Magickal Vision: The Art of Jolie E. Bonnette

I had taken some pictures of the pretty yellow flowers growing up on the back fence when they had their burst of budding back before the weather turned grey again for so long. I’ve uploaded them to my Deviant Art stock account. They are also available as prints and other items there on Deviant Art. Check them out!

I wanted to redo the Zazzle shop graphics a bit so they are a better match for the site redesign I did back in 2011. I updated a few things, but it just isn’t quite where I want it yet as far as appearance goes. It will take some CSS coding to get the remainder of what I want to do fixed. But CSS gives me migraines. I hate it and it hates me right back. LOL  So, when I feel like having a rousing round of torture at some point in the future, I’ll go mess with the CSS coding on a nice safe, EMPTY and hidden storefront I created just for the purpose of testing things I’ve not worked with yet. I really don’t want to test things on my actual running store because if I damage it badly enough, it can crash the whole thing. If that happened, I would probably lose my mind and run screaming. XD

I added some new device skins to Zazzle today featuring a fill pattern called Celestial Temple. You can now find it on Audio Devices and on Laptops, Tablets & E-Readers. Sadly, there is so much to add for each image now that it can take up to a week to do some of them. I’ll try not to flood the blog with too many announcements for the same image. ;-)

I’m on a few freelancing sites because a couple of people told me they were a good way to get work after I lost my day job. I’m finding that’s not so true, really. For one thing they are clogged with people who post things like this: ” I will pay 50 $ U.S. for the graphic. I would need all rights to this, please” 

Really? Fifty whole dollars and you own every right to MY work? Um, dude, you seriously need to pick up a book about pricing for art creation and ownership rights in graphic arts. I’m not sure which pisses me off more: the fact that people want to commit such thievery against artists or the fact that some idiot is more than willing to take this paltry sum from Johnny Cheapskate for their creative vision.

You artists who are letting clients rip you off like this are the very reasons why art isn’t taken seriously as a career. You also continue to promote the idea that “art isn’t worth anything”. At the VERY bottom of the creative ladder the HOURLY wage for art/graphics creation is around $20. If you want to own the rights to an image, this could be anywhere from hundreds to thousands depending on the specific rights you are purchasing. You are compensating that artist for not being able to do anything else with that piece of their work. You are paying for exclusivity. In this day and age, that is a COMMODITY and should have a premium price.

When it’s not one of those listings, there are so many proposals that, unless you’re willing to work for less than you’re worth all the time, you won’t win the bid. Trust me, with all the foreigners willing to work for crazy prices like $1(or less)/hour, you won’t win those bids. I’ve even seen jobs listed on there for those scam internet ads you see where you’re painting in whatever the bogus product is supposed to treat on a perfectly normal model or something along those lines. I definitely would question the ethics of anyone who took that particular job. Again, I know times are tough, but show a little integrity, artists!

I picked this up from Capn-Gary from Dazaholics on Deviant Art. Looks like the lying little art thieving troll, Chad Love Lieberman, just hasn’t learned his lesson. PLEASE get this around to all the art communities you can so more people don’t get ripped off by this little dweeb.

Hi, everyone!

Another artist here posted a thread on another forum about a ‘new’ art scam. It seems that they sent her an email asking her to participate.

Well, I went to the link and started poking around. Here’s the link to their home page: [link]

Take a look in the ‘Contact’ tab. It just so happens that the address that is listed for ‘International Contemporary Artists’ is EXACTLY the same address that our friend Todd Love Lieberman used with his Art4Love scam where dozens of us were being ripped off while he made millions!

I’m going to post this here, and send it to every group admin I know! Please, please, please repost this so we can stop this damned crook again!

Gary

We need to nip this in the bud NOW so this jackass will realize we aren’t going to take this crap anymore. Oy… some people never learn until you beat them to within an inch of their lives…. *facepalm*

Dear Photoshop Content Providers:

If you would include the PNG or PSD image files with your brush packs, you could actually sell more of your products. Those of us who can’t afford Photoshop or are using other programs like Paint Shop Pro for whatever reason would LOVE to use your brushes, but we can only do that if you provide us with the transparent image files so we can convert them. I happily pay a little more for packs where those files are included or offered as a separate item on the graphics sites I frequent. ;-)

NOTE: These are my views in regards to my own work. However, the fact is that Copyright Law prohibits use of any creative materials without permission of the creator or rights owner except in cases where the work is being featured in legitimate critical review (just saying “it sucks” is NOT valid critical review) or used by an accredited institution of education (your online graphics tutorials do NOT count as “educational use” by law) as part of its course materials for historical or critical review. Parody is also an accepted use, but it CAN be contested and overruled if the owner of the property sees fit. In short, it’s always better to have permission just to cover your own butt. This was actually spawned by me seeing a lot of my Pagan friends posting artwork online constantly without the artist’s name being associated with the images anywhere.

Being an artist, I just wanted to talk a little bit about good manners and the law when it comes to sharing the creative works of others online and other usage issues. I’m listing some general pointers here. It’s by no means a complete list. I especially send this out to my Pagan brothers and sisters because we should really be striving to live as ethically as possible and not cause harm. Sharing creative works without permission/proper credits can harm a creator’s ability to control their own work and may result in loss of income.

• As a general rule, if you’re going to alter the work or image in any way or add it to something else (like a video), you need to do the right thing and ask the creator for permission. You are required by law to ask for permission any time you’re doing anything more than sharing something (by itself) to say “Hey, I like this.” anyway.  Linking to someone’s art isn’t necessarily a crime. Doing anything else with it is. A creator 100% owns the right to dictate how their work is used until they sell that right to someone else.
• Be aware: Just because someone is giving things away for free doesn’t mean it’s okay. Copyright and trademark law say NOTHING about making money from a stolen work being required for the owner to enforce ownership rights. What it DOES say is that you can’t sue for any cash damages unless the work is registered. The right to issue a cease and desist order for illegal usage does NOT require the work to be registered. Copyright ownership in the United States is automatic when the work is created and can be enforced in any country where the Byrne Convention applies.
• If you aren’t absolutely sure who created the work originally and can’t ask permission, don’t use it.
• If you are sharing works without altering them on your FaceBook, Twitter, or other social network or sites such as Pinterest, do your best to always link back to the original creator’s website, shop or online gallery. “Free advertising” isn’t free advertising if the people viewing the stuff have no idea who made it or where they might be able to buy merchandise featuring it. At the very least, post the work with the creator’s name and the name of the work so others can look it up.
• Don’t just go grabbing images and other content off of any old site. A good 75% to 90% of sites where any particular item appears do NOT have the right to use it or authorize its use. Google image search is NOT a stock image site, so don’t think that finding something  there means you can use it without asking. 99.99% of everything Google images pulls up is copyright protected and NOT public domain (free to use). It SAYS THIS on the page when you use their image search, but people tend to ignore it. This is true of every other search engine and image dump/share site out there, including the wall paper and app sites.
• Don’t use the “gifting” and “flair” apps on your social networks. Almost all of the content used in those applications is STOLEN. By using them, you are allowing someone who stole someone else’s work to make a profit with their thievery. There are sites where people design these apps and they are paid for every use of them. Thus, they are making money off of the blood, sweat and tears of hard working creators who see no profit for any of it. By using these apps, you are promoting theft with your support.
• DO NOT use any of the millions of wallpaper/layout/app sites out there which allow users to post content for download. They are full of stolen images and other content and the rightful owners are receiving NOTHING for the use of their items.
• General rule: DO NOT tattoo anyone else’s art on yourself without asking permission. Again, if you aren’t absolutely sure who made it and you haven’t asked for permission, don’t use it. Check artist sites. Some artists don’t care if you tattoo their work on yourself, but some do. The best rule of thumb is ASK FIRST.
• Many artists don’t mind if you snag an image to use as your own personal desktop image. The trouble starts when that desktop image is then shared out on the internet. That counts as distribution of creative works and artists have 100% control of that right until they sell or give it to another person. If the artist site doesn’t directly say “I don’t care if you use my images as a desktop”, don’t assume that it’s okay.
• Never use someone else’s images as an online avatar or icon without permission. Again, it counts as distribution and is a no-no without permission.
• If it’s pop culture, someone owns it. Movie/book/game characters, taglines, mottos, logos, music… it all belongs to someone. When you use things featuring any of this material without permission, you are opening yourself up to the chance that a property owner is going to come after you even if you weren’t the one who made the stuff. So be wary of unlicensed materials.
• If a creator asks you to remove their work from someplace you’ve shared it, even if they are a rude jackass about it, don’t act like a butt-hurt little baby over it. Politely apologize, remove the content and DON’T repost it later when you think no one is looking. When you take someone’s belongings without their permission, they have a right to be pissed. If you are the thieving party, you do NOT have the right to whine about being caught at it. You simply reaped what you sowed.
• Not all artists/creators are ogres when it comes to this issue, folks. Treat us with respect and we don’t much care if you share our art so long as you don’t go cropping, cutting, animating or otherwise defacing (yes, you are committing property damage when you do these things) or printing out our work AND you credit/link back to us properly. Musicians will love you forever if you point people to where others can legitimately BUY their work instead of giving it away free on YouTube and other online venues.
• Many of us use our creative work to supplement our incomes in these hard times. Please keep that in mind. Many of use are also “self-representing artists” and this means we aren’t just busting our humps to make the work itself, we also have the tons of extra work involved in promotion, merchandise production, shop maintenance and every other task that goes into selling and showing our work both online and in person. So, please, don’t add more to our load by disrespectfully using our work and making us have to hunt you down and beat you with the clue-by-four. ;-)

C’Mon, New Jersey! Are you going to let Maryland look like better human beings than you?? Oh… wait… you’d have to get rid of Snookie and cancel Jersey Shore (and Jerseylicious) before people might believe you were actual decent human beings…. :-p I jest, of course. So far the Jersey folks I’ve met are pretty nice people. Too bad they aren’t the ones who get the spotlight in the media. :-/ Also too bad their Governor isn’t on the “nice people” list.

cheile:

one more state for equality….who will be next?

psyfic:

Maryland Approves Same Sex Marriage

*confetti*