Hm...
Thinking about that time someone literally copied one of gijinka designs for social clout, then just flat out denied it when I called them out.
At the time, I had buckled under the belief that āIām probably being paranoid. Thereās so few notes on this thing, and itās so old, thereās probably no way they would have seen it.ā and I had deleted the call-out.Ā
Honestly, I still get really aggravated when I feel like someone is āstealingā from me (and it happens a little more than youād probably think), but I just donāt feel justified in calling anyone out because itās mostly with fanart, and neither of us are profiting from it, so neither of us have anything to lose or gain from it except a bigger number next to a little heart icon.
I guess what upsets me about it is them getting recognition for something that isnāt theirs. I put in the work to make the thing, but they get to knock it off and get even more recognition from it? Thatās just unfair. But in a way, all fanart is like that, right? It just seems more okay to do it when itās a character from a company or something, because theyāre not really being *hurt* by fanworks but hurts when fanartists copy other fanartists because we occupy the same space and thus are in competition with each other.
Tangent aside, my feelings basically boil down to: āAm I really gonna start drama with someone for saying they stole the design of a character neither of us ownā? At the time, Iād decided, āno,ā so I just kinda let it go. There really wasnāt anything for either of us to lose or gain by pushing it further.
But I recently saw them getting called out for other shit, so I got reminded of that incident.
I 99% believe that they stole the design from me, but because they made their design moreĀ āwokeā and maybe because I didnāt watermark my original one, that somehow made it āokayā for them to do.
I donāt really wanna start shit now because itās been over 2 years since it happened, but I would just feel a little better if the āproofā was out there. Iām not gonna repost their art here, but if you go to my main blog, @gamebunny-color-spā and searchĀ ākirby character designā, Iām sure youāll find what Iām talking about if youāre really that invested in this tale of mine.
That said, I am going to talk about the differences between the two like youāve seen theirs already.
Now, Iāll concede that puffy sleeves/shorts is a kind of obvious thing to do for a Kirby gijinka. Heās a round ball made of smaller balls, and those very easily translate into āpuffyā features. And big olārubber boots is another easy way to translate his feet. Iām not gonna be mad at every Kirby gijinka that has puffy sleeves and boots.
But why the cape? No Kirby forms really wear a cape unless you wanna count Meta Knight, but he wears his very differently. My reasoning was that, besides the hat, I wanted him to have something that would show his copy ability. Itās actually a carry-over from an even earlier version of the design Iād made where I actually played with that idea.
But you know, a cape still isnāt an *uncommon* design choice. Itās basically a staple of the hero archetype, so whatever. A cape doesnāt necessarily mean that they got the idea from me.
But what gets me, is the yellow stripe motif. I donāt think thereās *ANYWHERE* that Kirby is associated with yellow stripes, or stripes at all for that matter, and yet (un)coincidentally, both of our designs have them.
When I first started making gijinkas, I really just did whatever I wanted without too much concern for if it actually fit (arguably, I still do that *cough*bigtittyrob*cough*). You can see that in this old timeline I had made, chronicling my iterations of this design.
Why was my first thought to give him blue accents? Who knows. But itās also where the yellow stripe on his cape started and had carried over to each new design, just because I liked it and thought that it still went with the yellow star motif that Iād added. So for me, it was just an evolution of my bad design choices getting better.
But, if you didnāt already start with the stripe motif, why would your Kirby have stripes at all? And itās not like stripes are uncommon. I realize that. But thereās just no logical progression to it unless you just happen to think in the same stupid ways that I do/did. If you wanted to accent the cape, wouldnāt you just add it like a border, like I did with my first 2 designs? Or add more star motifs to it? Why the stripes? And why add 2 except to make it seem more different than mine? Thereās other little things, but I think my point is clear: there were just too many ācoincidencesā for this to not have been a case of plagiarism.
Like I mentioned earlier, Iām coming out with all this because the person in question got called out on a pretty vicious forum site, so theyāre probably dealing with a lot right now. Theyāve basically deleted/private all of their social media accounts, so whatever ācloutā theyāve gained from my design, and possibly othersā, just up and disappeared, but I donāt feel any catharsis in that because that really has nothing to do with what happened to me. And you know, the person who did it is younger than me (Iām 23), and this happened literal years ago. They probably just didnāt know any better at the time and were still in the mindset of āstealing is fine if I add positive representationā like a lot of kids still have these days.
I donāt really wish ill will on anyone that does me wrong. I just want things to be set right, but given how long itās been since the incident, Iām probably never gonna hear, āYes, I stole your design. Iām sorry.ā from them. My catharsis is in now standing my ground and saying, āYes, my design was stolen, this is why I think so, and even if Iām the only one who cares, at least itās out there.ā
I gave in back then because I didnāt have much confidence in myself. I thought I was wrong because I know I can get over-emotional and that I was too small to be seen by anyone and thus couldnāt be stolen from. But I feel like I know my worth a little more now, and Iām not going to let this happen again if I see it. At the very least Iāll blog about it vaguely like Iāve done today to let off steam.
