Civ V stock image Scavenger hunt

Well I know it's sort of easy to just shrug it off and just move on with our lives, and sort of give Firaxis a free pass on this one. But hypothetically, what if you were one of the many photographers that took any of the pictures in question?

Try to think if someone took your work, your original work, and created another piece that it's pretty much the same framing, composition and has the same semantic. They are not creating something completely different with it: it's not a commentary, it's not a parody, it's exactly the same thing you took a picture of, but sneakily made into a drawing that looks exactly like your photo.

Now imagine that not only they took your work, but they didn't asked you first if this was ok, they didn't source that this was your original work to begin with, they (likely) didn't pay you for it (and this is a multi-million dollar videogame) and finnally to make matters worst, not only did they did it with other fellow photographers, they also proudly advertise it as "Art Deco influences and touches abound in the menus and icons, creating an inviting presentation, loaded with style".

I'd be a bit pissed. Mostly because it's very sneaky.

So far it looks like they just took the first results that were on google image search, and just drew on top of them by rotocosping them. I hope I'm wrong and that everyone got paid and was asked for permision.
 
i don't think a copyright infringement case would hold up; the images have undergone plenty of transformation and they don't diminish the value of the originals, which probably qualifies them as fair use.
 
Hungarian State Opera House

HungarianStateOperaHouse.jpg

buildingatlas_49.png
 
very first result for japanese zero:



it's flipped horizontally and rotated, but it's a 1:1 match in perspective and glare off nose and propeller position.
 
Can we stop with the talk about usage rights already? Obviously work was still put into them, resulting in a visually recognizable consistent style that in itself defines the game.

At worst what were you expecting? "Oh hey, we wanted to use one of your photos (of which google image result would come up with a hundred other options for us should you want to make a fuss about it) as a reference/trace for an icon in our game which has literally hundreds of them, we'll offer you 0.00051% royalties on it"? Who's going to keep track? On the flipside who's going to kick a huge fuss about it? Lawsuits over issues like these benefit no one but the lawyers.

It's not like someone's photos are being used as copy-pasta for i.e. the main title screen, or figurehead backgrounds, or anything else bigger than a 10-cent coin in terms of screen real estate.

The posts on the issue at this point are becoming redundant filler in an otherwise really interesting thread. I had to speak up. :|
 
iffy because of the placement of the flags.
I don't know about the UN in NY, but in Geneva (the second-most-major HQ of the UN), there's one flag for every member and they are in a set order (alphabetical by name in French). So, with the exception of a new member being admitted, they're fixed. I would tend to assume the same were true in NY.

Most obviously it's the god of thieves and artists, Apollo.
Artists is right for Apollo, but isn't the patron of thieves Hermes?

If those are the basis (for either original artwork or for filtering), then that makes it a derivative work, which means copyright is a concern (although arguments can be made in the case of the pictures of famous buildings or iconic statues). Then there are lots of possible arguments that can be made for all sorts of reasons, mostly regarding the Fair Use doctrine, but also from the question of at what point it is a derivative. I'm sure 2k/Firaxis had a legal team involved in this, licensed stuff where it was felt necessary, and so on. In any case, that's between the copyright owners and TakeTwo, nothing to do with us.
 
Maybe it is this one:


With the pillar added separately?

edit:

More likley, it is this one, searching for Roman Theatre

Wow, I'd never seen the theater icon blown up. I'd thought it was an interior shot of something like the globe--which would fit better with where it falls in the tech tree--but now that you guys have shown me the icon close up, I obviously feel silly since it's a Greek theater (which is ironic since I always play as Greece).
 
The legal talk is mostly because no work was put into these, in most there was little effort to mask the sources at all, in some of these the image is the same!. The artistic team was obviously under a lot of stress from tight deadlines, but that doesn't excuse it either if indeed no permision was asked.

-Fair Use does not aply just because it seems fair. Fair use is very strict about it's usage (in a nutshell: it's either for art, commentary or educational purposes).
-Photographers have rights too. This is a practice that no matter how often it's abused it's still unethical and still a bit ilegal (it could have been 1 image, from any size posible and it would still be an issue).
-Graphic Designers usually don't do this sort of thing. As it will get you a forum thread on Civfanatics.
-This is a best selling franchise. It could have had all original art if they wanted and could afford to pay for a one time royalty fee for each stock image too (which is usually what it aplies with stock images when done right, it's a 1 time fee).
-Derivative Works does not aply. There's no commentary and it's not a work of art (it's Graphic Design). Plagiarism could likely aply if no rights were paid or permision asked (so far the images are not sourced either).

The law can be annoying about Fair Use rights on wikipedia, but wikipedia is a non-profit organization, this is a game most of us spent $50 dollars plus DLCs (I've purchased all of them). As a Designer I would like to support companies that operate ethically, specially in my line of work. Which is why I keep bringing the issue.

I for one just would really like to know if Firaxis did the right thing here. That's all. Although likely nobody is going to court over this issue.

As an extra, this is not unkown in videogames, NeverWinter Nights did something similar (first post) but wisely changed their images in subsequent patches. The Doom Soundtrack for example samples heavily from heavy metal tracks:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4H3BB2gKKeY

Doom's composer Bobby Prince however was also a Lawyer, and aparently he knew just the way to use the original songs without breaking any laws (I believe it's something like it must not use a certain number of notes from another song, cannot find the source for this claim though). However that was then, Doom was made by 4 guys and id was a struggling company. Today id just wouldn't do this, in the same way that Civilization V sports 3 hours of original music.
 
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