Geoworld and plagiarism

[Takama]

First 20

[tyrantqueen]

The first one (Acrocanthosaurus) looks to be a rip of Brett Booth's work, with the colours changed.

[Patrx]

It's quite jarring to look at those cards all together!  The art styles are all different, "borrowed" from different artists.

[tyrantqueen]

Btw, that Eustreptospondylus looks like one of Dmitry Bogdanov's.

[DC]

This is not a new problem.  Marx figures were copied by MPC and both borrowed from the Peabody Mural.  Knight and Burien art work is often copied.  The Papo Allosaurus looks like Todd Marshall's work so I shed no tears for Papo.  I do not need to mention Salvat.The convention seems to be if you modify it a little it is not a copywrite issue.  National Geographic, defends its published work aggressively, but has been called on using artists work without permission and selling CollectA knock offs.         

[tyrantqueen]

I can't find a Marshall drawing that looks exactly like Papo's Allosaurus. Which one are you referring to? I would like to point out that one cannot copyright a style of drawing (in spite of what GSP tries to do).

I believe the Papo Allo was inspired by a Brett Booth drawing.

[SpartanSquat]

Most drawings are inspired by another ones. For example: Raul Martin in his early days, probably copy Paul work.


Even some figures from Battat are inspired by the brilliant Brian Franzack


@Gwangi: I think the Troodon artists is Gabriel Lio.

[tyrantqueen]

Raul Martin's copying is pretty well known in the paleoart community. Btw, those two Battats aren't a very good example. They are not even in the same poses. You can see the influence, but it's obvious the artist did his own thing when he was sculpting them. That's an example of good inspiration. The colours are the same, but you can see the Battat sculptor put his own individual stamp on the sculpt, not copied the artwork completely.

Inspiration ≠ outright copying.

[Pinkamena]

Surely even if the pictures were only inspired by original work, the polite thing to do would be to state that and the artist on the card somewhere? Or is that being too idealistic?

It makes me sad that big companies can get away with stealing peoples' work, unless a lot of artists got together and took the company to court, nothing will happen to stop the companies using stolen art. Even if loads of artists ganged together, the company would probably get away with it. Funnily enough if an artist copies or inspired by a certain brand, the company sends them cease and desist orders quickly enough (thinking of the MLP plushies that Hasbro went banzai on) 

[Hynerpeton]

These look cool. I plan to get some.

[Yutyrannus]

Geoworld is ripping off artists' work both for the cards and the actual figures. You still want to buy them?

[tyrantqueen]

Geoworld is ripping off artists' work both for the cards and the actual figures. You still want to buy them?

She was happy to buy bootlegs of Safari's toys. She probably doesn't care.

[Yutyrannus]

Yeah, you're right. As a paleoartist though I'm actually insulted by what Geoworld is doing, they act like paleoart doesn't really matter and they can rip off anyone's work.

[SBell]

I have to say, this is really diappointing--because one of the things I like most about Geoworld is the fact booklets. It really elevates the product form just a toy to part of a true learning engagement--and if you like, creates a companion paper guide to a 3D model guide.

But if that's the case, they should either compensate or commission artists, not just do image searches and do a quick photoshop (even if, according to copyright law, any small change to an image actually makes the person who made the change the copyright owner of the changed image--it's a bizarre loophole, but it apparently holds up legally).

[Hynerpeton]

And now we can say goodbye to Geoworld. thanks.  ok probably.

[brandem]

according to copyright law, any small change to an image actually makes the person who made the change the copyright owner of the changed image--it's a bizarre loophole, but it apparently holds up legally

I'm not sure about that, in the Shepard Fairey/Hope case he did plenty of alterations to an actual photo, but it wasn't enough, true the fact he altered evidence didn't help, but he was not going to win.  For that to work I believe the alterations would have to represent a transformation of the work, altering its meaning or impact, I.e. satire, parody, etc. In this case, they took an image of the dinosaur created for educational purposes, and turned it into and image of a dinosaur used for educational purposes.  The true difficulty in this case would be proving the plagiarism, the original image on a company hard drive, artifacts from the original image, something like that.

[Takama]

I would like to point out that The mammals Cards seem to be based on the figures they made. and not someone else's.

[tanystropheus]

I didn't realize Geoworld is so popular here. What is the appeal? Besides the Guanlong, the models are more or less subpar.

[tyrantqueen]

I didn't realize Geoworld is so popular here. What is the appeal? Besides the Guanlong, the models are more or less subpar.

I don't like them either. However, I think the appeal is that they make a lot of obscure species. That seems to be the draw for a lot of people.

[Takama]

I didn't realize Geoworld is so popular here. What is the appeal? Besides the Guanlong, the models are more or less subpar.

I don't like them either. However, I think the appeal is that they make a lot of obscure species. That seems to be the draw for a lot of people.

That's the draw for me at least.   BTW sorry I have not posted more cards yet. I took pictures of the next 20, but they turned out bad so I have to retake them