Have you heard about this lawsuit mess between the Associated Press and Shepard Fairey? Basically, the AP, who owns the photograph on the left, is accusing Shepard Fairey of stealing their image for his poster for the Obama campaign. While I can see how it would kind of suck to be the freelance photographer (Mannie Garcia) that took the image after you see it explode into this huge icon without any kind of special financial compensation at all, the fact of the matter is that he and the Associated Press don't deserve any financial compensation at all. Copyright law for this sort of thing is pretty tricky. In fact, I think the law says something to the extent that if a source image is used that you don't own, that you have to change it 30% in your artwork in order to have made it your own. While giving it a percentage value seems pretty bizarre (what is 25% versus 30% versus 35%?), it is basically just saying that you have to have done something substantial to make it your own, and I would certainly say that Shepard Fairey has done enough to make the image his own. His art is popular because people like his graphic style. People like it so much that there are several sites where you can upload your own photo and have it turned into an "Obamicon". The Andre the Giant Obey campaign didn't get huge because of everyone's undying love for Andre the Giant. It is worth pointing out that when the Obama campaign realized they didn't own this image, they asked Fairey to make a new poster with an image they did own, and he did, and it wasn't quite as popular. There is something about this particular image of Obama that resonated with people, but the fact of the matter is that it is Shepard Fairey's stylization that really popularized the image. Something tells me that the following poster wouldn't have made much a splash:
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