To What Extent Do You Have To Change Up Art Or Graphic Design Samples For Avoiding Copyright

Can you copy a game 'idea' without breaching copyright?

Let’s use Flappy Bird as an example here.You’ve probably seen tons of knockoffs for flappy bird. Here’s why these knockoffs exist:Copyright protects expressions, not ideas.Following are defended by copyright laws, according to Wikipedia:LiteratureArchitectureMusicDramaChoreographyAudioGraphic, Pectoral, and sculptures.RecordingsAudio visual worksCompilationsDerivative worksCode is considered a literary work by copyright law in the US and Canada (In India, software is software by copyright laws). The way the code is written, or expressed, is all that matters, not what’s coded.Copyright can defend sounds and art, but not theme. The game can look similar, but, as long as it’s not the same flappy bird, it’s unprotected.But, this doesn’t really work out for the company. I’ve been told by a game developer that you shouldn’t copying something that’s already popular, because you’re already too late, but that wasn’t the case for devs who stole from something not so popular, such as:Angry BirdsPongWell, Pong was sued, right? That’s for these reasons:Pong was suing under the infringement of its exclusivity rightsIt’s unknown who would have won. The lawsuit never happened, as Atari couldn’t afford to pay the dues, so it agreed to pay $700,000

When writing a blog post, what constitutes copyright infringement?

When writing a blog post, you are constrained by the same copyright laws that cover any other form of writing (newspapers, books, song lyrics, etc.).It is a breach of civil law to copy the creative works of another, including making a derivative work. This is assuming that you do not have explicit permission. Such permission is gained by asking the copyright holder (usually the author) directly and having them grant it, or by some standing license that they grant, such as one of the Creative Commons licenses. There are exceptions that allow usage without permission, however, and the best known is Fair Use.Fair Use allows for the copying of another's work for the purposes of education, commentary or criticism. Every single time someone is sued for copyright infringement and the defendant claims Fair Use the judge/jury must make a determination if the exception is allowable by examining the four considerations.the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;the nature of the copyrighted work;the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; andthe effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.So, which uses tend to pass this test? Parodies (a type of comment), short clips of the text/movie/audio for the purposes of comment, music sampling (less than fully recognizable clips), web searches (i.e. Google), excerpts of a paragraph or two from books/articles/blogs.Care probably should be taken. Use has been allowed for copying an entire news article. It has also been disallowed for the copying of a single page from a book (because it was the most important page in a memoir). Also, Fair Use is not recognized in many countries. (The above is the US law, with Israel being nearly identical. For other countries see Fair Dealing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fai...)

Is making an 8-bit style pixel art using a graphic from a retro video game illegal?

Hello,Copyright law is really complicated, but you’re in a dark-gray area here, so I’m pretty comfortable saying that this is illegal.When you take someone else’s work and modify it into something new, that new thing is called a Derivative work.A derivative work of La Joconde, also known as “Mona Lisa with a moustache” (PD-US, File:Marcel Duchamp Mona Lisa LHOOQ.jpg - Wikipedia)In general, when you create a derivative work, you are generating a new work that shows substantial influence from some underlying work; it looks like your “pixel art” may be in that category (more on that in a second). For a derivative work, both the original author’s copyright holds and you also hold a copyright over your derivative work. However, because of the presence of the underlying work, the original author may stop you from distributing your derivative work; they still have strong control over it.Regarding whether this is actually a derivative work, your pixel art looks a bit like you’re just dropping the resolution of the original art. For a work to even count as a derivative work, there needs to be some degree of “creative transformation.” Painting on a moustache counts, but a faithful conversion to pixel art may not (and it may take a lawsuit to decide). In particular, if you are just reducing the size of the original artwork using an image-resizing program, then I’m pretty sure what you have doesn’t count as a derivative work; it counts as a minor transformation of the original work, and you would gain no copyright of your own over it.In any case, in both situations, the original copyright holder has the right to protection from you copying their material, which you clearly are. Since you don’t have their permission, what you are proposing is illegal.

Is it possible (and legal) to modify a copyrighted font for use in my book?

Original Question: Is it possible (and legal) to modify a copyrighted font for use in my book?Are you talking about using some kind of font editor (e.g. FontLab Studio) to change the shape of every character in the font? Not all font licenses allow modification.Example 1: Here's a page on the Adobe site which lists the permissions for each font in their library:Adobe Type - Additional License RightsAs you can see from the table, some fonts permit modification, and others do not.Example 2: Here’s a page on the FontShop site which addresses a question similar to yours:FontShop- If I license a font, can I modify it for my own use or for resale?Example 3: The Monotype End User License Agreement (which may vary depending on the font) states:You agree not to adapt, modify, alter, translate, convert, or otherwise change the Font Software, or to create Derivative Works from Font Software or any portion thereof. - See more at: EULA on monotype.comBe careful: Licensing a font does not necessarily give you free rein to modify it. Check the end user license agreement on the font you want to license and see if modification is permitted.That said, there may be an easier workaround:Depending on the application you’re using to layout your book, you may be able to create a paragraph style which vertically scales the characters as much as you want. Note: If you scale the letters too much, they’ll start to look distorted. This may make them look even worse than their original “squat” appearance.

Do you think copyright laws promote the progress of science and the useful arts, as they are intended to do?

To clarify, "copying" is infringing on a copyright, whether it is an artist or someone else.  Building on the work of others does not necessarily fall within the boundaries of what is considered "copying" for copyright purposes.  For the most part, it works pretty well, as I don't see too many disputes among painters that allege that someone else painted a derivative work of my painting.Copyright does promote the arts in many areas.  For example, making movies typically requires some mechanism for money to get to the people who move the cameras around, make costumes, and act.  Preferably, that money comes from people who want a copy of the movie but don't have one.  You can dismiss all of the talent and studios as being unnecessary, but there are some people involved in a movie that need to be paid in order for the movie to get made.  That normally comes from the viewers.

What kind of fonts can I safely use while designing logos?

When designing logos you can safely use any font really if you are using a program like illustrator, Photoshop, Corel Draw, etc.In those programs you can convert the type to outlines (curves in Draw) which makes them no longer a font. When creating a logo, you want to make sure, when it is finalized, that you don't have to keep recreating it. It is an identity and should be treated as such.After creation, make a vector and raster file of the logo to use for specific media mediums.However, always save the original (native) file without the text converted just in case you need to tweak it in the future or happen to lose all existing art of he logo.So choose the font you want and looks best.Worry about font issues when designing newsletters, brochures, flyers, posters, etc.