Legal use of One Monk products

[jibey]

Hi everyone!

First I'd like to thank everyone for your excellent work, even though i have never posted here, i come here from time to time to check new miniatures (which are better every time!)

I have been using your miniatures for quite a long time now, and i have created a card games for children, which is fantasy related, and I'm wondering if i could use the miniatures on the site as pictures for the monsters of my game?

Do you think it could be possible to get a copyright on this game if the pictures come from this website?

Many thanks in advance for your answers!


PS : sorry of i made any mistake, I'm french and i don't speak (or write as a matter of fact) english very often...

[hackbarth]

Some time ago Jim put royalty free image packages from his miniatures on RPGNow, that seems to be exactly what you need. But now I believe that the copyrights belong to Sanity Studios, so you gonna have to talk to them.

[nikloveland]

Thanks jibey for the compliments and welcome to the forum.

All the figures offered for sale on onemonk.com are copyright by Sanity Studios. You can contact me directly (email is best) for any licensing/permission. Typically I'll want to know the scope of the project (size and future plans), whether it is commercial or free, and the amount of art you would like to use.

All HOARD Forum submissions are released under the Creative Commons 3.0 License. Basically you can Copy, Share, modify, credit the original authors, but no commercial use.

Other art posted in the forum is copyrighted by the respective artist. You'll have to contact them directly for any permission. I believe Kiladacus is making a card game from the forum art. You can view that as an example of some good "permission asking".

As far a copyrighting a game: At least in the USA you can't technically copyright game rules. You can copyright the explanation of the game rules, but the mechanics are not protected under copyright. I don't think that's really what you meant but I just add it in there. I'm not a copyright lawyer but I think you can indeed copyright your "game rules" regardless of the artwork used in the game. You may need to add attribution to each card and the rules introduction (based on the artists requirements) to clarify who owns what but the game you create is indeed yours.

I hope that helps a bit.

[Deleted]

EDIT:
I'm obviously late with my post - Nikloveland was faster and I have to fully agree with him:)
-----

I'm not quite sure - are you referring to:
1. stricte *One Monk* figurines/products (vide thread subject)
or
2. figurines submitted/presented on CardboardWarriors forums

In 1. case according to what @Hackbarth wrote you should contact actual copyright owner (SanityStudios?) or perhaps just ask Jim whom you have to contact.
In 2. case I believe that you should obtain individual authors permission.

Regarding Hoard files:
"
COPYRIGHT
All submissions must be original works, and are submitted with the understanding that this set will be free under the Creative Commons License 3.0, free to copy, share, modify, but not for commercial use.[/b]
"
Forum thread link:
cardboard-warriors.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=freefigures&thread=269&page=1#2449


Anyway even if figurines/products posted here are free, notice that they are usually free under some conditions and mostly for personal and non commercial purposes only - unless not explicite stated otherwise.

Regarding copyrights - you kinda automatically become owner of copyright for your own work (or your part of work in project). But you can't just include someones art into your project and then claim copyright for whole project/game including these arts.
You have to obtain copyrights (by purchasing them or signing some kind of agreement (specifying royalty payments/conditions) or obtaining author/copyright owner permission.
Please also note that in last case authors might granted you rights for using they arts under some conditions (for example restricted to time boundaries (it's more like license agreement) or territory/language, obligatory links to they websites etc...).
These conditions might vary depending character of your project -- ie. you might possibly obtain rights for free use under just including credits info for non-commercial or educational project but the same author might lay down different conditions in case of commercial project.

However in any case besides strict Creative Commons License use I'd strongly suggest contact with individual authors/forum members just to stay on safe side thus avoid unneeded misunderstandings.

BTW: it might be also helpful if you could provide some more info (website/blog link perhaps?) regarding your game...

[nikloveland]

Lol, I actually got to Ninja Post someone! That's the first time ever!

[jibey]

Hi! sorry for the long delay! Thank you very much for the replies!

I wish to use mainly "One Monk" figurines for my game, and i'll ask other authors for any other figurine.

Is it ok if i send you a copy of the game in the current state?
Right now, i used D&D images for the art ; i'll try to translate the rules but i don't think i'll be able to translate the cards right now, it would be a bit long as there are 46 of them...

I was also interested in the Creative Commons License, do you know the process for a game, or game rules?