Using photoshopped images from good on products.

[funmaker]

I have been thinking about making some t-shirts to sell. I found an image on google and changed it quite drastically using photoshop. I was wondering if it would be illegal to use this changed image on my shirts. Sorry if this is a bad place to post. I'm new.

[Atom]

*moved from Marketing Forum*

[G10]

Sometimes it can be an issue and if they catch you doing it, they may try to push for the profits on that specific product, also you may have to remove them if they are listed on a site so be careful.

[ewomack]

Unless you can prove it's a parody, altering copywritten images violates the right of "derivitave works." Copyright holders have the right to keep you from making derivative works of their material, especially for profit. Your only defenses in court would be fair use parody or fair use transformative for "the good of society."

Personally, I wouldn't do it. Make your own images. But I'm not your lawyer, nor would you want me to be.

[Cricket]

If it isn't yours, don't use it.

Respectfully, I have never understood why people think it is okay to take something that is not theirs and then feel that by making changes they now own it and can sell it. If you could have created the image without their photo, then why use it? It's not yours.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DMCA

[Taltos]

As a web designer / developer, you have to love the DMCA!!!!!!! I have had to use it as a "big stick" a few times.

[ewomack]

Yes, the DMCA played a role in saving the internet. A few cases involving images from Playboy led to big fines for ISPs and UseNet servers. If those had remained law the whole notion of an ISP may have become monetarily infeasible. Luckily they were overturned, and the DMCA nailed the final jelly to the door for such cases. It also declared that transitory routing was ok in terms of copyright. Now an image sitting in a router for .0034 nanoseconds doesn't imply copyright infringement. At one time it could have.

Three cheers? Ummm.... Two cheers? Bronx cheer? Anyone?

[Forsh]

The term derivitave works is the correct one, from asmp:

Which images can be copyrighted?

Several things must be true in order to copyright your photo:

1. The image must be original (in the sense that it was not copied from someone else and represents your own creative expression). If you make an exact copy of something like a painting or another photo, your copy cannot be copyrighted because it is not original.

2. You must not have signed away your rights to the image, whether through a “work for hire” situation, an employment contract, a contract that assigns the copyright to someone else, or other types of written agreements (such as a purchase order with work-for-hire provisions in the terms & conditions).

The original image belongs to the creator and he/she is the only one who can make a derivitave work, unless they sign away their rights.

Now, if the creator of that image you wish to use has registered it in the Library of Congress and finds out, the penalty starts quite high, and justice is pretty clear-cut in these cases....

[ryukenden]

Simply contact the image copyright owner and he or she might agree free or at a fee for you. It will keep you peaceful in your mind.