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Mar 3, 2010

Rip Off Alert: Half Life Box Art

I found this Half Life box art today on Bit Mob linked from a site called VG Box Art.com, but funny thing is ... I've seen this before. My friend, Arcade Art made a couple of Half Life NES bead sets a while back and along with them she designed box art for the original NES.

This box art design is composed almost completely of her original sprites and even her original box art concept. And though the artist, Grand on VGBoxArt.com mentions he saw bead sprites for Half Life, he doesn't link to Arcade Art's original work and the way he phrases his description of the box, it sounds like he made everything.
Saw some Half-Life bead sprites, so I went ahead and made a sprite of Gordon Freeman & a headcrab. Made the 'black box' NES template from the ground up, and I created the screenshots myself.

I'm happy with the result and I'll definitely keep on doing these retro boxes.
Overall, most artists don't mind people using their original work but for God's sake, give them credit for it if you don't ask for permission. This guy is getting all the credit for Arcade's hard work on the picture design & sprites and that's not fair.

3 comments:

Grand said...

I never indicated that I designed the sprites myself. I said in the OP that I saw some bead sprites and just made them on the computer. Wasn't it obvious that I'd copy an existing design rather than make my own? I mean there's only so many ways you can make an 8-bit Gordon Freeman and headcrab.

I wasn't 100% on who made them though because even though Arcade Art had them online, I saw them and other Half-Life sprites at Magfest in January. This kind of sprite artwork is ubiquitous on the Internet and I had no real way of knowing who the original creator was.

Unknown said...

Then you should have at least linked back to her even if you weren't sure. Everytime I use other art sources for my bead work I always post the original source so people don't think I made them.

You didn't make any effort to point people back to the original design.

Anonymous said...

I agree with Faith...linking to the original or at least where you found it shows some respect to the person who made it to begin with.

...or don't use another person's work at all...create something different and new. If I find something out there that I like, especially an idea, I try to create my own spin on that idea...not use it straight up. It's a more legit form of creativity that way.

Remember...if you think about it, you should link about it!

Peace.

-Joel W