “take credit” and get away with it would pretty much mean redrawing the entire piece which is a pointless use of their time and effort since if they are THAT SKILLED, they should just draw their own original version of the piece in their art style.
 
What it boils down to is artists are often protective of their work because they don’t want people stealing credit for it(which is understandable). As long as they are credited and linked to the original, then an edit should be seen as a complement. I don’t understand how this concept is so hard to grasp.
 
If someone likes your work enough to want to do an edit to impress you, embrace it, hell even critic them on the mistakes they may have made when they edited your piece, help them improve! Don’t belittle them or rage at them because (in your eyes) they sullied one of your pieces of artwork.
Stoopedhooy
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Sad Confused Artist.
@deathsia
 
While I see your point, you seem to lack the understanding some people put emotions into own art. They literally vent in it and this is purely their input, they want nothing to be changed about it. Not everyone is as pragmatic as you and think of art like this.
 
Also tone down your temper and accusations if you really don’t want a conflict.
deathsia
Daring Do Dakimakura - Attended a Derpibooru panel at a MLP convention
Not a Llama - Happy April Fools Day!

Experienced Writer
@Stoopedhooy
 
Okay, an emotional venting piece of artwork I can FULLY UNDERSTAND being like a rabid guarddog of since that is you pouring your emotions into a piece to express yourself but unless EVERY SINGLE PIECE OF ART you publish is you venting your emotions into it, its hard to see or understand why you would take offense to an edit as long as you are given credit.
 
I mean sure, some artists are like that but in the defense of any potential editors, how are we supposed to know this art piece was RAW EMOTION brought to life unless you tell us? Also, you can’t tell me that every single piece of artwork on this site or most art sites in general is nothing but pure emotion put to art. Much of it is just them putting a piece out for praise and/or critic on how to improve their craft.
 
Or in the case of this site, expressing their love of ponies by drawing them in different situations which everyone can here can get behind and understand.
 
Let me use myself as an example here, some time ago, I saw a piece of artwork I really enjoyed and wanted to do a teat edit of the piece, I tried contacting the original artist but I never heard back from them so i went a head and started the edit, I myself with very little art knowledge spent a lot of time and effort trying to get the sizes and proportions right on each mare based on their distance and perspective. The result is as you see here:
 

 
While it wasn’t super popular it did earn a few comments one of which made me feel happy with the time and effort I put into it and felt I even grew a little as an artist.
 
Another piece I did a coloring job (involving spike and Sweetie Belle) however, I attempted to contact the artist and got no response once again so I went ahead and did the coloring edit only for it to get yanked down in less than 24hrs. I spent 8hrs coloring that piece and it getting yanked down so fast even though the artist never said anything to me, I haven’t done an edit since out of fear of my creativity being shut down and stomped like it was then.
 
So I speak from experience on this matter enough though this thread isn’t a direct result of that event, it did have a minor influence on its topic and my stance. This whole thing occurred months ago though so it wasn’t at the forefront of my mind at first when I began this thread.
Stoopedhooy
Shimmering Smile - Celebrated the 10th anniversary of Equestria Girls!
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Sad Confused Artist.
@deathsia
 
Well, you actually experienced exactly what I am talking about.  
You invested into the piece physically with time and emotionally by loving the end result of your editing work.  
While I am sorry for that, it is not too fair to call out the artist for that though, they may have own reasons they don’t wish to disclose. They don’t really have to either, to be honest.
 
If your goal is to grow as an artist, you can actually draw using arts you love as references, having artists as your silent mentors, so to speak. As long as you are not tracing, you should be fine.  
You can also contact plenty of artists in person and ask them for help, usually they are willing to give an input for people who are grateful. I do understand though it can be scary to write to strangers, heh.
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@Stoopedhooy  
The concept of closed species has always been ridiculous to me. The off-brand closed species flamewars were entertaining petty drama.
 
 
@deathsia  
Your edit is probably back up on one of the other boorus. One of the silver linings of all these new horse boorus is that each one can set its own rules on what kinds of edits are allowed rather than there being only one booru with a “take them or leave us” approach to rules.
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