Art not made officially by staff of a manga or animation would be the best way to describe fan art. That’s much different than saying art made by people or fans since staff or authors also make their own not so official art. What would you consider that since not all of their illustrations and works may be from series they worked on? They are more than a simple fan and some images they share may also be official ones.
The fact is many people believe it’s fine to take an image off of another blog that was taken from Anime News Network that got it from an official site or announcement to post on a discussion forum. It takes money and effort to get a digital camera and scanner to produce images from real life objects not previously added to the net. This brings me to a good supporting point of how the Internet is. If you make anything creative and share it publicly on the net, what do you expect everyone to do? Not saying it’s okay to be a jerk, but not everyone using fan art has a malicious intent and the uploader should know the possibility of others using their work without permission.
Human beings like recognition and linking to their image account or site shows you support them, however, don’t assume all artists are upset when they see their work used without permission. They may simply enjoy knowing someone liked their art enough to use. This being said, not all sites have field or detail areas when uploading a image and other sites may not be focused on comments and image details. Then what?
The best the artist can do is add a watermark or sign their name and put a notice where images are displayed that you wish to be linked to or asked before having an image used. The best blogger, graphic creator, or web disigner can do is link back, ask, or ask around for the source if unknown. One thing you can learn to do is add the artist or source name when saving an image so you can remember and so that some image hosts may keep that file name in the url or details page. Or just don’t upload at all…any of you.
Besides, people like to be able to find more. On a semi-related note, this community does have a link directory for anime and manga illustration and our gallery does have a copyright area.
This is quite possibly the most reasonable thing I’ve read about the issue all day.
I try to bookmark the page the fanart came from for future reference in case I want to use the pic on a blog post.
Geez, does that illustrator link page work? I’ve “submitted” over ten links and I see no proof that you ever received them.
Twitter: anime_gerad
They have to be approved, but for some reason it doesn’t give any notification…
Since it takes time and effort to create art, it’s only fair that you link to the place where you got it from. The net is the information for a reason, data (images, content, rumors…think The Wired from Lain) travel at blitzing fast speeds. If you don’t want someone using it at all, either put a few watermarks on the image or don’t let it get on the net. Of course it’s better to host the image on your own account, otherwise you’re stealing bandwidth and that could be costing the other guy more money. Not that it’s a very serious situation or anything, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be taken into consideration.
I usually don’t post on Blogs but ya forced me to, great info.. excellent! … I’ll add a backlink and bookmark your site.
I’m Out! :)