The Road to Manga - Copyright 101

1. About this course: Did you ever wanted to create your own manga but got worried about copyright? Or are you trying to find out what you can and cannot do with references and other influences. Then this course is for you. My name is Auger ageist ski from Studio AutoAI. I have published manga professional int. I have been in love with Manga for many, many years. In this course, I want to teach you my techniques. While I'm not a lawyer, I have worked at two law firms and have taken a course in media law during my university years. Knowing about copyright helped me quite a lot in my work as a manga and freelance illustrator. And while this course cannot replace a deep dive into the topic, it will provide the basic information for those who feel lost when they hear the word copyright. In this course, I will talk about copyright, about what can be protected and whatnot. How long does the copyright protection last? What the public domain is, where you can register the copyright. What to do when others want to use your work or want to hire you to create their manga. I also will talk about what to do when you work is stolen. 2. What is Copyright?: You might have heard about copyright on different occasions. But what does it really mean without all that lawyer speak? Copyright is the ownership of a work by its creator. Bit literary, artistic, educational, or musical. It exists as soon as our work is created and it is not required to be registered, but you can register it for additional protection. The copyright gives the owner the exclusive right to copy and distribute the work or allowed to use it by somebody else and anybody who tries to use of published it without your consent does so illegally. In order for our creative work to be protected, it needs to have an actual form for a literary work that this text for an artwork that is a drawing. There are certain standards whatever work has to fulfill in order to be protected, such as originality or its actual existence. The idea alone is not enough. There are differences between the standards, however, based on the location where work is published, which is why I would suggest to look into the copyright law in your country being formed. Knowing your rights protects you from getting exploited. While there are differences between the countries, it doesn't mean that your work is not protected in another country. That is what the Berne Convention and the US is CR4. The Berne Convention is also known as the Berne Convention for the protection of literary and artistic works, is an international agreement governing copyright. It was first accepted in the Swiss city of burn in 1886. It was originally assigned by a 179 member states. It syncs to that Berne Convention that the copyright is assumed as existing as soon as the burgers created, instead of requiring separate registration, it also requires that the other members recognize the copyright of the other countries. The UCSC, also known as the Universal Copyright Convention, was adopted in another's was city, the city of Geneva in 1952. Along with the Berne Convention, it is one of the two principal Conventions protecting the copyright. It was created as an alternative to the Berne Convention for countries that disagreed with some aspects of the Berne Convention, but still wanted international copyright protection. Another Copyright Convention, the Buenos Aires Convention, was signed in 1910 and is a special agreement between the US and the Latin American countries. Today, it is part of the Berne Convention, and the US is c. And the US, for instance, has its own Copyright Act of 1976. There's also the WIPO, which currently has 193 member states. It was created to promote and protect intellectual property world-wide. At less but not least, there's the DMCA, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, which manages the copyright in digital domain. But I will talk about that later. I know it's a lot of different terms. So what does it mean for us? So let's say you create a novel and illustration or a manga. You, as the creator own the copyright to it. And only you can decide what happens with it. Only you can make the choice whether to publish it yourself or to work with a publisher who will publish it on your behalf. For that, you need to give the publisher the license to publish it. In some countries, such as Germany, there's even a term for it called lute song site. The right of use, the right of use of the permission that you can give to a person or a company to use your creation. Without it, they cannot do anything with your creation legally. When working with a publisher, you sign a contract that includes which writes you are giving to the publisher for which amount of time. And it can be exclusive or non-exclusive. Exclusive right of use means that you are only giving it to a certain person or a company and nobody else. For instance, when you sign a contract about manga creation with a publisher, you are typically granting them an exclusive right of use. Non-exclusive right of use means that you can grant it to different people or companies. For instance, companies independently might contact you and ask you for an existing illustration to be used. Merchandise and they're parallel. You can grant each of them the Non-exclusive right of use. Generally, exclusive right of use should be paid better. Also, the right of use is not permanent and can only be given to the users known at the time that the contract is set. A publisher, for instance, cannot demand the right of use for a technology or use the does not yet exist in this unknown to them. But if you want, you can give them that right as well. But you can also limit the duration of the right of use that your grant to a publisher I accompany, for instance, you can set it into the contract that you are giving them an exclusive right to distribute your work for a limited amount of time, like five years. After this five years, the right of use returns to you and they either have to renegotiate and extension, setup a new contract and pay additional fees. Or you can give the right of use to a different publisher or person in the US instead of the right of use it as a copyright transfer agreement or a copyright assignment agreement in which the copyright is transferred from one party to another party. That way, For instance, in case of a game company, An artists can be hired for asset creation and the rights of the assets are transferred to the game company and set of licensing. So what is the difference between a copyright assignment and copyright licensing? In the case of an assignment of copyright, no longer control over how the rights are used by the person or the company. In case of the license, you have ownership of their rights, but allow the person or the company to use some of the rights without fear of copyright lawsuit. But in many countries you cannot legally transfer the copyright from the creator to another person or company. So the corporate remains with the Creator. While in the US, you can also, when an employer hires an employee to create copyrightable work, that employer is by default the owner of the copyright. But in many countries, since the copyright cannot be transferred, only economic rights are transferred. So make sure to check out which copyright laws are applied in your country and which writes can and cannot be transferred. Google Wikipedia, as well as the legal publication regarding laws in your countries are your friends until usually available online. Also, you might have come upon the notion that because something has been uploaded to the internet, it can be used by anyone who wants it, but that is not true. In fact, most pictures on the Internet that copyrighted, except for those which are part of the public domain or have been uploaded. That the Creative Commons license, with the stated permissions that people can use it, Everything else is not free to use and should not be used without consent. Because technically, the copyright owner could sue companies such as Facebook, reserve for them the Non-exclusive right of use in order to be able to host and depict images on their platform at all. But that doesn't give permission to a random Facebook user to take content on the site and posted as if it was part of the public domain. And I will explain the topic of the public domain in Creative Commons license later. 3. What is protected and for how long?: In order for work to be copyrighted, it needs to be creative and original. Theoretically, even the drawing created by a child is protected by copyright, but not everything can be protected. For instance, an idea cannot be protected, but the execution of that idea can, let's say two artists draw the same house. In the first case, artist a drove that house and artists be copies. The drawing, the work of artist a is protected by copyright. While the work of artists B cannot. And they just committed copyright infringement by copying the work of artists a in the second instance, are just a, an artist be, draw the house from live independently. While the idea, the object, is the same, both works enjoy copyright protection. Same can be said if the artists had drawn the same person or a story. Let's say two or more artists draw a manga with the same premise. By the way, our premise is a short description of a story that can be told in one sentence. It describes the situation that drives the plot. So two artists follow the same premise in their manga. Do each of them manga enjoy copyright protection? Yes, because the premise is the idea of a story. And while the idea of the story might be the same, just by the virtue of their different experiences, choices of characters, designs, dialogue, scenes and endings. The stories will turn out different. For example, Pocahontas and Avatar follow a similar premise, but are very different stories. And I cannot count the number of Cinderella type stories out there. The same can be said about designs. The idea of a character design cannot be protected, but the execution can, for instance, creating a copy of a seller moon design is copyright infringement. But if you were to draw a different type of school uniform and combine it with a different style of JRR, then it would enjoy its own protection unless you copy the story as well. However, if you create your own magical Goliath story that has its own world and storyline and design, then it is not copyright infringement, but didn't peach such a case. They also have GRS and outfits akin to sell our uniforms from Sailor Moon, but they are different enough to be considered original. You have to be careful when drawing a line between inspiration and copy. If the works have too many similarities and the source is clearly recognizable, then it becomes a copy and your risk committing copyright infringement. But if the derivative work is different from the work that it was inspired by, then it enjoys its own level of originality and thus protection. Like with the design of weapons, It is said that this sort of gods from Bismarck popularized the use of oversized weapons, which are now common in manga, anemia, and games. If you copy the sort design, it is copyright infringement. If you take the idea of oversized weapons and applied to your own sorts, guns, kitchen knives, whatever. It is original and enjoys its own copyright protection. With images. It depends on the level of originality. For example, if you combine different elements from different images, the outcome becomes its own unique blend that can enjoy copyright protection. And I'm not talking about tracing. This is also applicable to styles. When you're starting out and are experimenting with styles, you could combine different style elements from different artists and create a new style that looks different from the style that inspired to you. Use it long enough and it becomes your own style. So how long does the corporate last? The copyright has an expiration date, but don't worry, it happens long after the creditors debt. The amount of time that has to pass depends on the country of creation. In some countries, it is 50 years, in others, at the 70 years in Mexico, at this even 100 years. That means before that time has passed, the corporate still belongs to the creator or their estate represented by their spouses or descendants. You cannot do anything with their works without their permission. So what happens when these 50 or 70 or a 100 years are up? Then the work becomes part of the public domain. That works in the public domain have no more exclusive intellectual property rights. This is why there are so many different editions and translations published of classics. But there is typically only one edition published by one publisher from the modern writers that this unless derived us which publishers, and they are now two editions out there, published before and after the switch. 4. Creative Commons License: Does that mean that all works have copyright and you have to wait long after the grantor has died in order to use the work. Now, which is where the Creative Commons license comes into play. Basically, it is a license issued by the copyright owner in which they waive their copyright and allow anyone in the world to use their work in any manner that is consistent with the license. Creative Commons license, also known as CC Zero, allows the work to enter the public domain and be used without crediting for commercial or noncommercial use. There are other licenses available there, seven, and some require attribution. Others prohibit commercial use, so you have to be careful to use only materials that has been explicitly uploaded under the Creative Commons license. Or as in the case of the attribution license, credit the Creator when they use their work. What type of license applies is usually stated in description of the work online and do not use Google images. Just because Google displace you images does not mean that they are free of copyright. You cite that specifically have content that is uploaded under the Creative Commons license that just pixels. People uploaded the photos there, which can be used for free for personal and commercial purposes without attribution. But of course, you can also buy a license to a photo on such platforms as I stock or from the Creator. People and companies sell image and acid parks for all sorts of purposes, where you obtain the license through your purchase. 5. Cease and Desist Letter: A cease and desist letter is a document which warns an individual or a company to stop performing a certain activity, such as using your work without your permission. Basically, it's a warning that unless an activity stopped by that line said in the letter, actions will be taken, such as suing or issuing a DMCA takedown. You can use a cease and desist letter to threaten a lawsuit, or you can make a licensing offered. That means if the person or a company want to continue to use your work, they have to get the license agreement with you and pay your fee. Cease and desist letters are often the first step to a lawsuit. So if you discover that a person or company is using your work without permission, it often makes sense to send a cease and desist letter before taking other actions, provided. You have an actual address where you can send it to, which is not always the case on line. As I mentioned before, a cease and desist letter give somebody performing an illegal activity, a warning that should they not stop what they're doing, there might get into trouble. And you will consent a cease and desist letter. It does help to have the advice of an attorney about whether the cease and desist letter have married and what rights have been violated. A ground for sending cease and desist letter is, for example, copyright infringement, which is useful to know for artists like us. But if you cannot afford an attorney, you can find cease and desist letter templates online which are applicable for your specific needs. 6. DMCA Takedown: The DMC, or Digital Millennium Copyright Act, regulates the copyright online for creators lack us. The MCA's is really useful. Not only does it offer protection of our works, but it also offers us a so-called DMCA takedown. Very can issue a takedown of images, text, videos, audios, or products online when you work has been used without your permission. Some services, they offer a free some come with a fee. However, DMCA is a lot cheaper than hiring a lawyer, and it also works a lot faster. They do it by going to the service providers of the infringing parties and are bringing the hammer down from the top. Typically, service providers have a close in that terms of services or the TOS that prohibits criminal activity and copyright infringement is such a criminal activity. So if an online shop uses your art on merchandise without your permission, DMCA take-down is likely not only going to remove the items from the shop, it this likelihood that the shop itself also gets removed as well for violation of terms of services due to copyright infringement. Dmca takedown can be issued when the person or the company that you sent a cease and desist letter did not react or when you don't know who they are, or if the person or company not only ignored your requests to have your work removed from the side or their shop for whatever reason, you will be surprised how many people are completely clueless about copyright. And think that finding an image on Google or Facebook give them the right to do whatever they want with it. They have this notion that because you publish something on line, makes it free to use for others, which is not the case, unless you explicitly published it under the Creative Commons license. If they are on reasonable, you can make DMCA takedown reason it for you with the service providers that they use. However, I'm not saying not to hire a lawyer. Dmca protection and DMCA take-down is just a cheap solution for when you want to go after copyright infringement quickly without paying thousands of dollars. Because a lawsuit can be a lengthy and costly endeavor. And I would recommend only to take the road if it's really financially sensible. 7. Copyright Registration: In most countries, you own the copyright by creating an artwork, and it is not necessary for you to register it. However, you have the option to register your work with the electronic copyright office on the website of the Library of Congress in the US. After your application has been examined, they will send you a certificate of registration. This can be useful because it creates a public record, right? And if somebody infringes on your work and the case goes to court and you when you can collect statutory damages and attorney's fees, you do not even need to live in the US to register your work with the US Copyright Office. And the work is also protected not only in the US, but also in countries that have copyright agreements and treaties with the US, such as the Berne Convention and the copyright protection after registration, less after your death for 70 years, or in case you publish your work on the soil or new, or it does some work for hire. It lasts for 95 years after the publication date, 120 years after its creation. Some people in the past when in a different direction in order to create a physical proof of copyright. For instance, they make a copy of the work and then mail it to themselves. Then they store the envelope away without opening it. That way, the postal stamp provides a proof of when approximately the work has been created. Nowadays, digital files of our work have information about when the work was created or when it was edited. However, mailing a physical copy to yourself, as well as registering the copyright with the corporate office might still be recommendable as an additional layer of protection. In case of a lawsuit, these are important proof that you are, in effect, the copyright holder as a predates the use of the infringing party. Plus in case of traditional works, you also have the original physical work to prove your claim. 8. Use of your work by others: When somebody wants to use your work, you have to decide whether you want it or not. Ask them what they want to use it for. Whether the US will be personal or commercial or non-profit. In case of commercial use, it is important to know whether they want an exclusive license or not, but that the US will be limited to a certain time period and how wide the distribution will be. Basically, I use on a magazine cover that test millions of subscribers or buyers will be priced differently then on the cover of a menu at a local restaurant or whatever they use and its details, it has to be written down and colored by a contract. In just because somebody license or work for private use doesn't mean that they can use it for commercial products, or that when somebody license of work to be used on their website doesn't give them the permission, the printed on T-Shirts, unless the contract that you set up with them covers it. And of course, as the copyright holder, we have the right to refuse work over them. 9. Advance Payment VS Royalties: When you discuss terms with that person or company that wants to use your work, you have to determine whether you want to have an advanced payment, royalty percentage or both. So what's the difference? In case of an advanced payment? You are paid a flat fee of money, sometimes in several pieces based on the milestone delivery said in the contract and displayed to you before the project is published. In case of royalty payments, you get a percentage from the sales. Art licensing usually has a royalty range between three to 10 percent. In some cases it is up to 15 percent. Personally, as a manga artist, I would recommend to opt for the advanced payment or advanced payment plus royalties instead of pure royalty payments. That way, you get paid for the project while you are working on it at not after you have completed it. I mean, you have got to eat. And also there is the issue of trust and the ability to have insight into the sales thing is when working for publishers or our company, it is really difficult to get insights into their books and see how many products were actually sold. I had a friend who create designs for a company without a contract. She was supposed to pay it and royalties. The company produce merchandise and did not give insight into the sales of merchandise that they produced of the three years of begging them to pay her, they pay tear 50 Euro, which is around 56 US dollar. And she was just too poor to hire a lawyer to get insight into their books. Many manga publishers work with advanced payments and some at royalty payments on top. This was the case with the publishers that I've worked with. Common method is also royalty with advanced upfront. Meaning you will get an advance upfront which will later get deducted from the future royalties. Also, there is the option of GM AR, which means guaranteed minimum annual royalty payment. Read the company you are working with promises to pay you a certain amount at the beginning of the year regardless of how well, it says during the year, the earnings exceeded what was paid in the beginning, that difference will be paid at the end of the year. Although personally, I wouldn't get into royalties without having a lawyer who looks over the contract. Royalties involve a lot of different specifics and uses. You really need a legal expert to navigate that legal jargon. It is much easier to work with. Advanced payment. Alloy can also help you arrange all audits of the royalty income so that you or your representative have insights into the books of the company you are working with. They can also help set and writing what will happen if an audit uncovers an error. For instance, that the company that only has to pay the different but also covered the cost of the audit and cover legal fees in case of a lawsuit. So how much money you can earn with your work depends on you. Just be aware that commercial illustration prices can range between 500.3500 or more. You can ask for less, of course. But I really wouldn't recommend to go below $100 phone illustration. In case of manga, I have seen patriots anywhere between 30 and 100 and 50 or more dollars per page, depending on the artist. And as I have already said, I would not recommend to opt for royalty payment exclusively. I know there are a lot of writers looking for artists to draw their manga and promise a cut of 15 percent, 25 percent, or 50 percent in case the project ever makes money. But that is just unreliable, particularly when it's the first project. And 50 percent of 0 US dollars, it's still 0. And you might end up spending a year or more working for free. 10. Lawsuits and Legal disputes: I thought that that might be an interesting topic for you to look into some recent and less recent copyright lawsuits in disputes. Once that recent case in Wolff, the Berlin artist Jonas your DKA and Aaron Carta. Yes. That Aaron caught that the younger brother of Nick Carter from Backstreet Boys. So what happened? Unesco decay, also called Jojo greater than illustration titled brotherhood, depicting two lions in January of 2020, aaron Carta, use that illustration to promote his foodies on social media without permission from your nose and without attribution. And after Jonah's reached out via social media to Aaron and quite politely pointed out that his work was used without permission. The reaction from Aaron Burr's quiet, nasty. In the end, you just took Aaron to court. And after 1.5 years, Aaron ended up paying $12,500 as part of a settlement. So where did Aaron Carta go wrong? First, he did not ask permission from the university or DKA. Second, he did not credit him as the artist. Cert team did not take the image down of debt, was brought up to his attention that he used it without permission forth. He did not try to reach an agreement with the artist. 5, insulting and taunting the artists for month of our various social media channels. Another interesting case is the Da Vinci Code trial. You have probably heard about the Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown, be it through the book or the movie or both. But few probably remember that there was a copyright lawsuit involving it. In 2006. The right AS Michael Bay agent and Richard Lee had sued Random House, the publisher of The Da Vinci Code in the UK. They alleged that the Da Vinci Code infringed upon their book, Holy Blood, Holy Grail, which deals with a similar topic, namely that the Holy Grail is a person, namely the descendants of Jesus and Maria Magdalena. In the end, the lawsuit failed. But why did it fail? First is the topic of idea versus execution. It was proven that Dan Brown used and reference Holy Blood, Holy Grail in his book. But Holy Blood, Holy Grail was not a book of fiction. It was a book of nonfiction. Also. Some referred to it as pseudoscientific for good reason, and it just followed the same idea. Basically then Brown took the agir of a nonfiction book and then wrote a fiction book, but with a different execution. Second, then Brown never tried to hide the source of the information. In the fact, Holy Blood, Holy Grail is mentioned in the Da Vinci Code even more, the name lead teaming is a reference to the authors, with D being, being an underground for beige and 3. The content of the keeping lectures by the book Holy Blood, Holy Grail is mentioned and praised in the tipping lectures. The term that refers to the conversation between Robert lengthen and lead teaming about the history of the Grail. A lot of the content is not taken from Holy Blood, Holy Grail. For example, the opposite day as valid the da Vinci themes are not from Holy Blood, Holy Grail, nor is the name of the daughter of Maria Magdalena mentioned anywhere in the book. In the end, Dan Brown used an idea for his book. And as mentioned before, an idea cannot be protected only the execution can. In 2005, the Japanese manga artists UK sued sue, went on hiatus after it was proven that to appear serious, they're subject to plagiarism, has serious flower of Eden or Eden? No, Hannah was removed from the stores and taking out of print y here, serious silver was canceled after she was found guilty of tracing. She published an apology and resumed her career two years later and she actually better to herself and her next work to haha foo went on to win manga award and received live action films and an anime adaptation. So where did she go wrong? Reference versus copper versus tracing. It is one thing where you reference the idea of an image. The idea cannot be protected like a pulse. If there's another way you copy an image, a copy stays very close to the original, albeit with small variations in then there's outright tracing. In case of tracing, you can actually lay over the images. And unless you own the source material, for example, because it is based on your own drawings, are photos that you shot or images that you have licensed, or images that have Creative Commons license than tracing is a big no-no, at least in terms of commercial use. Some people trace for private use and for training purposes, but that does not concern the public or the law. It is an irony that slam dunk got into the spotlight for plagiarism just after UK sued Suger, got in trouble for plagiarizing the basketball a theme in Aden no, Hannah from slam dunk. The issue was that the cortico noir used photos of NBA players for slam dunk. While you cannot copyright poses, photo still enjoy a copyright and copying them, or probably tracing them as problematic. And while there was no legal fall out for vehicle Illinois, many people were still really disappointed. Nixon wins, the son of Gene Simmons from the band Kiss, got into trouble in 2010 regarding his comic incarnate, which was accused of having plagiarized character designs, expressions, poses, plots, segments, and fight scenes from bleach as well as from other professional and amateur Artists. Ultimately, the publisher was forced to stop production due to vegetarianism allegations and where quite massive. Just see for yourself. There is quite a history of using fashioned illustrations as references for manga, such as by now good The QCI, Yukihiro Takahashi, or by Hirohito Iraqi, whether one gets into trouble is often decided by where you draw the line with images. Copyright protection is dependent on a level of originality. But sometimes the question where to draw the lines between inspiration, reference, or copying this ad debate for the courts. And sometimes it's also a matter of luck. My suggestion will be, if you think about copying art from other artists for commercial purposes, don't do it. It's just not worth it. At best, people will be disappointed in you than the Meta comes out to light as it's usually does. At first, you get your career ended and your projects canceled, or even you get sued. If you need to use references, don't blatantly trace images that you have no rights to. But if you shoot photos of yourself or by asset packs, then you can use them without worries. Also, many kids and 3D models are fine to use as well. So why take the risk and possibly up and your career. 11. Contracts: Do you really need a contract or can you just have an oral agreement or an email from what I have seen during my time working at law firms, having even a simple contract was better than, for example, having screenshots of e-mails or a statement of an oral agreement. So I really would suggest for you to have at least a simple contract. Publishers and companies typically have their own contract that they can give you. But when they don't, it's good to at least have you own it, this uninsurance for both sides. So y, for one, it will filter all its cameras because those are typically allergic to contract and do not want to sign anything binding. When somebody who pretends to work with you refuses to sign any kind of contract, Then that is a major red flag. Also taps you to have written down description of what the project is, about, what the terms of the project are, what the deadlines are, how the payment is handled, what the work is going to be used for, which rides you are passing on, what happens if the contract is terminated? Of course, it named the Pardis and provides contact information. And that way you have a record of what has been discussed and the contract doesn't need to be complicated or have a lot of lawyer speak. There are many free contract templates available online for all sorts of uses, but that will include a template that they use in their attachments. You can expand it or adapted if you are commissioned work demands it. 12. Invoices: Before payment, many companies demand invoices and it is good if you can send one. The invoice provides you and your client with a record of sale and offers a verification. In some countries, invoices are needed for tax purposes, boss, for that client and for the person they are contracting to perform a certain task. In practice, using invoices increases the speed with which you get paid. So I really suggest for you to use them, I will add that template for an invoice and the attachments which you can adjust to your needs. But you can find invoice template online. You might want to look into the invoice template that are applicable to your country, since there might be specific rules which do not apply elsewhere. Also, in many countries, in order to be legally allowed to send invoices, you need that text number which you will have to request from the Tax Office. 13. Class Project: For the class project, I want you to check the copyright law which applies a new country, as I mentioned before, knowing your rights helps to protect yourself from being exploited. And it is also helpful to know what pitfalls to avoid, which are specific to your country, such as what do you need to be able to issue invoices? Do you need to register yourself and what other things might be relevant in your country that are not relevant elsewhere. Typically, this information is available online as well as at the tax office. So good luck. 14. Conclusion: I hope that I was able to give you an overview or the topic of copyright and provide you with a map so that you can navigate the jungle of the rights and legal pitfalls. Never forget that you are secreted a half Friday and that you can decide to negotiate what is to be done with your work, particularly when you are partnering up with companies or publishers. So good luck on your journey.