Inktober Book Plagerism Accusations

[davidhohn]

Watched the video. My verdict: I don't know.

There are two different issues being blended in the video. Content vs arrangement of information.

As for content -- I've never seen Dunn's book but nothing he highlighted was unique or original to me. I've been drawing, learning, and teaching a long time and these are simply concepts and techniques that I've learned over the years. They are fundamentally facts. Facts are not protected by copyright.

Arrangement of information: Given that this is a fact-based book that is designed to teach, the arrangement of information is important and is more readily protected by copyright. From the video there appears to be a basis for a claim on this point.

BUT Dunn has not seen the finished book. Amount and nature of infringement matters. The only way to properly evaluate is by putting each book side by side and carefully evaluating both. Ideally, done by an impartial third party.

Instead we are only seeing one side that is clearly highly biased.

[Lee White]

@Julia Thanks. Yea, it's a bummer. I love Alphonso's work and he seems like such a cool guy. And jake too. I wonder what happened to just calling someone if you have a problem and talking about it? Seems like people could avoid a lot of headache!

[korilynneillo]

I am very glad there is a thread here - the discourse on social media and on the art groups (facebook/discord/etc) I am in have turned absolutely vile and nasty.

I agree a lot with David Hohn on the content vs layout. I think it's unfair to compare a finished book with one that's not out yet. I don't have enough information to form an opinion either way.

HOWEVER I don't think it's my responsibility or the responsibility of the collective internet to make that call. I think this entire situation has been handled incredibly poorly on Alphonso's part - bringing this to social media instead of his agent (if he has one), his lawyer (if he has one), and his publisher (is the place I would have gone to first, honestly) is absolutely out of line. Even he doesn't want to give Jake a call, this should have been handled differently. If he thought he had a case, he should have gone to a lawyer or his agent FIRST, because posting the video he did puts his case in serious jeopardy.

Handing this straight to the social media outrage machine, especially since Jake's kinda got a target on his back surrounding Inktober anyway, comes off as an incredibly callous and cruel move to me.

[kylebeaudette]

@korilynneillo i agree. I understand he got upset and made that video out of anger, but that was a mistake.
I like Alphonso, he makes good videos. But this was a bad call. Contacting Jake would have been the right idea, or a lawyer I guess.

[lpetiti]

I've only just seen this story come to light, but I agree that this should have been handled with agents and lawyers.

[A Former User]

I was not even able to make it 5 minutes into Alphonso Dunn's video, because here's the thing: he starts out talking to his students to teach them to protect their work - and talking about how much effort it is to make a book as if immediately assuming Jake didn't do a lot of work on his - and comparing a preview on amazon to his book is the LAST way to do it.

If he wanted to teach his students rather than use their inexperience to get them on his side, he could have been professional about it and talked about it later.

Maybe I have too much of an svs bias already, but a teacher that always thinks they're right drives me crazy. He thinks it's proof that he's right, and it isn't, he starts out walking through how he got upset, so I can't watch. This is a good example of why it's always a good idea to question teachers.

[Norman Morana]

Wow it is really rough out there.

I've watched Dunn's video and I'm going to piggyback off David Hohn's words about content a bit. A lot of what Dunn points out as his work are things that I learned in one of my first art classes, Principles of Visual Communication. I've also heard these lessons from multiple teachers (I think Lee even covered a lot of stuff about the mark making and how to get different values with ink in a class called Quick Sketch, which was all in ink) and I could grab most any book on my shelf teaching drawing and it would have a good chunk of similar information. It feels and sounds like what happened on some level is Dunn has come to these art fundamental conclusions on his own, which would be incredible. I feel this would also give you a sense of ownership of a technique or way of mark making.

By no means am I trying to take anything away from either artist, making a book like this is no joke. I think it's important to have multiple books on the same subject. A particular teacher could have a way of conveying information to you that just clicks even though you've heard it from someone else in a different form.

[Pamela Ruddy]

Absolutely gutting for both men. Both to believe that someone has stolen your work and to be accused of doing so. I feel for both of them. I hope Jake is ok and that the publishers and their lawyers can sort this out.

There are definitely elements that will be common to all instruction on the same topic, because they are the skills that are required to e.g. draw well. And there might be an element of someone teaching something so clearly that it seems the obvious way to teach it to people going forward.

What a horrible situation for you both.

[jsnzart]

Yep! He should've contacted Jake first.

Anyway, I hope it gets resolved quickly and without anymore nonsense.
And I hope everyone involved gets over it!

[lpetiti]

@carolinebautista I agree, it's hard not to think about this from the bias of respecting Jake and his work and wanting to do Inktober. It also doesnt help that Jake was blasted on social media rather than this being handled more professionally.

Inktober helped rekindle my love of art, has helped me get my confidence back, and even got me my first illustration job. I still want to participate...but man, I dont want to deal with people possibly berating those of us who still want to do it and participate in this. I dont know if anyone else felt that way?

I certainly hope that this gets resolved for both artists sakes.

[korilynneillo]

@lpetiti I definitely feel the same way! I've posted a couple of "getting ready" posts since I'll be using Inktober to finish up a project this year and have already gotten a little bit of flack.

But I'm taking it as an exercise in letting bad mojo just roll off. Bad comments are going to happen sometime in your career, it's just what happens when letting things loose in the wild wild internet. Let the bullies bully, I'm gonna make something really freaking cool this year and if they don't want to be around for the cool thing they don't have to be. I'm still super excited, I'm still going through and grabbing last year's pieces and seeing what can be improved/where my holes are in my story, and I'm still super pumped to get this project out into the world! I don't have time for haters!

[Nyrryl Cadiz]

@Lee-White this is horrible. why would he do this? It’s like he’s saying we can’t use perspective because he invented it.

[lpetiti]

@korilynneillo I really like what you wrote (your art is awesome too btw!). You're right...I guess I'm so used to avoiding conflict like the plague (which makes more sense these days, hahaha) that I forget that about negative confidence. I cant imagine dealing with this on the level that guys like Jake and Alphonso are...you really have to have rhino skin to deal with it.

[korilynneillo]

@lpetiti Thank you so much!! It took a lot of practice (and being on the "wrong end" of an issue according to the internet mob a while back) to get here. I come from the music world, which is a similarly small community and honestly a lot of the same stuff goes on there too. Small communities get amplified by the internet and people don't look into things to form their own opinion, and I've learned that the only way to completely avoid content is to not engage at all!

I also can't imagine being on Jake's and Alphonso's level - I don't know if it'd be for me! I'll just stick with "can feed myself with my work", thanks! My heart goes out to both of them though, this isn't easy on either side and is going to cause some upset for what's probably going to be a pretty long time.

[Joanne Roberts]

I know you asked us to wait to make any judgements, but without seeing either book and not having seen the video, I must point out that I am disappointed one artist used the internet to accuse another without contacting him directly. Bad form. If you have the time to make a one hour video, you have the time to speak with a colleague. I have not changed my intention to buy Jake's book. Please let him know his reputation as a generous teacher and artist carries weight with his community. I wish him well.

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

@Lee-White This should have never been handled this way, esp given Jake's track record of helping artists and the fact that he has been teaching these very concepts for years.

Trying to ruin another person's livelyhood without even talking to them and trying to work things out is unacceptable.

Similar yes but this does not seem like an open and closed case and he had very few samples to pull from.

He is acting like he invented drawing. Horrible situation all around.

Mob mentality is strong and unfortunately for Jake the internet mob is coming for him.

Praying for him and hope any misunderstandings get worked out soon.

[deborah Haagenson]

@Lee-White Hi Lee - I just watched this video with a man reviewing Alphonso Dunn's books. He mentioned at least three times that what was presented in Alphonso's books is basic knowledge. After listening to his review I wouldn't be a bit surprised to see some of the same knowledge in Jake's book as well. Maybe Jake can use the information in this video to back himself up if necessary. https://youtu.be/AD1AX-yXPL8

[Pamela Ruddy]

I just wanted to add, given how many horrible comments Jake will be dealing with across social media at the moment, how much I learned from Jake's SVS course "How to Draw Everything" and how I value his teaching.

I was pretty good at drawing from reference but drawings from my imagination or if I wanted to change the perspective or angle of a reference I found it difficult and my drawings felt really flat (unintentionally!).

I found Jake's step by step approach to drawing solid looking 3D shapes and combining them and cutting into them very helpful to improving my drawings.

So helpful that if I were ever to teach drawing, exercises with 3d shapes would probably be part of what I share with others.

It is interesting the implications of be protective of copyright of teaching methods - whilst understanding why instructors would be protective of their work. (I'm speaking more generally here than this situation with Jake who had a prior history of teaching).

Does it mean that if you learn from a book or workshop or YouTube video that you are not allowed to teach? My knowledge is definitely a combination of the books, videos and practical experience I have. At what point does that morph from being derivative of the people I have learned from and become something I can teach myself?

A legal demand to the publishers to prevent publication until the matter was cleared up would seem to be the route to deal with arguments about copyright. As Will had with his kick starter.

Let's hope these things don't come in threes @Lee-White There's one experience that you don't want to have in common for the podcast!

[Pamela Ruddy]

Let's hope no one has copyrighted the idea of explaining one point perspective with a road with fence posts and telegraph poles or lampposts because that is in basically every book on drawing.

I understand why Dunn was upset at the similarity. The problem is once you think someone has stolen your work, it biases how you look at it, so differences, instead of counting against the theory, are interpreted as devious attempts to hide the similarities.

I really do feel for them both, thinking you have been ripped off is awful, and being publicly accused of plagerism when you were getting ready to launch a new book is awful. I hope this can be resolved through the proper channels.

[tazzyartist]

@deborah-Haagenson said in Inktober Book Plagerism Accusations:

@Lee-White Hi Lee - I just watched this video with a man reviewing Alphonso Dunn's books. He mentioned at least three times that what was presented in Alphonso's books is basic knowledge. After listening to his review I wouldn't be a bit surprised to see some of the same knowledge in Jake's book as well. Maybe Jake can use the information in this video to back himself up if necessary. https://youtu.be/AD1AX-yXPL8

Hi I watched the review, well about a 1/3, of it and the man is talking about how valuable and impressive the book is and how its not basic like the other books he has seen on drawing. So probably not the best back-up.

Anywho like others said I am also biased, but in the other direction as I've been following Alphonso for many years but somehow have not gotten familiar with Jake Parker outside of knowing he started Inktober. So if I'm to be honest with myself, it is a sad situation for both and its too early to judge. I think Alphonso had a knee jerk reaction and should have thought through how best to navigate the situation better, and I feel for how horrifying this must be for Jake. I hope for the best.