Celebrity tattoo artist Kat Von D went on trial over a photographer's claims that an image of a Miles Davis tattoo she inked on a client infringed his copyright -- in a case that may upend the entire industry.
A judge has granted a jury trial to the photographer suing celebrity tattoo artist Kat Von D for using his photo of jazz musician Miles Davis as a tattoo for a client -- following the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling on The Andy Warhol Foundation v. Lynn Goldsmith case.
A photographer, who is suing celebrity tattoo artist Kat Von D for using his photo of jazz musician Miles Davis as a tattoo for a client, has claimed that the inking is not a fair use of his work -- after the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling on The Andy Warhol Foundation v. Lynn Goldsmith case.
A photographer has filed a lawsuit against celebrity tattoo artist Kat Von D, accusing her of infringing on his copyright by using his photo of iconic jazz musician Miles Davis as a tattoo for a client.
Andy Baio has some experience with copyright infringement, especially where iconic photographs are concerned. In case you didn't read our previous coverage on the matter, his story goes something like this: in 2009, he put together an 8-bit version of Miles Davis' album "Kind of Blue" called "Kind of Bloop," and for the cover art he had a friend create a pixel-art version of Jay Maisel's famous cover photo.
Maisel wound up suing Baio for over $100,000 for the infringement, and despite an offer for free representation, potential court costs still forced Baio to settle out of court for $32,500. Baio wound up writing a long blog post about the matter, and now, a couple of years later, he's expanded on that post in the above talk he gave at Creative Mornings in Portland.
In 2009 Andy Baio of Waxy.org -- founder of Upcoming.org and former CTO of Kickstarter -- created Kind of Bloop, an 8-bit tribute album to the best-selling jazz album of all time, Kind of Blue by Miles Davis. While Baio meticulously licensed all the music he used to create the album, he released a pixelated version of the original album cover (top, second from left) without licensing it, believing it was different and low-res enough to be considered fair use. He was then sued by the photographer, Jay Maisel, who "felt violated to find his image of Miles Davis, one of his most well-known and highly-regarded images, had been pixellated [...]".