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I'm usually pretty candid on here, but a little bit more of that: it really can feel devastating to see your work used and altered without your permission. I know a lot of people see fandom works as derivative, but I truly do see it as transformative. It's an art.
I spend anywhere from a couple hours to dozens of hours on my 3D models, and it takes a lot of energy and thinking and patience to take something that was only ever designed to be in a video game, or drawn on a page, and make it something someone can hold in their hand.
A video game can cheat dimensions, defy gravity, use UV maps to hide relatively simple forms, and make pieces move without any real-world logic. A prop has to replicate design details that were never intended to be real.
When I'm modelling, I have to think things like:
- how will these pieces assemble?
- how will this need to be cut or oriented for optimal printing?
- where can I put a seam that minimizes clean-up?
- how many pieces should this be?
- how will these pieces assemble?
- how will this need to be cut or oriented for optimal printing?
- where can I put a seam that minimizes clean-up?
- how many pieces should this be?
- what details should be omitted because they won't print well or could be applied using a different method?
- how do I scale this to different bodies?
- how do I ensure this has structural integrity?
- how do I make this approachable for beginners?
- how is this travel friendly?
- how do I scale this to different bodies?
- how do I ensure this has structural integrity?
- how do I make this approachable for beginners?
- how is this travel friendly?
And that's nothing to say of the emotional attachment I have to my work, the pride I take in it, in seeing my own skills develop, in being able to help others make props. That's so special to me.
It does really hurt my feelings when my work is treated as interchangeable with any other 3D model. When I see my files misappropriated and my authorship denied, I feel like something has been cut out of me. It's a violation of my relationship with my work.
Experiences like that will never stop me from selling my files, collaborating with others, doing new projects, or anything like that -- but it does make me sad. I dunno. Just some thoughts.
Please respect digital artists.
