How does it work when you get paid for deriving from a copyright piece of material in the first place?
Since the artist was commissioned by Bungie to make the original concept art in question, I believe that Bungie still retains ownership of the copyright, since the work was created under Bungie’s employ.
That said, it’s not uncommon for these types of commission contracts to stipulate that the artist retains some rights to the works they create. It varies from contract to contract, though. Sometimes they just require that the original artist is credited in any further usage of the piece, sometimes they require the artist earns royalties from any sales of the piece, etc. Or, he could’ve also just taken a fat stack of cash for zero ownership, which isn’t totally unheard of.
The artist we’re talking about appears to have (illegally, though no one really cares until you try to do it at scale) translated the game design to a nerf gun for a fan of the game. He wouldn’t have done it for $60 for Bungie.
No, the nerf gun is sold by Bungie in collaboration with Hasbro. Whoever did the art for the nerf gun, whether in house or contracted, looked online and just stole the artists’, Tofu’s, work. Bungie are compensating them for it, so its a non issue now, but its just another case of art being stolen for official products.
Oh right yeah, extra confusing in the way I worded that too.
A guy called Josh commissioned the original art, I don’t know if he was a Bungie employee or not. I was just interested in peoples view of this dynamic. An artist takes money to draw/copy copyright material and then is immediately upset when someone is taking money for their work too. I know it’s not apples to apples, one being a corporation and one being an individual. I was just unsure on where the line is drawn on this kind of stuff as I don’t spend much time in the art communities.
Since the artist was commissioned by Bungie to make the original concept art in question, I believe that Bungie still retains ownership of the copyright, since the work was created under Bungie’s employ.
That said, it’s not uncommon for these types of commission contracts to stipulate that the artist retains some rights to the works they create. It varies from contract to contract, though. Sometimes they just require that the original artist is credited in any further usage of the piece, sometimes they require the artist earns royalties from any sales of the piece, etc. Or, he could’ve also just taken a fat stack of cash for zero ownership, which isn’t totally unheard of.
The artist we’re talking about appears to have (illegally, though no one really cares until you try to do it at scale) translated the game design to a nerf gun for a fan of the game. He wouldn’t have done it for $60 for Bungie.
No, the nerf gun is sold by Bungie in collaboration with Hasbro. Whoever did the art for the nerf gun, whether in house or contracted, looked online and just stole the artists’, Tofu’s, work. Bungie are compensating them for it, so its a non issue now, but its just another case of art being stolen for official products.
But the question being asked is about the fact that Tofu’s work is clearly an unauthorized derivative work of Destiny’s original gun.
The post I was responding to assumed that he had done commissioned work for Bungie, not that he used their art to make a version for a fan.
Oh right yeah, extra confusing in the way I worded that too.
A guy called Josh commissioned the original art, I don’t know if he was a Bungie employee or not. I was just interested in peoples view of this dynamic. An artist takes money to draw/copy copyright material and then is immediately upset when someone is taking money for their work too. I know it’s not apples to apples, one being a corporation and one being an individual. I was just unsure on where the line is drawn on this kind of stuff as I don’t spend much time in the art communities.