Happy Belated Valentine’s Day, Everybody!

Here are some kid’s Valentine’s Day card illustrations I did awhile back. Better posting it late than not posting at all, right?

Writings about plagiarism

Professionally, I work with my wife, Eleanor. I was inspired to write a blog entry for our site about plagiarism having recently discovered an instance of such. It’s not the first time that someone has claimed our work as their own but it still stings. Before I started writing the article I reached out to one of my college design professors, Karen Kresge, to look for some perspective and help me collect my thoughts. She wrote back with a very thoughtful and lengthy response. I’m truly grateful and humbled that she could. I post it here so that I can reference it externally, in its entirety, for my own full article. Here is what she had to say on the topic of plagiarism:

I think that there are many reasons for plagiarism. And surprisingly, most of them do not stem from malicious intentions.

  1. Fan-girl mentality. Especially in light of the popularity of Instagram and Pinterest, where design ideas are shared and “liked” by the billions, it is easy to see how a designer might reach superstar status and be copied by young, impressionable designers. Sort of like how every 12 year old boy got the Justin Bieber hair swoop down to a science, these youngsters see a big shot like Seb Lester and think, “I’m gonna set up my Go-pro and get a calligraphy pen and get famous.” Or they saw Dana Tanamachi’s chalk lettering and tried their own hand at it. It isn’t a direct copy, but the “artists” are trying their best to emulate Dana’s work. They really don’t mean any harm, but instead of developing their own style, they just practice and copy their “design crush.”
  2. Mistakes. Sometimes a design will stick in your head and stay there for a very long time until it rears up during a sketch session and you think it’s your own, when really it is something you saw in Graphis or even in your Historical Survey of Graphic Design class sophomore year. I have actually had this happen myself and was scared by how close I “copied” without ever referencing the original. Thank goodness I realized before it went to the client or worse, to print!
  3. Clients. They are guided by a client to copy and they are too green to realize they should say no. Sometimes a client brings in something that they like and ask the designer to create something similar. This is unfortunate, and we hope that the designer would know better, but sometimes a designer is hungry and caves in to their client who really doesn’t understand that there is anything wrong with copying someone else work. In general most people don’t really understand what we do, and they probably think we all just copy off each other and are happy doing it.
  4. Actions and tutorials. I love actions and tutorials, they teach you new skills and tools that you can apply to your own work. But sometimes a designer sees something that they love, they find the action or tutorial and just plug in their own information. It isn’t exactly plagiarism, but it isn’t exactly original thinking either.
  5. Fear. I have seen this happen with students, they are so afraid that their own work won’t measure up, that they just copy something that they think is fabulous, sometimes subtly and sometimes blatantly. They don’t mean any harm, and I think they see it as a way out of a difficult situation. In the end it would be impossible for this kind of plagiarism to be anything but eye candy: pretty to look at, but without substance. Also part of the “fear” problem is the designer who is afraid they’ll miss the deadline.
  6. Stupidity. They don’t realize that it isn’t okay to copy. Kids who grow up using a bootlegged copy of Photoshop, typefaces from questionable sources online and images downloaded from a Google search have never been taught that copying someone else’s designs is wrong. Someone has to teach them that just like stealing a candy bar from the 7-11, stealing an image from a photographer or a layout from a designer is wrong.
  7. Laziness. This is bordering on malicious and is really pretty sad. Rather than go through the work of developing a concept and choosing colors, typography, layout, etc that will communicate their concept, they just find something that is pretty and copy it.
  8. CHEATERS. No excuses here. These folks just see something they like and take it. Ever the optimist, I think this case is the exception.

In any case, it is wrong. As an educator, I feel like it is my responsibility to teach my students how to design responsibly. Research your client, your project, your audience. Create original concepts and build and develop them through sketches and thumbnails. Hire illustrators or photographers or create your own artwork from scratch (again developing and polishing your work in stages). It is this process that will always ensure original and unique solutions to design problems.

I must also teach my students the difference between inspiration and plagiarism. They can look at Dana Tanamachi’s work and be inspired to try chalk lettering, but they’ll put their own twist on it, working on a different surface, in a different style, or scale. I like to look at the process that a designer uses to imagine concepts and use that process to look at my own design problems from a fresh angle.

Plagiarism is not a new problem, and it certainly will continue to be an issue, especially with the easy access we have to so many examples of design. Sometimes it seems impossible to come up with a new idea, it seems EVERYTHING has been done before. Then it is best to step away from Pinterest and go take a walk… listen to music… look at a building, a painting, a sunset… talk to your friends… be inspired by things that are not design at all. Above all, we must remember that a designer’s primary role is to communicate. With that clear purpose, plagiarism just can’t occur.

And what to do when we are plagiarized? That’s tricky. If it the offense is clear and will cause you or your client hardship, then I think you should contact a lawyer. Often a cease and desist will do the trick. I have been told that plagiarism is actually a form of flattery, and that I should feel honored. Maybe this is true, but that is a bit like saying, “I love your bracelet, you look beautiful in it, so I am going to take it and it will be mine so I can look beautiful in it too… aren’t you flattered that I like your bracelet?” I think it feels like I have been burglarized whether it is my bracelet that is stolen or my design. If I don’t feel like the offense is worth contacting a lawyer, I might call out the thief myself and hope that they didn’t really know that they were doing something wrong. Maybe I can educate them… maybe not. A thief is a thief and I suppose their career can’t be in a very good place, and can’t possibly be moving in a positive direction if they can’t come up with original ideas. In the end, we can always pity the plagiarist and move our own work towards loftier goals.

The World’s Greatest Hotted Dog

wghd

The World’s Greatest Hotted Dog is one of my favorite Birthday Street characters. He was created by Matt Sutter as a part of our collaborative comic endeavor with Kevin Cornell. Kevin is in the process of reposting colorized versions of all of the Birthday Street stuff and I’ve been hit with a wave of nostalgia as I page through them.

It took a little while for this little hot dog to show up in the series. In fact it wasn’t until the 148 comic! You can see here what makes him so great:
To me he’s sort of like the cartoon mascot in a commercial for cereal. He’s sassy, surprising, good natured, and a pretty cool dude. Somebody you wish was your best friend. I never attempted my own comics featuring the W.G.H.D. Probably because it’s intimidating to create one with a character that doesn’t speak. Since Birthday Street’s goal was to be a humor site, creating visual gags didn’t play to my strengths. Matt and Kevin did such an excellent job with this character and I enjoyed his every appearance.

Birthday Street In Color

pee clouds

Kevin Cornell has been hard at work adding a bit of color to the older Birthday Street comics. In other exciting news they’re now posted on Tumblr! Share them with your friends and family! The whole series isn’t uploaded yet, but there’s more than plenty to look at. TGIF!!!

Never too early to plan Halloween

That’s right, it’s never too early to plan your Halloween party!

Actually, I’ve finished some card concepts for a client this week. Working with a company that produces greeting cards means that there’s a generous lead time until that holiday comes around. It can feel a little weird working so far out of seasonal alignment. Here are a couple of fun illustrations that ultimately didn’t get used for this round of cards. Most don’t have any type treatment in place but I think you get the gist of it.

bat-beer jack-o-booze mummy-walk witch-face

Giro d’Italia Giveaway

If you’re on the ol’ Instagram, “regram” this image and tag @eleanorgrosch with #giroeleanor and your t-shirt size for a chance to win our Giro d’Italia prize pack (consists of our new Giro art print series and our Aprés Velo t-shirt design). We’ll pick a winner on May 31st on the last day of the race. Tag your neighbors and friends!

giro d'italia contest image

Mother Medusa

tiny-mother-medusa

Sometimes I like to think that I’m a bit of a metalhead. Then Eleanor makes fun of me for it and I realize how square I really am.

Lately, I’d been feeling the itch to try to do something a little bit different. Most all of my “professional art career” I’ve always been playing the role of working within someone else’s style. So I’ve been trying to make it a point to set aside time to do some personal work. Some self indulgent explorations if you will. So in a fit of feeling a little bit like a metalhead something kinda clicked.

To make a long story short, a friend of mine has thought that Mother Medusa was the most badass name for anything that ever was. It turns out to be the name of a hot rod in a modern day B movie that he had watched. I have yet to watch the film, but to me the name felt like something out of a neo-classical painting. For some reason I found myself thinking about it and a couple of visuals popped into my mind. After some image searching I found the proper paintings that I had been thinking of. Two very similar pieces by William-Adolphe Bouguereau, The Queen of Angels and Virgin with the Lily. Since both of these paintings are very religious I looked to the work of Becky Cloonan and Jeanne D’Angelo to help me “darken” it up a bit. I thought I was done with it and then Eleanor told me to put some flames on it. Now I’m just left struggling with how Medusa got pregnant in the first place.

William-Adolphe Bouguereau's "Virgin with the Lily".

William-Adolphe Bouguereau’s “Virgin with the Lily”.

William-Adolphe Bouguereau's "Queen of Angels"

William-Adolphe Bouguereau’s “Queen of Angels”

Promo art for the band "The Sword" by Becky Cloonan

Promo art for the band “The Sword” by Becky Cloonan

"Medusa" by Jeanne D'Angelo

“Medusa” by Jeanne D’Angelo