In the years I’ve been displaying art and sharing articles on my web sites, a number of people have “borrowed” my work without asking and used it for their own purposes. I am like most creatives in such instances and look poorly on the infringement. Most people are apologetic and will remove the material quickly, however more than one has claimed “fair use” and refused to apologize for the crime or remove the offending materials from their site.

As part of the copyright law, Fair Use is shrouded in mystery because it is not clearly stated what is and is not meant by the term. I remember a case where an artist was sued by the New York Times (I believe, it was years ago and my memory is cloudy) for copyright infringement for using images in a collage. The newspaper won and the artist had to pay damages.

Joan Beiringer’s Blog has this to say about the subject.

During the last year, there has been a lot of press on what is fair use in art, photography, music and the written word. Fair use is a very complex concept because the law does not provide clear guidelines on what is fair use and what constitutes an infringement. Unfortunately many people believe the “old-wives-tale” that all you need to do is change art a certain amount and you don’t have to worry about getting sued. However, what is allowed in fair use is more complicated than that…

Visit her web site to read the rest of the article and find more links to other information on copyright law and fair use.

Happy New Year. See you in 2010!

Visit this blog for the first post of a series featuring A Journey Round My Skull’s recently-acquired collection of Soviet children’s books from the 60s, 70s, and 80s.

I believe searching (and viewing) as many examples of other artists’ work as possible is a great way to improve your own work.

While my own work is focused on children’s art right now, I don’t limit my viewing to the genre. I visit fantasy artists’ sites as well as studying my favorite grand masters. I am often guilty of buying “just one more” art reference book far too often.

This week, because childrensillustrators.com is, sadly, still off-line because of a malicious attack, I went out into the wilds of the World Wide Web in search of contemporary picture book artists.

I consider myself a pretty patient person and often I am willing to wait for a page to load when it’s taking a longer than average amount of time. But, I’ve got to tell you some of the sites I tried to visit were too hard to see.

Fellow illustrators, please, if you want art directors or other possible clients to view your work and hire you, make your site easy to view. If you aren’t technically inclined ask a friend or aquaintence who is to help you minimize the load time of your images. When you load your site and open it to viewing by the public, check and see if it takes too long to load. Ask people you know to go to the site and tell you honestly what they think about it. Ask them if they could see the art. Ask them if it took a long time to load. If an art director or potential client has to wait too long for an image to load or can’t figure out how to view your images, they will go on to the next illustrator’s site and forget about you.

I’d like to say this was only in isolated instances, but it was every third or fourth site. That’s a lot of artists who are minimizing their chances for paying work.

You may have noticed a distinct lack of daily daily doodles. Between the kitchen renovation, the holiday festivities and having a book art deadline looming I find myself in a place where something had to give. Since the point of daily doodles is to make sure I draw everyday, no matter what, and I am busy on “real” art for the upcoming book. The doodles have been relegated to the back burner. (Kitchen pun intended.)

I will post rather sporadically over the next couple of months as the final push for the book art is in full throttle. No matter how well I plan time in advance of my deadlines, it seems as if there is always something to throw a monkey wrench into the works. At least I am getting better at forging forward when said wrench appears to muck up the works.

I recently received a copy (free – in exchange for my feedback and editing help) of Tara Reed’s Goal Wheel for Artists. She is a friend of mine who licenses art internationally and uses her marketing know how to help other creatives get a foot in. I was able to read through her very well crafted goal setting guide and use the knowledge gleaned from it in the production of my book art. I highly recommend the e-book download to other illustrators and writers who have trouble breaking down their goals and projects into do-able bites. Thanks Tara, you totally rock!

My drafting table is growling at me so I had better go and sharpen those pencils, kneed those erasers and make magic on paper. I’ll see you when I see you. Good energy and thoughts for deep creative well springs and accomplishment are always welcome and appreciated.

We went to my grand daughter’s piano recital last night. She is very sweet and really enjoys the musical instrument. She’ll play when ever she can. Sadly, some of the other students didn’t seem to have the same ideal. The stops and starts through out the performances were painful to observe. It was nice to spend an uninterrupted hour and a half sitting next to my hubby and the grandson and daughter.

Mudding and taping on the drywall began yesterday. The floor guy will come in when that is done. It looks like I get to paint primer on all the drywall next weekend after the mud is dry and sanded and before the floor guy comes. Then over the New Year’s weekend I can put the color on the walls. Since it will be a three day weekend, I am considering getting some stencils and jazzing up the walls in the dining room with something fancy. We’ll see how ambitious I am feeling after the floor guy does his bit. Also, how far along I am on the final pencils for my newest picture book.

The full size pencil stage always takes the longest to finish, the little changes and back and forth for approval can eat up days. I got approval on the final image thumbnail for the cover. I can’t wait till I get to lay in color. That is always the most fun part for me.

My husband has proclaimed eating out has gotten old. I am attempting to make meatballs for spaghetti in the crock pot! So far it smells good. I plan to “boil” the noodles in the microwave. Wish me luck. I have a feeling I am going to really need it to pull off a home-cooked meal without a stove! LOL

There comes a time when I wonder if anybody is actually reading this blog. It’s so hard to tell when so few leave comments. I am busting my butt to get interviews with accomplished illustrators. The spend their time answering the questions and supplying me with their art for the blog, I spend my time making it all come together. And then I send it off into cyberspace hoping people read it. Did they like it? Did they find it informative and enjoyable? Is there any point to me nagging other busy artists to answer questions and share art? I am sure I am not the only blogger who has these misgivings. I just wish there was a better way of knowing if I am having any impact aside from the occasional comment.

Getting a comment is like a getting a new shiny wrapped gift. I don’t know what is inside, but I cannot wait to find out. Most of the time I am thrilled with what’s inside the little comment wrapper of my email. I guess I am like many other creatives, or any blogger for that matter. A comment on one of my posts telling me I am making a difference in some one’s life makes my day. A lot. In a big way.

So if you enjoy the daily doodles, the advice on illustration and the artist interviews, please tell me! I do my best to answer the comments and if the comment maker has a blog, I visit and return the favor by commenting there. Sometimes I find places I want to visit again and again. Like I hope their writers are doing with my blog.

I am really missing my kitchen right now. So the doodle for today was cookies. They will be the only ones I will be making this season. Until I have a kitchen again, there will be no cookies for me.

Work on the kitchen is proceeding. Today the last of the drywall was hung. Tomorrow the men will lay on the first layer of mud and tape. Monday they will do the second layer and Tuesday the floor expert will come in to sand and patch the hardwood floor which is in surprisingly good condition considering the history of the house and all the layers of other floor it was buried beneath. After the dust has settled, I get to paint. Looks like that is what I will be doing the holiday weekend. At least the paint is green. In keeping with the spirit of the season. Not tree green, more a pale muted dusty green, but green none-the-less. I was going to take pictures of naked drywall, but I need to buy new batteries for my camera and I will have to wait until after the holiday madness subsides. I went grocery shopping in the middle of the day today and had to circle the parking lot several times before I could even find a space for the car. I’m digging in and hiding out for the duration!