Hi Weronika -
you raised a couple of interesting questions. Copyright law recognizes that there is a process by which a copyright image or creation becomes changed, changed again, and further changed, and eventually is no longer the original image or creation at all. Unfortunately there is no hard-and-fast way to decide exactly where "adaptation" stops and "inspired by" begins.
If I take an edging pattern I found in a book, and make a bookmark pattern that basically
consists of two pieces of that edging, with some changes, is that an adaptation
of the pattern, or what is it called? And can I put the pricking on my website?
What if I made my pricking by scanning the book pattern and making changes with
a graphics program? And what if I drew it by myself without any scanning?
Your bookmark sounds like an adaptation to me.
If you had looked at a photo of a finished piece and said to yourself "gosh, I bet I could draw a pattern like that" and then did, without using any published pattern as a guide, then that is your creation and the copyright is yours. But, you used the published pattern to help you create your own pricking and so you are adapting the published pattern and you may only use that for yourself. It doesn't matter whether you used the pattern by scanning it or by copying the dots by hand - it's still somebody else's pattern. Putting that pricking onto your website is a violation of copyright because you are basically republishing somebody else's pattern. But, you could put photos of your finished lace onto your website, with a credit to the book.
Also, are all designs in books automatically copyright?
If the design was done for the book, the designer (might be the author, might be somebody else) holds the copyright. But, if a book shows, for example, historical pieces of lace, nobody gets copyright on that design just because they put it in a book, but there is still a copyright on the *presentation* of that design - the photograph or drawing that appears in the book. So, you couldn't just scan the photo straight out of the book and put it up on your website, for example, but you could take a look at the photo and use the old lace as inspiration for a new pattern you drew yourself, and you would have the copyright on that.
For example, in the
Milanese books by Read and Kincaid there are lots of Milanese braid designs - I
guess I don't really know, but I was assuming that they didn't personally design
all the braids, but that some of them were just traditional Milanese braids.
Can I use these braids in my patterns (including "patterns" that are just a
straight piece of braid for a bookmark <g>) without copyright infringement? If
I draw diagrams by myself, can I put them on my webpage?
The difference is between illustrating a simple technique and a design. For example, if you learn from the book how to do the meandering braid, then you are welcome to use the meander design in your own patterns, just as you would be if you learned, say, cloth stitch or half stitch from the book. But, you have to draw your own pattern, even if it is just a straight strip with the meander technique in it. You can't just copy (hand or scanning) the ones from the book. Designs are more complex and may include many techniques - the actual designs, like "Tie Ends" or the "Braid Sampler" are of course copyright.
These are just my opinions based on a fair amount of time spent reading up on copyright (and I have a friend who juggles copyright laws for a living). The reason lawyers make lots of money is that there are always fine shadings of meaning and grey areas that may be argued until the cows come home. And, as Stephanie has pointed out, the copyright laws differ depending on which country you're in.
But anyway, I hope this helps.
Adele North Vancouver, BC (west coast of Canada)
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