can people steal your stuff off of drunk duck. i hope not. this is a great place to show your work but there are sharks out there.

people can always steal anything you put online.

people can steal your stuff anywhere...so we can't really promise you that your stuff won't get stolen. but we've never had anyone say that there stuff was stolen.

i would say just put your name on your property, keep the sketches and PSD files in case you have to prove that it is yours

I doubt you have anything to worry about.

I haven't ran into any art theift here on DrunkDuck YET. But it is possible. There is always someone jealous or someone who thinks your stuff is cool enough to whore themself to. Keep your name handwritten if it's handdrawn stuff and ALWAYS keep the original. Spread the word out that it's your stuff. Post it on multipul places. (Like I post some art here as fillers while posting it on my DA account as well.)

And it is always a good idea to report art thefts to your local friendly and hostel admins and moderators. :)

acadia
I doubt you have anything to worry about.

Days go by and I keep looking at this post thinking there is no possible follow up to it.

that kid yellow
can people steal your stuff off of drunk duck. i hope not. this is a great place to show your work but there are sharks out there.

Of course people can. And if they do, sue their asses into oblivion! Keep your sketches and PSD files like Subcultered said, and prepare to sue some fuckers if they even attempt to steal your work!

Usually though, people won't steal comics on DD. I have yet to see or hear about any comics getting stolen here. It's ok dude. Keep the evidence, and you've got nothing to worry about.

Just get yourself covered legally and not worry about it. At that point if someone steals your work, you're covered. Consider it to be like auto insurance.

StudioNFC
Just get yourself covered legally and not worry about it. At that point if someone steals your work, you're covered. Consider it to be like auto insurance.

Actually, your works are technically copyrighted to you the second you create them. All the legal papers do is show when you copyrighted. All you'd need is the original sketches and PSD files to smash someone's asshole open to Goatse proportions in court.

Also, this article will further elaborate. You own your works. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

I'd point a gun around every corner.
A metaphorical gun.
And by corner I mean page.

mechanical_lullaby
I'd point a gun around every corner.
A metaphorical gun.
And by corner I mean page.

0_o You scare me.

People may steal all of my pages that are on DD. Save it on your computer, print it out, mail it to friends, claim it's yours, I'd only be flattered. If anyone will get famous by stealing my stuff I will write a novel about it and become very rich, or just an unknown legend. Either one of those sound cool.

But... I doubt if anyone even WANTS to steal it :/

skoolmunkee

acadia
I doubt you have anything to worry about.

Days go by and I keep looking at this post thinking there is no possible follow up to it.

I put quite alot of thought into it. It covers all angles indeed =]

The answer is YES. People CAN steal your stuff. Right click, save as... and boom, they have it.

I suspect your question really is: "Can someone steal my stuff and make it theirs and not mine?" The answer is NO, if you do a few things.

1) Save originals. Sketches, drafts, computer files (PSDs), etc Save everything forever.
2) Sign your work. Even a small symbol hidden in detail will work... look at comic book cover art for references
3) Water mark your work. Put a large, unique, and barely visible mark over the majority of your work. Make is transparent enough that your readers won't notice it but apparent enough that you could show someone "look, my mark is still showing 'here'". All but great photoshoppers will show minor smudges when trying to get rid of watermarks.
4) Edit the EXIF data of your images. Most people don't know what this is. If you don't, google it. It's basically hidden data that describes the picture. Data created, author, camera, program used, etc... It's tough to edit unless you have a EXIF data editor so at least you can minimize the risk of someone saving your picture and just reposting it elsewhere.
5) Copyright work. Google how. It's often easy to do freely.
6) Develop a rapport with your fans, so they can back you up if needed. Loyal fans tend to know things like rough publishing dates and your style and can help validate your plagerism claims. Plus, fans tend to do some much deserved flamming on your behalf that you couldn't do without degrading yourself. =P

and finally, 7) Be flattered if someone steals your work. Odds are you are one of the majority of us artists that aren't making a penny off our work anyways. Let them go make a buck or some fame off stealing your work, then slam-dunk them with litigation and reap the fame and money that they did all the leg work for.

OTHER THOUGHTS:
* Disabling "right click" in HTML can help to eliminate the novice theifs from just clicking and using images.
* Make it public that images aren't allowed to be used without consent.
* Also, make it public that your consent IS easily given. They ask; they use with giving you credit; they become mobile advertisements for you.(this applies to stealing art for forum signatures and the like more than pure art theft). Sometimes people will be less likely to steal if they know they can just email you and you'll be cool with them using some of your image.

i used to be really paranoid about my art being stolen, but now i don't really care. unless they're making millions out of my art, i say go for it.

people steal my flash animations all the time and put it into their website, but i see that as a kind of promotion that reached a whole new audience. especailly russian, since that's where most of my flash films are being stolen to. heh

if someone stole my work I would be just tickled pink. I want people to steal my drawings!! *power trip* they wish they could be as awesome as me!!!!!! mwahahaha!!!
unfortunately no one wants to steal my drawings.
don't they say though, thievery is the highest form of flattery? or is that just me?

That's just you. Imitation is the highest form of flattery.

I remember once, I had someone send me an email informing me that one of my digital paintings had made its way, quite without my permission, onto the cover of a Brazilian magazine. :\ Of course, it looked horrible and was all grainy because they had just saved it straight out of my DeviantART account(and they slapped BRIGHT NEON YELLOW letters on top of a nice cold blue picture, ugh), and of course, no credit was given. That was probably the most annoying case of art theft I've been through. :\ People post my stuff on other sites now and then, but honestly it hardly bothers me anymore unless they're making money off of it.

Once I saw a picture on the internet of someone's tattoo, it was of a drawing I'd done a year or so before. Of course the guy changed the tiger's stripes to leopard spots and so it didn't look as good, but it was pretty flattering to think that some stranger wanted a tattoo of my drawing. :)

someone took a painting I did of a swordsman and put it into a fake magic card

Fortunately, I've never had anything stolen. Perhaps I'm just not good enough...

That sucks about the brazilian magazine... you didn't persue anything silentkitty? Seems like you could have taken some of their money?

AA stole my picture of Erag and put it on an Fightsplosion Trading Card once! :gem: But it's all good.

this thread inspires me!! My goal is to get good enough for people to steal my art!!

This reminds me, someone on DA asked me if I was taking my own artowkr from myself. >.> He/she claimed they had seen my art work and characters somewhere before but had lost it. Funny. XD I told the person that I have two webcomics and I post my art at a few different sites. :)

But I was flattered one day about a year ago. XD I drew somethign awesomely cool enough for someone to blog it! My mom saw it on her blog site and when I poped up to her with the actual pic she laughed. XD

acadia
That's just you. Imitation is the highest form of flattery.

heehee yeah I was being punny

well, u could always watermark ur stuff. usually i put my dA watermark on my comics. it may be tacky, but it'll work if u worry alot about that stuff

as long as Todd Goldman doesn't see your drawing, trace it, paint it and put it up in an art gallery...i think you might be safe :)

I have always been paranoid of people stealing my stuff.

Last year, when I was in the 9th grade, we were supposed to do some history project (or something), and I drew a cat. (This isn't your masterpiece, people. It had the same look as a childish doodle.) Some dude in another class saw my cat, liked it a lot, and drew an exact copy of it. Which was MORONIC, since I handed mine in before he did, and it was a 'do it in class' project. I was still mad, though. It's funny, I never met him. My teacher just put our stuff on the walls, and I saw it. Weird, huh?

And there was another time when my sketchbook was stolen. That happened two years ago. 8th grade. That same year, my cat died. Then, the next year, my grandmother died. Then my grandfather died.

Uh........ Getting back on topic...

THAT'S WHY I SIGN EVERY SINGLE DAMN DRAWING I DO!!! If you look at my comic, I sign my name, put 'dancingchaos', and I put copywrite 2007 on it. I'm going to soon going to lightly put the url in the middle of the page. I'M SO DAMN PARANOID!!! GAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!! I don't know why it bothers me so much! Someone thinks they can just walk in and take something I put hours into?! NO WAY. I'm going to go into an insane rampage!!! I mean, that person doesn't even have skill! He/she couldn't POSSIBLY do what I do, so basically, THEIR LOGIC is steal my stuff, and saying they did it!!!

Alright, this topic has angered me. Oh, but it's a good kind of anger. The 'no one can cut in front of me' anger. Yeeeeaaaaaaah...

...*ahem*...

Yeah.