Logo theft?

[Windmill360]

I created this logo off of a life phto of a cheetah a couple years back. You may instantly be familiar with it because it reminds you of one of davidsons designs. My intent was not to rip it off and slap my name on it, rather try my hand at designing it following instructions from one of his tutorials. I used a stock photo from google images and did not in any way use his desgn and manipulate\warp it. You may be familiar with the style as it is similar to davidsons as well. It was roughly my second animal design so its not enough sample size to claim my own style. I will include a sample of another logo i created to demonstrate the mothod used to create the cheetah and my other logos. Also the logo in question does not appear in my portfolio anymore for the sake of his concern that it will dilute any of his accomplishments, not that many people see my portfolio to begin with. Theres no competition, he is by far the better artist.

I'd rather have an open discussion than an all out twitter fued.

[Windmill360]

Here's my portfolio link if anyone wants to "check" and see if ive ripped them off: http://www.coroflot.com/Maass

[dmhtfld]

They look similar but there is no theft here.

[BrandMooreArt]

obviously you did not trace his work. you went about building the logo in the right way, taking reference photos (the real thing not someone elses logo) and using that as the base of your design. the styling is similar. the lighting, line work, color and spots are very similar of his, obviously thats the style you were going for and used his logo as reference in that aspect, but most importantly (and this was the mistake) its the same idea/concept: a full body cheetah in mid sprint running to the left.

the thing we as designers have to be most careful of is the concepts that already exist. this is why research is so important. even if you styled the logo in the same way, i don't think Fraser would have a problem with it if it were an original idea (or at least one that hasn't been done by him) say if it were a cheetah's face looking back over the shoulder within a roundel.

coming up with original ideas is probably the hardest thing about being a designer. even harder in the sports world. harder still when you're doing an illustrative style of an animal. but that needs to be the goal of every project. eventually you will unknowingly, and unintentionally "copy" someone elses idea, but in this case you were aware of the concept/idea and sought the same result. i think from this, we can say you do know how to build and render things in the right way, but focus on those ideas. "when everyone zigs; zag"

[Windmill360]

Yes I can digest that. Its his idea so its probably not right to have it on the portfolio. Im not the first to use someone elses style and i dont intend to brand it my own. Havent done a logo in a long while but i imagine if i continued the style would evolve into something else.

[The Fixer]

I'm going to have to play Devil's advocate and say Yes, this is logo theft.

Disclaimer: Sorry if this is harsh, or mean. It is supposed to just be an analysis of the logos. At the end I clear up exactly my thoughts on the bigger situation.

Maybe one instance of similarity (the cheetah) would be ok, but everything in your portfolio seems to be modeled after Davidson's. You didn't just coincidentally come up with some logos that were similar to his. I'm not saying you directly traced and stole his logos, but it is obvious you took parts, copied by eye, and were inspired by his logos. It's obvious you used his tutorials, and were DIRECTLY AWARE of his images and still produced logos knowing full well that they were extremely similar. Not just similar in parts, but the fact that they do look like bad rip offs.

The wings and feathers were directly modeled off of his crow logo. The highlights on the wings, the highlights on the feet. Fraser even sighted a way of "making a quick stroke" and you did that to that logo. The way you did the feathers, you were attempting to copy the way he did the wings.

The cheetah annoys me a little less, because it has more differences and although still very similar and styled after davidson's work, it isn't an outright copy of an example logo. The tutorial was trying to show you how to make your own logos in that similar style NOT teaching you how to indirectly copy the same logo he was demonstrating.

You even used the same style of texture and warping he does after he has finished a logo.

Everything else in your portfolio, although a similar style to davidson's, seems to be VERY VERY well done and original. I think you just made the crow and cheetah as a way to further your skills and that is perfectly fine BUT now that you have some solid pieces I would remove the crow from your portfolio because it wasn't your original idea. My verdict is the cheetah and the crow logos ARE copying and logo theft, but that is not saying you are a bad guy! But do the right thing and don't try to pass them off as your own. keep them for your personal files. I think your other work looks great!

[Mings]

I'm sorry, but I have to agree with the post above me. Because the logos look so different from the other items in your portfolio (even with different types of design it is easy to see the artist's "hand" in them), I feel inclined to believe that you copied and it is a bit of logo theft. That said, I don't think it was malicious at all. You just need to develop your own style, and I would not put them in a portfolio until you do so.

[Windmill360]

Can't argue with the above posters. As you can see i've done roughly seven logos and yes they are all in the same style mostly because I was learning from a tutorial and had little to no other reference besides those. Had others posted constructive tutorials as well I probably would have tried my hand at those.

However, It's hard to say any of mine (excluding the cheetah) would be confused for davidsons works. I agree the presentation could be less like his too. Whatever; those are easy habbits to break. Still, with a small sample size and not much practice it is hard to develop your own style in just six or seven logos (especially if you're used to working on different concepts), but I did put a good amount of my time building them. I could be wrong but I think he had a problem with solely the cheetah logo as I have had constructive feedback from him on the mustangs and the bat logo, and no direct negative feedback from the others.

Also, I get what you mean by artists hand but the other works in that portfolio are made by an entirely different process in most cases. I find logo building involves a lot of free hand drawing, and thats not something im used to on a digital platform.

[jeremythebadman]

Here's my portfolio link if anyone wants to "check" and see if ive ripped them off: http://www.coroflot.com/Maass

cool design .