I have a question about the legality of fanart. As I understand it, I can create fanart of any scene in the books, but I cannot sell it for profit.? So, if I were to lift an image from a press release and create a banner, that's OK, but if I put it on a bumper sticker and sell it, that is copyright infringement? Or, if I create original artwork of a phoenix, once I call it "Fawkes," that is trademark infringement? Does anyone have any information on how this works?

You can do fanart for your own entertainment and that of others as long as you don't gain a profit out of it, if you sell it on purpose you have to have written consent from JKRowling or the publishing company.

How are the artists on cafepress doing this then, or have they just not been caught yet?

It is quite legal to sell original fanart. And by that I mean original hard-copy art that there is only one of. (various fandoms have being doing exactly that at conventions since the Kirk/Spock days.)

You cannot however sell prints/multiple copies of the one painting.

Where this becomes tricky is when you're dealing with digital art, which must be printed to become hard-copy.

The ground becomes even more slippery if you use WB images/designs/actors/environs. And blatantly selling prints of 'Harry Potter' (or any names from the HP universe) is asking for trouble. There is no copywrite on wizards, magic, or castles.

There is no way to protect your work from being copied in the www - absolutely no way.

The copyright remains with you; normally anyone can use your pics, films etc. for private purpose - but they are forbidden to take the credits.

There are 2 possibilities to choose from, when you've made any works-of-art:
1. Lock them in a drawer where they're safe, and from time to time you can take them out - but no one else can see them.
2. Put them onto some server, where they are no longer safe from copying - but the whole wide world could see them.

I for my part chose possibility 2 when I put the biggest part of my work online on my website. I had to, actually, as I intended it to be my portfolio.
I'm a proud member of deviantart since a couple of days ...
and, of course, this is a platform where many (young) people dwell and copy/paste ... if it's for their private joy, I completely agree ...

I still have the original drawings at home; there's nothing like a sheet of paper where the colours can smear, and you can smell the lead or oil; I can revive the feeling I had with every line I' ve ever drawn. (well, this goes for traditional techniques)

I am absolutely happy with the positive feedback I get, which I wouldn't, if I didn't share my work.

Feel free to visit my deviant page (link in my signature)
BTW (and the reason for my posting in this thread), I've been a Snape fan from book 1 on; I think I've made the "young-Snape-and-Lily" quite cute in my drawing (where in the books does it say he's ugly?).

To expand a bit on what Leela said here because I always found that to be an interesting loophole that fanartists have and fanfic writers don't.

Unless you are drawing canonicle scenes that are clearly linked back to the boks, if you don't use the trademarked names it can be very hard to actually take action against *some* kinds of fanart simply because wizard, castles, dragons, goblins, and such are common images.

So it is somewhat easier to sell prints ofart that started out as fanart, but then of course, you couldn't advertise it as such if you wanted to stay kosher with the laws.

Anyway, I don't mean to encourage everyone to go out and try and sell their fanart, it's just one interesting thing I've noticed about doing fanart based not on canon interpretations of the book, but on fanon ones (You know, like if I drew Remus and Peter exploring Hogwarts together as 11 year olds, unless I say Peter Pettigrew and Remus Lupin, the image would be hard to legally prove to be based on the HP books since nothing like that ever happened in the books)

And this is very different from television/comic based fanart that I do, because no matter how "fanon" and removed form anything in the TV series the art is, it still uses the visual likenesses of the characters, which is clearly copyrighted.

But with books, most fanartists have invented their own visual interpretations.
Which is one of the things I really enjoy about HP fanart btw, the sheer diversity of it!

There are some people who collect artists' work and post it on the 'net, just out of love. Sometimes they forget to add the artist's name or reference where they got the image from. Sometimes they do it without asking the artist's permission, which is unkind and unsettling for the artist.

Then there are those cases in which people pass someone else's art off as their own. Sometimes the image file is even changed, a signature removed with a digital imaging programme, that kind of thing. This is plagiarism and it is an offense! I should think we all agree that the step after this, actually making money out of plagiarising other people's work, is downright criminal. [Maybe it's] a fan who means no ill, I don't know. But through Photobucket's printing policy (basically, you can purchase a print from Photobucket of any page you can view), those artists who make a living out of posting their art online and selling prints are harmed. I would hate to think that someone else is making money out of selling prints of my work.

Some people might say "If you don't want this to happen, don't put it online!" The internet isn't safe. But quite aside from the fact that some people make a living out of this - I do seem to have a Dumbledorian sort of optimism about people's common decency, and I want to share my work with a wider audience than I have in my immediate real life, and see other artists' works. I think it's great that the Leaky fan Art Galleries and other sites offer this kind of forum. I'd like to know what people here think about this!

See on this, I find that when it's out of love for an artist, the person mentions the artist's name. It may still irk an aritst, but for me, as an artist, it's the least offensive when someone re-posts my art *and* credits it as mine with some mention of my name somewhere. I really don't mind that at all.

What I tend to find when there is no mention of my name is, the art post is not out of love, but out of a desire for cheap popularity. Example (NOT based on reality btw): someone has a Remus/Tonk shrine and they want it to be memorable. Well an easy way ia an image gallery, so they just run amuck on the net, gather up every R/T image they find, and post it with not a care in the world wh the aritst is, because the point is to have the spiffiest R/T gallery so people like their webpage so then they get some sorta popularity.
The sad thing is 90% of the time, if they'd just ask, most aritsts are fine with it. It just taks more time than I guess people want to invest in their site *shakes head*



Agreed, and it's really scary when you think of all the ways someone can use another person's art. Perhaps the worst case I've come across in the HP fandom, was the owner of Hocus Pocus had his art used as Harry Potter stamps in anther country! I never heard of the legal outcome, but I would imagien it would be very hard for a porr fanartist to do anything about that if the Music companies have trouble stopping music pirating.

The worst non-hp case, and this is smewhat recent, is a deviantart artist who had her images used at Macy's IIRC, on pants. It seems the chinese company Macy used to design their clothes and just ripped the girls tiger image off, changed the colors, and put it on a line of clothing.
IRC, the women was actually pursuing a legal case.

And that is kinda scary, and sadly, the net makes it just so very easy to do this kinda thing (which is why you should never put printable quality images on the net at the very least!)

I do agree too that they "well you can either expect it or never put your art online" is kinda sad statment. Sadder because there is some truth in it, but I wish their needn't be. I can understand the sentiment, but the maddest I ever ogt was when an art theif told me it was my fualt they stole my art since I'd let them. Absolutely NOT! My putting my art on the net is in now way making it ok to steal. I mean yesh, I risk being crashed into when I get behind the wheele of a car, but that doesn't mean it's ok for someone to deliberately take me out 0.o


That said, I also think there's sometimes some silliness involved.
For example, I see a lot of aritsts going off about peple taking their art, without premission, for icons.
Well IMHO, if you are gonna complain aobut that, then you own icons beter not contain ANYONE else's art, professional or not, and that includes TV.

Because it seems to me to be a double standerd that you can take the artistic work of someone else, a movie, a TV show, an anime image etc etc etc, but expect that no one else can ever touch your own art.
What you do to another artist, I think, you should be willing to have done to your own art.

In all of my murals I've always hidden Easter Eggs of my name (in addition to my sig and date) that I don't point out to the client. Since I paint kids' rooms, I also do the name of the child who the mural is for as a fun thing for them to find when it's done. I got the idea from Hirschfeld who always put the name of his daughter, NINA, in every characature several times. I can't believe how rampant the stealing is! Not that I think anyone I've painted for would ever rip me off like that, but you never know who is coming to a home and may take a picture etc. etc. I haven't done it on any of my fanart. I'd be astounded if anyone wanted to rip that off since I am still bumbling around with CorelDraw. But I highly recommend Easter Eggs for anyone posting their serious stuff out there, make your name part of the work as well as your sig which can be erased. Either that or put your fingerprint in there somewhere!

I have done that in a few pictures - integrated my name or signature in some small detail. Sometimes they have turned out so small they can't be seen on the scan. I always wonder if it is some consolation that I actually have the physical objects of the original pencil drawings, as opposed to digital files only.

In any case, I tend to oscillate between being incredibly blasé about the work and indignantly over-protective...

You should be over-protective! Firstly, your stuff's great (I love your Voldemort taking Dumbledore's wand). And secondly, why should someone get credit (or money!) for your work?! Art supplies ain't cheap as we all know! Seriously, I'd rather have a mural of mine painted over than than someone else take credit for it.