Art Theft!

Art Theft!

There is something I want to address to you all before anything else. It is an unfortunate phenomenon that occurs more frequently than any of us would like to think. This phenomenon is art theft: when an individual, browsing the internet, sees an image they like, and says “wow! I can’t draw very well, but if I take this little-known artist’s work, I can become popular and make lots of friends!” Thus, the art thief is born.
To this day I don’t know why people do it. Everyone and their mother’s dog knows: stealing is not only wrong and unjust, but illegal. People go to jail all the time for taking things that aren’t theirs. So why is it that, through a computer screen, people feel they are exempt from the law? Stealing is stealing not matter how you present it. You surely won’t go to jail for idly stealing someone’s work over the internet, but it is still wrong. However, instead of going to jail, the thief can be sued, and that could hurt one’s checkbook REALLY bad.

How do you catch it?
I’ve been amazed by the amount of times people have unknowingly left a fawning comment for a really talented artist when, in reality, the “artist” actually is stealing credit due to someone else. There are several obvious signs that leave the thief very vulnerable to suspicion, and I’ll tell you what they are.
1. Poor image quality: It seems that commonly idle art thieves are folks who (a) aren’t experienced with the pencil, (b) don’t have Adobe Photoshop, (c) don’t have a scanner, and (d) are under the age of 16. Because of this, they are not only extremely inexperienced and in many cases foolish, but also don’t know how to save a high quality image. Because they don’t have Photoshop, it seems many art thieves resort to Paint on the Windows OS. As we all know, saving a JPG file from Paint will render a very poor image quality. The original artist of an image should always have the best quality and highest resolution image available since they created it and, if they’re proud of it, will never resort the image to being displayed at low quality.
2. Difference in style or artistic ability: A very common clue I’ve seen in art thieves’ galleries is a fluctuating quality in artistic ability. One image will be an obvious Paint drawing with little to no knowledge of anatomy, while another drawing will be a heavily detailed scanned image with correct anatomy. If the person claims to have done both pieces of art, they are most likely a thief. Every artist has a different style and, unless the artist is extremely skilled, will not be able to deviate from their personal style too much (most artists will know this from experience.)
3. Signatures and dates: The saddest and most blatantly obvious clue-in to an art thief is when there are website links, signatures, names or dates clearly visible on the image. When these names differ from names on other images from the same gallery, it’s stolen, bud. How an art thief can even fathom that they can get away with stealing without first removing the signature is beyond me. Better yet, sometimes Paint users will attempt to cover up the visible date or signature with a really crummy-looking logo or even a simple black box or design. If these art thieves were smart, they’d try to make it blend in. But no.

The main motivation for an art theft is a thirst for attention. These people will always act very charming and friendly, and have funny things to say about their “own” drawings. They will always say “thank you” to people congratulating them on a job well done. And if a person asks the thief for a favor, commission, or some other artistic-related action on their part, they will respond one of two ways: (a) respond to the person and make an excuse (for example, “too busy” or “we’ll see”), or (b) ignore the comment.

How not to become a victim: watermarking
Not posting your art on the internet is the best fool-proof way to keep your art safe, but this is in no way necessary. There is always something you can do to prevent it, and even if it does happen, there are always people on your side. No true artist appreciates an art thief. Just let someone know if it happens to you. If you’re on a public art website (such as DeviantART), very likely the site has a built-in reporting service for such things.
If you have art on the internet or are considering posting your art on the internet, there is an easy precaution you, as an artist, can take to make your art secure. If you have an image-editing application on your computer, then on every image you create place a watermark. A watermark is an identifying mark (usually text or a logo) that is imbedded in an image. Outside the internet, like with stamps, paychecks, birth certificates and other legal documents, a watermark is visible through light and identifies a legitimate document. With digital images, a watermark is simply meant to prevent fraud (such as the watermarks on photos at photo gallery websites).
The best way to create a watermark is through Photoshop. You can create a layer on top of your image containing your name and/or logo on top and set the layer to “Multiply”. You can lower the opacity to make it less distracting. Take care to cover a complex part of the image or most of the image if you can so that the watermark cannot be airbrushed over by a thief.

Keep proof!
If you have a personal online gallery ANYWHERE, be sure to always know where it is so that, in a case of art theft, you always have proof. That is your strongest weapon against any art thief.

Another side note: Plagiarism
There’s another breed of art thief that, in many cases, is actually innocent. This is the case of plagiarism. Many young artists may copy a drawing they really like and post it online, saying they drew it – which is true, but since it’s not their original work it is in part stealing. They should give you credit since you are the original artist of the image they copied. Even if their image has the exact same composition but they drew every bit of it, it is still dangerously close to plagiarism. With these people, let them know that they need to give you credit, because most often they are simply unaware of the implications of their actions.

Nobody respects a liar. Don’t think that you can get away with art theft, and if you’re an honest artist, don’t think that an art thief is invulnerable. He can always be busted.