Art usage

Make art for user-made content.

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CraigShaw
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Joined: February 4th, 2015, 5:31 pm

Art usage

Post by CraigShaw »

Greetings.

Not too sure who to address this to, just hoping someone from the developement team will see it and give me a reply.

I'm working on a pencil and paper RPG and am trying to find artwork for the various races and classes. It is a commercial project. Wesnoth is released under the GPL which I know is a software license that allows use provided the resulting program is also GPL.

Now I want to try use some of the Wesnoth unit portraits but the manuals/books themselves I don't want to be GPL.
I'm not too sure how it all works, but is it possible for me to include Westnoth artwork and have the artwork listed as GPL in my credits (and thus usable and still under the GPL) but keep the books themselves non GPL?

Anyways
Thanks for any help.
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Dugi
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Re: Art usage

Post by Dugi »

You can't re-use GPL stuff in something that isn't GPL itself. However, GPL projects can be commercial. You can make that game GPL, people would be allowed to reproduce it, but reproducing a physical object is obviously very impractical.

Otherwise, you should try to contact the artists and ask them to add another licence to their art, like MIT or CC-0.

It might be possible to license the project's artwork as GPL (and thus reproducible), but the game's rules not, but I am not sure about this.
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lipk
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Re: Art usage

Post by lipk »

GPL was written with computer programs in mind, so how it applies to artwork is a bit vague (and I think it will remain so until someone brings a similar case to court). From my point of view, the rule book, game cards etc. form one entity as a board game which, provided that you use GPL artwork, makes the whole thing a "derivative work". GPL requires derivative works to be GPL as well, meaning that you need to publish the rule book under that license, too. (Although you can still charge a fee for the actual physical product). Of course that's all invalid if you can, as Dugi mentioned, convince the individual copyright holders to re-license their material.

That's the legal aspect. There's also the moral aspect you probably shouldn't sell something that you get for free yourself ;)
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Elvish_Hunter
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Re: Art usage

Post by Elvish_Hunter »

lipk wrote:GPL requires derivative works to be GPL as well, meaning that you need to publish the rule book under that license, too.
There's also the problem of the source code of the derivative work. From the GPL v2 license:
3. You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it, under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:

a) Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
b) Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
c) Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer to distribute corresponding source code. (This alternative is allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you received the program in object code or executable form with such an offer, in accord with Subsection b above.)

The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it.
In other words, you can publish and even sell your book, but you'll have to make available (either as a free download, or by charging the cost of the CD or other media where you'll burn it) also the source code of the book itself.
What counts as source code of the book? It depends on how you created it; if it's a PDF file, for example, then it'll be the original file or files that you used to make it, like a LibreOffice Writer or a LaTeX document.
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The Sojournings of Grog, Children of Dragons, A Rough Life, Wesnoth Lua Pack, The White Troll (co-author)
GbDorn
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Re: Art usage

Post by GbDorn »

Dugi wrote:You can't re-use GPL stuff in something that isn't GPL itself.
You can add other requirements not in the GPL though. And Wesnoth is licensed under the GPL v2 or any later version...
CraigShaw wrote:is it possible for me to include Wesnoth artwork and have the artwork listed as GPL in my credits (and thus usable and still under the GPL) but keep the books themselves non GPL?
The GPL v2 wrote:These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the [GPL'ed work], and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the [GPL'ed work], the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.
[...]
In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the [GPL'ed work] with the [GPL'ed work] (or with a work based on the [GPL'ed work]) on a volume of a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under the scope of this License.
Bold parts mine. Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer.

As lipk, I think a book including GPL'ed parts would be a derivative work as GPL'ed and non-GPL'ed parts are clearly not distributed separately but form a whole.

Same if you want to release your book digitally. A PDF file or another document format with embedded GPL'ed images would be a derivative work and a document that links to images stored separately would be a form of linking IMHO. Maybe a .zip file containing clearly separated GPL'ed files and non-GPL'ed files could be considered an aggregate if non-GPL'ed parts make absolutely no reference to GPL'ed parts, but I guess this sort of presentation is not really appealing to you.

I think a legally clear (however impractical) solution is to distribute GPL'ed parts and GPL-incompatible parts separately and to instruct the user to assemble them himself. Depends how you design your book(s) ... or materials...
You could also have a non-GLP'ed rulebook, and a separate GPL'ed monster book or something with the portraits you want (preferentially distributed separately)...


Now, as already said, the simplest solution is you contact the copyright holders for the artworks (who may or may not be the artists, but I doubt any of them signed their right away) and convince them to re-release the artworks under another license either to the public or to you or your company. Whatever license they choose, the GPL'ed version shipped with Wesnoth cannot be revoked (unless the GPL itself is declared void by law or a judge in the future).
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ancestral
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Re: Art usage

Post by ancestral »

If you’re going to sell the product, when you know that time is coming, get someone to draw/paint art for you.

But in the meantime, before you’re selling it, you could use the Wesnoth art as a placeholder.
Wesnoth BestiaryPREVIEW IT HERE )
Unit tree and stat browser
CanvasPREVIEW IT HERE )
Exp. map viewer
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