MTG Salvation

Quote from Plaguefather

Gee, I didn't know Elesh norn had giant honkers like that... wouldn't that fall under the modifcation that you yourself said was wrongful infringement? Game, set, match.



I went and looked, it seems that that norn isn't the first copyrighted artwork you've modified... making larger breated, more scantily clad elspeths,
even Modifying Steve Argyle's alternate Liliana of the Veil artwork!

You're guilty by your own admission and from the evidence i've seen!

The sexualized alters you do AREN'T allowed by the DCI or WotC... Making planeswalkers dress more scantily and giving them bigger breasts counts as such.

ugh. are you a child? please stop with the "i can't wait to hear this" and "game set match" crap. no one ever wins an online argument.

if you had actually bothered to READ THE THREAD, you would know i already stated that what ALL alter artists do is copyright infringement. that was THE WHOLE POINT of my responses to that other fellow. i was stating that even though altering MTG cards is technically infringement, it is wizards own choice for what type of alterations to "allow".

my POINT which you seem so eager to miss is that the medium used (print, paint, marker, crayon, pencil, pen, chisel, dirt, etc, etc) to alter a MTG card is completely irrelevant when it comes to copyright law. the ONLY thing that matters is taking a copyrighted work and changing it. just drawing a smiley face on a plains is technically infringement.

PS.. Elesh Norn does have breasts, in the majority of the artwork portraying her. i felt the character looked better with them so i added them in. i apologize if the female form offends your delicate sensibilities.

Quote from Plaguefather

No, it's actually a matter of fact, allow me to explain what you're doing.

This altered elesh norn took me about 6+ hours to complete.
In order to accomplish this, I had to use several artistic skills including color blending, color matching, and paint thinning. As well as having to know how to use the paint brush to achieve the effects desired.
This is artistic value, the alter contains effects hand painted by someone who has the skills to do so.

vs.

You know how long this render took me to make? 20 seconds... I'd assume another 2 minutes to print, and another 18 to cut and stick to a card... The only skill you apply is with a cutting knife. Literally, my non-artistic mother could do this in roughly the same amount of time...

Yet, somehow, your barely 20 minutes of work somehow gets you more money than MY 6+ hours of skill intensive work shown. You know how much the paints I use cost? about $4.25 per pot, and you only get a little 12ml container of it... Yeah, I use the good stuff because you can't match the colors otherwise...

I was barely able to get $20 out of the above Norn, whereas I normally see printed cards going for a lot more than that, about 2-3X the price...

Tell me, what makes your barely 20 minutes of copy, paste, print, cut, stick more valuable than my 6+ hours of artistic skills in practice?

I wouldn't miss this for anything.

well i didn't think we were making this personal...

you may have had a point, were you not wrong. this is my elesh norn:

i spent hours altering this as well, about 10 hours in fact. and it takes several more hours to actually apply this to a card. each tiny little bit is cut out by hand, this isn't printed directly on a card.

i'm not going to argue that there aren't print alterers that do what you said, but the same could be said of paint alterers as well. some people just don't try very hard. i only meant that the medium someone uses to alter a card is not indicative of the actual amount of work put into them, nor their artistic value.

Quote from saa

I don't understand this part.

If I take a forest card, and I put a unicorn sticker on it, and resell it for $5, how does that violate anyone's copyright?

I understand how it would violate copyright if I scanned my forest + unicorn and was selling the digital artwork (because the forest part contains copyrighted art), but if I own a forest card and I own a unicorn sticker, and both are perfectly legal by themselves to resell, why can't I put them together and sell it?

because you are creating what is called an "adaptive work". you are taking the original work (forest), and altering it with the unicorn sticker, hence creating a "new" work using the original forest as a base. now, no one is every going to be prosecuted for putting unicorn stickers on forests, but it does technically still fall under the adaptive works form of copyright infringement. under the letter of the law, putting a unicorn sticker on a forest in order to change the original forest art is no different than taking an oil painting of a forest that someone has done, and painting in a unicorn of your own design. both are adaptive works, and both are copyright infringement. one is simply more likely to get you in trouble, since the oil painting will likely net you more than $5, and the original artist is more likely to press charges if he sees the changes.

EDIT: also, this only works if the item is considered art and falls under copyright. obviously it is not illegal to combine objects and sell them, otherwise we wouldn't have things like food and clothing. but if you take "art" you don't own the copyright to and change it (even if you don't sell it), that is technically copyright infringement. case in point, someone was repainting and reselling Marvel Comics statues (not in some crazy way, just doing a better paint job then the factory did). seems totally legit, but he was sued for infringement because he isn't allowed to repaint (and therefor adapt) the work.

Quote from Plaguefather

Yeah, that's kinda what I was getting at, a lot of the art that these sticker-printing guys use, is stolen.

However, nothing will get done about it because if the stolen art is WotC commissioned for a card, they'll say they'll do something, then dont... I told them 4 months ago that someone was stealing their art and just blowing it up, pasting it on stickers, slapping them on cards and making profit, and they didn't really do anything...

Heck, even Daarken lead a crusade against art theft, and it really had no effect, if companies don't pursue it, nothing gets done.

And yes, Daarken did lead a fight against a card game that stole his art, I don't remember if it was settled or not, but the guy blatantly lied to Daarken and it really grinded the artist community's gears.

I think if companies got spammed mail about these topics, they'd be more willing to do something.

the idea here is "what constitutes copyright infringement" and "what kind of infringement is tolerated?".

the reason wizards doesn't go after "print" alters is the same reason they don't go after traditional paint, pencil, or marker alters. they all fall under the same type of copyright infringement. it is just as illegal to paint and resell a Thragtusk as it is to print out a picture of Thrastusk and put it on a card. so long as they aren't creating a fake card, the only difference between the two is the medium used. whether or not painted alters are considered more "artistic" than print alters is a matter of opinion or semantics. fact is, both equally violate wizards copyright (both are adaptive works).

so then it is left up to wizards to decide what they will tolerate from their alter fanbase and what they will not. through my own dealings with them, it seems that so long as you are not creating "new" product (fake cards), proxy cards, or using nudity or overtly sexual themes, and aren't stealing art from other non-wizards sources, they don't feel inclined to go after you.

however the original point that was made, about art being taken from other (non-wizards) games or websites and being used for alters without permission, i totally agree with. i can't myself confirm that AlteredPrints is using art without permission, but i do know from experience that wizards doesn't take kindly to you using non-wizards art without permission. taking wizards art for non-wizards products is also something they would likely have issue with.

anyway, i just wanted to add my 2 cents about the whole situation.

Quote from surfkatt3216

They were fine with your alters? Huh. Interesting.

except for the anime lands i used to make, yes.

Quote from surfkatt3216

We try to stop this guy yet?
http://myworld.ebay.com/monkiesarefeedingoffmynightmares?_trksid=p2047675.l2559

again... i'm not doing anything that warrents stopping. i am already following Wizards own suggestion for altered cards. to quote the Wizards rep: "alters using art that belongs to Wizards or that you personally own are what we typically consider 'altered art', and aren't an issue."

they really only took issue with me when i was using art that DIDN'T belong to them, such as the anime lands. i was as shocked as you are.

Quote from Plaguefather

I've reported them to WotC for using copyrighted artwork on other cards, but it seems nothing has been done to stop them...

There's really no way to inform the entire community not to buy from him... His stuff isn't Tournament legal, it has been proven to be a considerable bit thicker than a normal magic card, ergo, easily identifiable in a deck of normal cards...

hey guys, feel like i should explain myself...

first and foremost, i HAVE been stopped, when i was doing something Wizards had an issue with (using art that didn't belong to them or me). i was shut down by Wizards, and then was contacted by them about what types of altered cards CAN be sold, and every alter since then has followed those guidelines. they don't seem to take issue with people using their own art or art owed by Wizards. plus they are all real cards, i don't make or sell proxies EVER.

secondly, these cards ARE tournament legal by DCI rules. it's simply up to the head judge at any event whether or not to allow them. if you actually owned any of my cards, you would know that once they're in sleeves you can't tell which cards are altered vs which aren't. i was even contacted by Steven Ulm (lvl 3 judge and creator of Orcish Librarian), and he said he would allow my cards to be used in tourneys.

anyway, i didn't mean to jump in here and start a big thing, but i did want to explain to you guys that i am following Wizards own recommendations when it comes to my altered art cards.

Quote from Gerrard"s Mom

It should actually say "If you revealed three cards with different names," not "If you searched for..." (This is a translation error, not a rules assumption.) Someone was asking about how it would check if you actually searched for the cards or not.

THIS. though, i'm assuming the english card will have the text corrected, or at the very least the rulings will state you have to reveal 3 different named cards in order to get one. since you technically could 'search for 3 different cards but fail to find 2 of them'.

Quote from Arigat

But what proof do you have that you bought this drawing. Its been 3 different people who say they comission Drake Tsui for this art. Hard to know who the real owner. And more, Drake is selling this art too. I bought it at the Montreal Comiccon a 14x8 picture of Chandra and another of Nissa.

because i am the owner of the copyright, as credited on Drake's deviantart account... James Stansell, Comicmania Customs. Ask Drake himself.

he sells prints because it is in his contract to allow him to do so. he's not selling the rights to the image, just a print...

Quote from Zhared

Let me know if you can find the artist!

With spill:

Without Spill:

hey there!

been coming here a long time, just don't post much...

um, sorry to be that guy, but could you please remove this and the other Chandra? i have no problem with people making cool proxies as long as they aren't selling them... but since i DO sell these (as real altered cards, not proxies), i'd really rather people purchased them from me rather than printing their own.

i commissioned Drake (quickilicious) to draw these for me, and the images actually belong to me.

as i said, not really against the whole "printing proxies for casual and cube" thing... but these images being here might actually prevent me from selling my alters, which was the whole point of me getting the commissions in the first place.

thanks

Quote from tommo999

I have a mate that i watch on DA, and she has just done this http://my.deviantart.com/messages/#/d5gi6oe can anyone help her do the report too? since normally when you guys do it, it does go.

reported. i really hope this guy gets taken down. he's not only stealing art from all over the internet, but selling fake cards, and using pornographic images of planeswalkers on his fakes. this person is disgusting in so many ways.

my apologies if this post is off topic

Quote from nightride

BR this with undying evil ahahahahahahahahahaha, add some snapcaster, noxious revival, thunderous blast thingie... BRu TOPDECK HERO

not sure if you got this reply yet, but he won't work the way you want him to with undying evil. the choice to take 4 damage and make you sac him will be part of the resolution of his ETB effect, meaning there won't be an opportunity to cast undying evil after an opponent has decided to take the damage. now, you COULD respond to the ETB effect, basically forcing your opponents hand at the cost of an undying evil being wasted, but it doesn't seem worth it.

still, the most amazing addition to RDW i've seen in quite a while. can't WAIT to throw 4 of these in my mono-red or G/R beatdown decks

hmm, good to know. thankfully he wouldn't have won no matter what, as my brother played Divine Intervention with Vampire Hexmage

hello!

i was playing a game last night, and a friend was playing a sliver deck, and cast Hypergenesis. He started with no slivers on the battlefield, and put down the following cards in this order:

1 Dormant Sliver
2 Harmonic Sliver
3,4,5 : other Slivers

i told him, because they all enter simultaneously, and therefor don't "see" the other slivers yet, that he will draw 1 card, and may target 1 artifact/enchantment for destruction. is that correct? or would he draw 5, and target 4 (or 5?) artifact/enchantments for destruction?

i also assume that if he had Dormant Sliver out before the genesis, he would draw cards equal to however many slivers he played.

keep in mind also that if they decide to do anything else (activate a different ability, cast a spell, or pass a phase), you could then lightening bolt them. but as the others said, if the first thing they do after casting the planeswalker is activate its ability, there is no chance to bolt it before the ability is on the stack.