Do illustrators always copyright their artwork and should it be a good idea to do so?

Question

And can I copy right a photomanipulation of an image from America's Next Top Model or not?

Answer 1

If you're using art from someone else,no you can't copyright it unless you've got permission AND your version is far enough different from the original to not interfere with payments the original artist is getting for their work.

Your own work is technically copyrighted once you put your name on it and the c in the circle (symbol for copyright) plus the year. If you want to officially copyright it for official use, you compile a group of your work, or the individual item, and send in the paperwork and $35 to the copyright office. They process it, give you a number and send the paperwork back to you (in 9 months, there's a lag time on it now thanks to 9/11). You're legally covered soon as your forms are in the US mail.

Most artists do group portfolios, so a number of designs are all registered at once for the $35 fee. Cartoonists do a group filing of one year's work, songwriters do groupings of songs, etc. It's up to you.

But photomanipulation is touchy, the original art isn't yours and you can't copyright what already belongs to someone else, especially without their ok of you using their work. If you don't know who took the origional shot, you contact the studio of the show and ask. If you don't, and go ahead and use it anyway and someone alerts the show, you're going to have lawyers on your *** pretty quick and they don't take prisoners. I got a cease and desist letter from the lawyers of Calvin & Hobbs artist when I made and sole TWO Hobbes dolls at a science fiction convention one year--the letter came 3 weeks after the event..... they were nice about it. The Disney lawyers would not have been that nice. Paramount is the same way, hardass.

Answer 2

The answer to question number one is that depends. The answer to question number two is no. There was a case in the 1980s where TV Guide hired an illustrator famous for his very linear and stylized illustrations to do an angela lansbury cover. A photographer sued for infringement and won which, given the illustrator many of us thought was unfair but the law is clear: unless your photomanipulation is utterly unrecognizable, copyright belongs to whoever owns America's Next Top Model.

In theory if you have a copyrightable work it is protected by copyright and you can just slap a notice on it. In practice unless you register it with the copyright office (which here in the us costs a little over 50 dollars) you probably won't be able to prove damages in court and whether you have registered or not, there have been enough suits, some even frivilous, so if you put your copyright on something and try to sell it most markets will just return it because of liability issues.

Established illustrators can and will copyright their artwork because that enables them to resell it.