Vancouver Photo Of The Day-Squash Blossoms

Butter Cup Squash Blossoms
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At the end of April I planted my first garden mostly from seed. The garden is growing and exceeding my expectations. The Buttercup Squash is exploding and taking up a great deal more space than I thought.

I just love these blossoms that are popping up in several places. They just opened up over night.

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Ferry Trip to Gibsons BC

My brother and his son visited Vancouver, and yesterday we took the Ferry from Horseshoe Bay to Langdale. We travelled on BC Ferries Queen Of Surrey. It was a beautiful sunny day, and the trip was fabulous. I love being on the ocean.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

You can view the slideshow on my FLICKR page.

Copyright 101 For The Artist-The Basics

I was reading a question about Copyright today on the Everyday Matters group on Yahoo, that asked if using photographs to create artwork from the Internet was allowed under the US "Fair Use Law" with respect to Copyright.

Someone replied to the question by saying yes, it is OK to use photographs from the Internet because if falls under "Fair Use". This is FALSE.

Let me start off by saying that I am not a Lawyer, and anything that I say should not be considered Legal Advice. If you require Legal Advice, you should contact a competent Lawyer.

Also this post is not intended to be a comprehensive tutorial on Copyright Law, but a useful guide for you the artist to educate yourself to the pitfalls of copyright law, and to give you some resources to read that will ensure that you have at least a minimum amount of information.

In 2008, a Canadian artist won the gold award from the American Watercolor Society for her ultra realistic watercolor. She used two photos from Shutterstock to produce the watercolor. The two photographers found out about this and screamed copyright infringement, and there was a comprehensive discussion about this that ensued on the Internet about the issue.

Subsequently she was stripped of her award by AWS, and asked to return her prize money to AWS, and the work was removed from the competition, and the traveling show of the winning works. AWS disqualified the work because it was derived from photographs that were copyrighted (against the AWS rules for entering the competition) on Shutterstock. The artist purchased the photographs royalty free, but this purchase does not include the copyright.

A comprehensive post on this issue can be read on the Making A Mark Blog.

So what is Fair Use anyway? (US Copyright Law Definitions)

Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include —

(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;

(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and

(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.

As you can see, the term "Fair Use" is quite restrictive, and as an artist you must be very careful in relying on this as a defense for using a copyrighted photograph to create a derivative work.

Other than using your own photographs which is the best option, there are resources for using photographs under the Creative Commons License (CC) on the Internet. In many cases in these resources you may be allowed to use the photograph to create a derivative work if you reference the name of the photographer in your name for your derivative work. An example would be "Eye Of The Totem, after a photograph by Time Ennis". Usually you are requested to provide a link to the original photograph as well.

In general in the US and Canada, an artist's work is considered in the Public Domain 50 years after his or her death, and the work may be freely used. However be careful, the estate of the artist might still retain the copyright.

It is also very important to remember that copyright laws may be different from country to country. What may be acceptable in the US or Canada, may not be acceptable in the UK and other parts of the world. (Thanks to Katherine for reminding me about that in the comments below)

Here are some resources on Copyright and Creative Commons Images.

Find Creative Commons Images In Google Images Search.

Picasa Adds CC Search

Flickr Creative Commons

Plagiarism Today Blog

Wet Canvas Reference Image Library (Membership required Free)

I sincerely hope that you find this information useful, it is not comprehensive, but everything you need to know about Copyright in your country and the world can be found by a simple search on the Internet.

All comments are welcomed.

Happy Copyrighting!!

Ukiyo-e-The Art of Japanese Woodcut Printmaking

Hokusai Irises
1760-1849
Source Wikimedia-Public Domain

Ukiyo-e means "Floating World" and I have been fascinated with this form of artistic expression since about 1969 when I saw a reproduction of a Japanese Print that my art teacher in high school showed me.

During this period a number of Japanese artists started print making using blocks of cherry wood which are turned into engraving plates by removing excess wood with small knives, and utilizing one single woodblock for each color to be printed.

Step 1 is to create a detailed line drawing, carve that out into a block of cherry wood, and then print that line drawing as many as 100-150 times. W.J. Phillips in his book mentioned that he was able to get a maximum of 150 prints before the block would degrade from the process.

The watercolor paper is kept wet with water during the printing process. The wet paper is laid on top of the block, after the colored pigment (watercolor) is painted on the block. The back of the paper is then rubbed with a block of wood wrapped in leaves. Each impression is then stacked in a pile wet, with newspaper in between each layer.

There can be as many as 10 colors in each print, meaning that there have to be 10 blocks, so the printing process is a long and arduous one.

However the Japanese discovered a beautiful way to expand their markets by providing limited editions of watercolor paintings. In essence they are not necessarily exactly the same because each wash that is applied can have it's own subtle difference from print to print.

Here are some Ukiyo-e resources that you may find interesting.

A guide to Ukiyo-e websites
Ukiyo-e Wikipedia
Empty Easel-A Brief History of Japanese Artprints
The Woodblock Prints Of Ando Hiroshige

Watercolor Demonstration-White Blossoms Ukiyo-e Drawing-Step1

I decided to challenge myself, and create a Watercolor Demonstration and post it as it was in progress instead of completing the whole thing first and then posting it.

Read my post Ukiyo-e to get some idea of what style I am trying to emulate here. I'm not doing a limited edition of prints, but only one watercolor in that style.

The process for step 1 is to select a subject as I have done, this is a drawing from one of my photos of spring blossoms that I thought would make a good watercolor painting.

For this I used a Black Pigma Micron 005 pen on tracing paper.


The purpose is to tape this to my light box, and then to tape the watercolor paper on top. The black lines will show through the paper when the box is turned on, and you can create your drawing much quicker, and you can change anything that you want easily.

The drawing looks very complicated because many of the lines define shadows, and these will give me a guideline as to the boundaries of the shadows which can be changed as you wish when you start painting.

So the next step will be to complete the initial drawing on watercolor paper and begin painting.

Stay Tuned

Vancouver Photo Of The Day-White Rose Afternoon

The roses on this white bush in the garden are getting larger every 24 hours. It is amazing how much happens within that 24 hours of growth.

The center of the rose was finally revealed today, what a treat.

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Vancouver Photo Of The Day-White Rosebud

The Rose bushes are in various stages of blooming, and I captured this photo around noon, bright sunlight with a bit of high cloud, a wonderful sunny day.

The aroma from the Roses is intoxicating. I think I will have to cut one off and keep it in my window sill.

This was taken with my Nikon D70 camera with a telephoto lensNikon D80 10.2MP Digital SLR Camera (Body only)

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Yellow and Magenta Rose Bloom-May Flowers

If you like flowers, now is a good time to go out with your camera and take some shots.

There is an ant inside one of the petals having some dinner. I love the the subtle colors inside of the petals, and the rose has a wonderful aroma.

This was shot Saturday afternoon shadow lighting 4:50 pm with a Canon PowershotCanon PowerShot SD1100IS 8MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom (Blue)
which is a great in your pocket type of camera.


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New Creative Commons Application For Facebook

Many Facebook users are aware of the uproar that ensued a few months ago when Facebook changed it's terms of use agreement, which raised questions about how creative content such as photos, video, blogs, and writing might be used by Facebook.

Thanks to a great post by Jonathan Baily of the Plagiarism Today Blog, there is a new application that you can install on your Facebook profile.

Jonathan goes into a fair bit of detail about the limitations of the new application for Facebook, and expresses some opinions of the usefulness of it, and provides links to the application on Facebook so that you can add it to your profile. Installing the applications is very simple and quick.

So if you are on Facebook, click on the link Creative Commons On Facebook and read the post, follow the links, and install it on your Facebook profile.

Orange Delight-Spring Flowers Photograph

Orange Delight
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I was shopping at the plant store in Marpole, and just had to take some shots of the fantastic planter they had out front with lots of beautiful flowers in it. What a delight, such a nice warm greeting at the front door of the store.

Saturday Blossom-Spring In Vancouver Postcard

Saturday Blossom
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Spring is coming along just fine, with new blossoms bursting out amongst the various trees in my neighborhood. I thought it would be a good idea to put this on a postcard, so that you can share the bounty of spring.

Celebration Of Spring Calendar 2009

Celebration Of Spring Calendar 2009
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Spring is busting out all over in Vancouver, so I have created a 2009 calendar so that you can enjoy spring every month of the year. Filled with a number of photos of spring blossoms for your enjoyment.

Pink Blossoms-Spring In Vancouver

Pink Blossoms
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I just had to get this shot today, the clouds are moving in quickly and it will be raining for the next few days. The pink blossoms will not last much longer, and will fall to the ground quickly when the rain arrives.

I shot this with my new Nikon D70, which I am still trying to figure out how to use properly. Out of 32 shots, this was the only decent one.

I love spring so much.

April Blossoms-Spring In Vancouver

White Blossoms
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I truly love springtime in Vancouver, and we are fortunate that we can enjoy this spectacular display of mother nature being reborn every year at this time. Spring has arrived a bit late this year for some reason, but I am so glad it is here at last.

There are many displays of pink blossoms to be found, and this is the first time I have come across a bunch of trees with white blossoms while I had my camera with me.

What a beautiful sight to behold.

Three Daffodil's

Three Daffodil's
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I went shopping yesterday, and I always take my camera with me just in case. I was sure glad, as it is spring in Vancouver, and there were lots of Blossoms and Daffodil's blooming.

Spring is my favorite time of year, I only wish it would last for 6 months, boy would that be a treat. Spring always energizes me, gives me hope, and makes me feel more alive than any other time of the year.