And I’m not trying to knock against you, Budwin. You seem to have some real talent going into your work. I think Frankly Built probably jumped the gun in his assertion.
However, you’ll probably be hard pressed to find a lot of support. As much as people love this kind of stuff, I think a lot of people also find it silly when people fight over IPs they don’t hold the rights or license to. That’s an aspect of the argument you’ll never be able to fully set aside.
I imagine it’s frustrating, for sure. There’s a issue there at the core, of being accused of stealing work, and it gets completely sidelined by the question of the IP itself. Modeling takes talent and time, and regardless of the IP, I imagine it’s endlessly frustrating to be accused of just stealing someone else’s model. It’s extra problematic in the 3d printing space, as often people are so quick to make that accusation without looking at the models closely enough to see how tangibly different they actually are. Even with the interior of the mask you showed; not sure you should have just followed their layout, but it’s obvious enough you created yours from scratch and didn’t just pull their model into your application and call it a day. I’d dare say, yours even looks improved in a number of aspects.
That’ll always get washed to the side though in favor of the arguments that surround the IP itself and those issues.
Missing it here, in the first comments people said that the IP stuff was okay because no money was being made, Budwin pointed fingers saying that the other person was profiting and that he himself was not, which was not true. Some of us commented saying that Budwin does profit off the IP and regardless of profit it’s still not in the clear in response to the first comments.
You can clearly see that both commenters about stolen IP clearly say that they believe Budwin designed his own models.
Sure, as long as it’s given away for free, you’re right, but that’s not the case.
The customer gets it for free? yes.
The designer has received 18k boosts on designs that are mostly exclusive, they generate cash? also.
If it is lucrative it is not “free” or “fan art” anymore.
This topic is already very heavy among the 3D printing community, here everyone steals and then believe with the right to defend “their work”, the same is happening with the accounts that upload AI generated files, which are not few and unpopular, selling commercial licenses of files that legally have no copyright, nor have real way to protect them.
And I just want to make it clear, I am not in favor of anyone here. I find the work of all of these just as bad, including FB, tired of seeing how the vast majority of content creators base their work on IPs that they sell without paying licenses of any kind.
Fan art, while it has existed for decades, is still stolen IP. No matter who does it. If it looks like iron man, it is stolen. Both are wrong here. An dbith profit in some way. But Stolen IP doesn’t need to have a profit motivate to be illegal. So far no one of consequence has called anyone out over it. But it can happen. An dhas in oyhet venues.
I get the feeling most companies follow along similar principles. We can get into the weeds of the legality of it all, but I think most brands recognize the value of fan made creations and provide room for them to exist.
I imagine Marvel/Disney is aware of Frankly Built and the places he gets his models from; but all of this still exist without legal intervention. It’s all helping to sell the Iron Man brand afterall.
Long time Bambu user here, and occasional lurker. But I’ve got to throw in my 2 cents on this topic…
There will perpetually be a demand out there for the works people are already familiar with and enjoy. (EG. If you grew up with Disney characters and love them, and everyone you know is familiar with them? Then you’re going to prefer a 3D printed figure of one of them to a 3D printed figure of some made-up cartoon character that never existed until the designer created it.)
But like is SO often the case? The “letter of the law” doesn’t quite align with the intent of having the law. The smaller animated cartoon makers, for example, usually get that designers making 3D prints of their characters is GOOD for their own business. It helps build a loyalty to the core product they’re making; the cartoon series. And if they want to sell their own physical figurines, action figures or what-not? Nothing’s preventing them from doing so, with or without other people making these copies. The biggest players in the space like Disney or Universal Pictures tend to let teams of lawyers enforce every one of their rights to the letter of the law. People keep infringing on their IP because they feel it’s still ethically/morally ok to do so, given the circumstances. (They know in their heart that their printing off several of their own interpretations of the Enterprise from Star Trek isn’t really hurting Universal’s ability to profit from the franchise.)
It’s unlikely a small hobbyist content-creator can either afford or cost-justify paying what they’d be expected to pay, just to print off an officially licensed Lord of the Rings item, or the like. Those prices are based on letting someone mass produce the stuff. That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be able to ask a few bucks for their effort designing it up. It just means everyone involved understands the reality of things… the original IP holder isn’t offering a reasonable/cost-effective option for the 3D print hobbyist or small business owner to legally make anything based on their work.
No legal requirement, but it’s an ethical question at the least!
If you refuse to allow reasonable use of your original work for things like fan art, yet you place a high arbitrary price on what you demand for a person to copy the work? You’re being just as unethical as store owners who price gouge on goods when they’re in high demand. It’s probably legal but no surprise when people complain or even boycott your store for doing it — and try to find workarounds.
Just here to say I widely despise the culture on makerworld of not allowing remixes on models. There is one way for this community to thrive and it is through the free and widely shared usage of models. Making your models paid or restricted goes against everything 3d printing is about.
