What's the difference between inspiration and stealing?
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What's the difference between inspiration and stealing?
For instance, I took this picture of a rad (yes, rad is in again, I promise) sign yesterday:
As an exercise, I tried to make something "new" with my own text/colors/texture:
Then, you look at them side-by-side, and it looks like I flat out ganked the design, even though my goal was to take a modern something (pixels) and apply it to a 30-year-old style sign.
Again, I beg the question, what's the difference between inspiration and stealing? Do you just keep cramming your personal style, add more design elements, until it looks far enough from the original that it becomes your own? But that seems like it could come at the cost of making the new design look stupid or not at all what we were trying to achieve.
All people that reply are ridiculously awesome by the way; just sayin'. -
Well, I think that as soon as stealing is smart, it transforms to inspiration. For example, this slab you posted, I think they don't work good, from design point of view, both of them, so if I`d use it for inspiration/stealing, I`d design it better.
Actually that's the difference :) That make stealing transform to inspiration.
Or let's say you are looking on some famous artwork, you use it as a reference, you`ll create something your own anyway, unless you just make a 1:1 copy. You always must go 1 step forward, at least. -
the difference is about 30%
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Inspiration is something that pushes you to action. Not necessarily to how you do it, but to simply do it. Stealing would be how you do it. I'm going to represent this logo in a certain way that looks the exact way another person did it. That is the how and that is stealing. However, if I see a logo I love and throw my own spin on things because that logo inspired me to get it done, then that is inspiration.
At the end of the day nothing is original. Just how close it replicates something else is the only differentiation. -
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Tough question that doesn't really has an answer that will please everyone, but i think my opinion can be summarized in: 'Everything is a remix' :)
http://journal.drawar.com/d/copy-transform-combine/ -
It’s stealing if you get caught.
Kidding/trolling aside, it really is a matter of how you handle the creation of your work. You can be inspired to create a design that has the look and feel of something familiar and still be original, even if it looks very close to the original. For example, well, *your* example takes similar elements and creates something new. It’s heavily borrowing the same ideas as the original, but not blatantly ripping it off and trying to say it’s new.
Stealing, on the other hand, would be if I took your redone version of the logo, and changed, “Pixels” to “cliffpro” and passed it off as my own creation and inspiration. I wouldn’t have been inspired to create it, but rather taken a moment to modify it in an attempt to cover my tracks (badly, but quickly).
If you take the time to create something new based off of another work—The Flintstones being inspired by The Honeymooners—then it can be considered inspiration. When the similarities between your work and the original that “inspired” it are painfully obvious copies, with little or no thought to originality included—The Lion King vs. Kimba the White Lion—then it’s stealing.
To digress, stealing won’t stop me from buying The Lion King on Blu-Ray next week… ;) -
It's not stealing, you made your own version of it. Plus it has nothing to do with that sign. Don't claim you came up with the original design and you'll be fine, imo.
For example, I'm into the whole car modifying scene and these are some of the logos and their roots.
Illest (a lifestyle hiphop blog)
Original: Titleist (golf)
Supreme (hip hop clothing)
Canibeat (automotive blog)
Original: Barbara Kruger
Also, Look at the music industry (hiphop, jazz, funk and rock), people sample music/guitar riffs/etc all the time. -
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Remember that original ideas often evolve into trends, then become a style. Referring to that style is called homage. I think that's what you did here, and did well. Copying an entire design, that would be stealing. IMO.
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@nilsgeylen, "...and did well." Thank you kindly, I greatly appreciate that! "Referring to that style is called homage." That's exactly what I was trying to achieve, more of a paying respect more than anything :)
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Most people attribute, "Good artist borrow. Great artists steal" to Picasso.
Here's the original quote by T.S. Eliot:One of the surest tests [of the superiority or inferiority of a poet] is the way in which a poet borrows. Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different. The good poet welds his theft into a whole of feeling which is unique, utterly different than that from which it is torn; the bad poet throws it into something which has no cohesion. A good poet will usually borrow from authors remote in time, or alien in language, or diverse in interest.
I came across this on a post saying why the ipad was not stealing, as it added a level to the conversation, while many of the other, similar devices were nothing more than 'me too' money grabbers.
It's one of the better answers I've seen to this question. -
I agree with the sentiment that stealing adds nothing more to the conversation, while inspiration takes something to the next level. It is a level of progression that one wouldn't get from stealing.
