Tonya Woldridge Organized Play Coordinator |
Arutema Venture-Agent, Texas—Houston |
Tonya Woldridge Organized Play Coordinator |
Berselius |
Kelly Youngblood wrote:Can an artist submit work they have done of another player's character? (On commission or otherwise.)Most definitely!
Really? What about if the commissioner owns the rights to the character depicted in the artwork?
Also, shouldn't the artist CONTACT THE COMMISSIONER and ASK PERMISSION before submitting artwork of their OC to a company for a contest?
TwilightKnight |
1 person marked this as a favorite. |
It depends on the ownership stream. I'm sure no one is advocating the illegal use of someone else's intellectual property. At the same time, the point is to recognize the artist, not the owner of the finished product. Just because you own excellent art does not mean you should be able to win a contest because of it. That award belongs to the artist that created the work. And since the rules say the artist (not the owner of the finished work) must submit their own work, it is up to them to determine which of their works to enter. That could mean making an alternate choice if said work is owned by someone else who does not give permission for its use
Wei Ji the Learner |
I have released/relaxed permission for two artists that did commissioned art of my characters to participate in this contest, if they desire.
All accolades and any awards they may attain are rightfully theirs, I've only asked for recognition that my characters were the inspiration for their artwork.
Maxim Nikolaev Venture-Captain, Russia—Moscow |
Tonya Woldridge Organized Play Coordinator |
rknop |
Hmm... from a technical point of view, digital art *is* the computer doing the drawing, as it is the computer that renders the picture, i.e. puts color on the page. The disconnect is bigger with a 3d program than a 2d paint program -- in a 2d paint program, the analogy to using physical techniques on paper is stronger than in a 3d program. However, I would argue that it is possible to do entirely human-created art in a 3d program. It's just not "doing the drawing"; it's a different set of skills, but requires an artistic eye. So, I'm not sure saying "not the computer doing the drawing" actually clarifies anything. Would 3d art be allowed? Understanding that it's computer modelling that handles how light reflects and so forth, as well as foreshortening, shading, etc. But it requires a good artist to set all of that up so it looks good.
Next question for 3d : what about reuse of other assets? For instance, textures created by somebody else? What if we start with a human basemesh that we then modify?
A lot of what people do in 3d programs is clearly original and creative, but also is clearly not as "all drawn by just one person" as somebody sitting down with a pencil or paints and a blank piece of paper. The real worry, I believe, isn't whether or not it's the computer doing the drawing. (That's a red herring; visual art designed to be displayed on a 2d surface is more than putting color on a 2d surface nowadays.) It's that a lot of original art involves a lot of reuse, and it's hard to know where to draw the line to call it enough one's own work.
I guess a related 2d question would be: what about photomanipulation? What if you start with a photo of a model, and then work on it from there? Again, I would say that this is real art, but is less obviously all one's own original work than sitting down with a blank canvas and painting.
rknop |
To help clarify what I'm asking, let me give a concrete example. I'm a little embarassed to show this, because it's really not very good (I told you I don't have a great artistic eye). Here is a rendering of my now-retired character Sarallindia.
To create this, I started with MakeHuman (http://www.makehuman.org). I spent some time getting the body and face shape I wanted. I then exported that and imported it into Blender. What this means is that (a) although I modified the base mesh, the base mesh (the list of squares and triangles that make up the shape) for the body was created by somebody else. (It's part of MakeHuman and legal to use.) It also means that (b) the skin texture, although globally colored a bit by myself, was also originally created by somebody else.
Once I got it into Blender, I changed the eye texture to match Golarion elves, and I changed the shape of the ears (which were pointed, but not long enough, in MakeHuman. I probably still need to make them longer). I spent a *lot* of time working with the hair particle system in Blender to get the hair to do what I want (and I'm still not completely happy with it). I modeled the robe from scratch in Blender; the texture for the robe (including the trim) I created in the Gimp. The bow is a 3d asset I got from somewhere else (it is Arcane Bow by Gabriel Lanzer, licensed CC-BY-3.0). (I modelled the arrow myself, as that's not a very hard thing to model. The feather texture comes from a public domain photo of a bird feather I found, probably on Wikimedia Commons.)
I also posed the model (i.e. adjusted the limbs and body and so forth, including the facial expression), and set up the lighting. I then rendered it.
So, the question is: would this be a legal submission? It's clearly mine... but it's also clearly built on the work of others.
Also, I *know* it would not come close to winning. Like I said, I don't have a great artistic eye. This is not false modesty; I *know* this isn't all that great. One can objectively create much better looking stuff using 3d modelling. Most video game characters nowadays look better than this. Or, for a RPG character example, see the paper miniatures from Arion Games ( http://www.arion-games.com/paperminis.php ).
Vinyc Kettlebek |
If everything in the image isn't created by the artist making the entry it probably isn't a legitimate entry. Using something like Photoshop or Paint to draw your character from scratch is okay. Using 3d software like Maya, Makehuman or Blender and using premade parts provided by the software or other artists probably isn't.
rknop |
You don't need compressionless, you just need lossless compression. PNG files will tend to be much larger than JPG files (factor of 10ish, although it depends on the "quality" factor in the JPG and the nature of the image). However, they will be smaller than uncompressed BMP files.
thistledown Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East |
2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I need to pick just one of them?!
I'm in the same boat as rknop though. I use a 3d modeling program (DAZ) to make my character art as both player and GM.
For instance (Not submissions, as these are scenario NPC's):
Mavius for 7-16
Valais for 5-09
Valais again for 7-17
Liz Courts Community Manager |
7 people marked this as a favorite. |
Here's our official stance on using digital tools to create portraits of your characters:
Using digital tools (such as Blender, 3D-Max, DAZ, Photoshop, Manga Studio, SAI, etc.) are acceptable means of producing your final art for this contest. Modeling assets or digital brushes are not any different than having a selection of paint and canvas at your disposal—what matters is the final form that is sufficiently unique to claim it as your own. You put in the hours to tweak textures, remodel hair, set up the pose, lighting, background? It counts.
Pick your favorite render and send it. :)
thistledown Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East |
thistledown Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East |
Tonya Woldridge Organized Play Coordinator |
thistledown Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East |
thistledown Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East |
Chris Lambertz Community & Digital Content Director |
Snorter |
4 people marked this as a favorite. |
May I echo Max's suggestion, that any future competitions be advertised in their own blog post, front and centre?
I only found out about this contest this evening. Not that I'm likely to have entered myself, as my skills are rusty and I'm pushed for time, but there are many people I know who would have jumped at the chance.
I think it unnecessarily limits the number of entrants, especially from overseas, if the info is buried inside a post about a convention they are unlikely to be attending.