It really seems to be kicking off, but I do believe there are two different sides to this.

Oscar has put up some of our photos, not claiming them as his own, but showcasing what can be done with balloons, his mistake was not asking first if he could use our photos. When asked about this, he has done the right thing, and taken them down

The other company, Party Packages, are clearly trying to make money on our photographs, are branding them with their own watermark, and will never provide the quality to do it as well as we can.

Oscar has tried to put it right, and has done so.

I agree. It is quite spooky as this week I am teaching my kids at school about copyright and the internet!

If this is party packages in Edin, i just found them last week and commented to freind photos looked familiar. why not put a comment on their FB page if he does not remove, so all can see.. he got just over 2000 likes in a week using pictures in his albums..
just my pennys worth, ok i have have been converted, as previously fell foul, but sorted it when notified..

Hi Ali,
Any comments put on his page he removes, and then blocks you from posting anything else.

Ok , just actualy read whole 4 pages of this post.

As a member of Balloon chat, can i suggest we stick we stick togerther, We are all human and make errors, what is important is we correct our errors, poor Oscar. I do not beleive any member of Balloon Chat has used others pictures for personal gain, but to demonstate how varied designs can be, we all share on here... ( bad and Good in my case).

How ever there is some, Who have stolen picture purely to gain  ie "Party Packages" and more.. these should be stopped and publically notified, in any manor.

Graham, is it now time that members have and agree to a "code of conduct", and any new members must agree before, joining..
this would also clarify to newbies some of the issues and boundries, covered in this and other similair posts.. I know that i didn't have this knowledge at the start and hence fell foul, but was educated.

This forum, aims to insipre, improve and make the Balloon Industry better , through sharing and encouraging others into our world.

Just my thoughts, hope i dont upset anyone.

I agree with Phoenix, in that Oscar likely didn't realize the mistake he was making.  We all collect pictures of balloon art we find on line.  I keep mine in a folder  on the computer called "Things I would like to try".  Unfortunately I  believe that Oscar simply collected them in a facebook album.  He has done the right thing by removing them and I really don't think it is necessary to condemn him for this mistake.  There is an old saying "Don't throw stones if you live in a glass house" and I for one, have made many mistakes in my life.

Many years ago.. before the internet was so popular.. we all had 2 albums of photos we carried round with us to customers/clients..

One of photos of designs we had created and the other of photos from magazines of what can be done with balloons, and of designs made by our peers that we would like to make.. We called the second album balloon ideas.... and we openly stated that the pictures where not our work..

Those of us in Decor are aware of the Wynn & Lyndy Bell competition piece of a horse and carriage.. for some of us it was the last pic in the ideas book.. absolutely stunning piece created by them...

Likewise we all had their picture of gold and white balloon columns with tuille canopy and balloon heart in centre with balloon clouds behind and air filled balloons on the dance floor.... a design we knew how to recreate but a magical picture (still used in qualatex publicity)...  this picture secured us our first large scale balloon decor account for a wedding, the brides words "thats is exactly how I want my wedding to look".... when I travelled to IBAC in America and met Wynn I shook his hand and thanked him, he told me I was not the first to say it and that he was pleased for me... A real nice gentleman and so happy to share information and ideas with everyone...

Over the years of us entering competitions ourselves and developing our art of balloons and the internet becoming a bigger part of peoples lives .... we have had many people send us emails saying your pictures are on this website and that website etc and I used to have a very strongly worded email I would send to have them removed..

Years later I had conversations with people at the Party show at NEC Birmingham... where people have come up to me and said "I have a picture of your Big wheel in my ideas book" and "your band pictures are the back page of my ideas book"

Then I got an email telling me to go look at an American website (I cant even remember its address)... this website was not created from some one in the balloon industry, but a website showing the amazing things that can be created from balloons from an artistic point of view....

There where pictures from My heroes of the balloon industry and the sculptures created at events around the world and saying who had created each one, in amongst them all was a picture of the Big Wheel  we had created with our company details... I felt so proud, to be there with them, but the website had not asked for my permission!

Since then, if I get notification or find a picture of mine on another website, I see it so differently.. I do still email but these days I just ask for an acknowledgement to be placed with the picture... I just ask for them to say created by Paul & Pam Pearce, thats all...

We all need aspirations to move forward in what we do and cant do everything in one go..what we do in this industry is still changing and moving and new ideas come along regular with new designs of balloons and products.....

But if you do have a website/facebook page and upload pictures that are not your work, I am sure most would be happy as long as you acknowledge them... Or why not have them in an album thats named BALLOON INSPIRATIONS AND IDEAS, but say not done by us and say who .. and when you replicate the picture put your picture in your albums and delete the ideas one...

Thats what we did but in books/albums, so it was not so widely published as is the internet...

Going to stop waffling now, just wanted to put across that I understand both sides to the discussions taking place and maybe adding a different perspective to those getting upset

Pam
xx

Oscar should not be condemned for promoting our balloons, he never tried to pass them off as his own work, he was just showcasing what could be done with balloons

And as Millie said, if you live in glass houses, you shouldn't throw stones.....you should throw parties..,...with strippers  

Right on Kevin!!!!

Hearing about all this picture theft, I feel compelled to let all of you know that I am not trying to claim that the dresses made by Marie Dadow of Ephemeral Designs are mine.   Marie requested that I help her promote her balloon dresses on my Business Page as I have close to 6,000 fans already.  

I must admit that since posting the album of her dress my likes have increased by close to 300.   I was going to label every photo with her name and the info she had on her pages, but she told me it is not necessary.   As I have time or as I see a lot of people commenting on a particular picture, I make sure to say that Marie Dadow is the one who made the dress.

I have seen others using my work and passing it off as their own and I know how frustrating that can be.   It is also very frustrating to see youtube videos of designs I know my son Dustin originated a few years back and shared at jams.   This designs are now claimed to be the designs of those who want to get famous from youtube, facebook and the internet in whole.   Some have even made videos of my Big Bear head designs and claimed it is their designs.  
I see this type of behavior all the time and I also see the newer people in the industry giving praise to those people like they are the most awesome balloon twisters since they provide designs for free.  Too bad so many think it is okay to reproduce the designs learned from others and call it your own work.

Anyway, please let me know if I accidently do post a photo of something any of you find questionable.   I would hate to do harm to someone else unintentionally.

SS

I think in the balloon world, we quickly learn who the reputable artists like you are Shonna.  This forum has shared a great many pictures of work by those artists and anyone who tries to pass it off as their own work is a fool.  "Piracy" has gone on for many years, in many fields and I honestly don't think anyone here or anywhere else can stop it.  Some make the mistake of posting photos that are not their own and don't give proper credit for them - but in my heart of hearts, I don't believe its intentional in most cases.  When I saw your Big Bear design, I realized that I could get a similar effect using the Mickey Mouse heads I had ordered by accident and just adding a round to the top.  However, that being said - it is still your design and if I post a picture of it I give credit to you for the idea.  The bottom line is this, we are all getting paranoid about what we post now and that's shameful.  Let's not let this spoil it for us, it's a great forum where I personally have learned so much from the people here who really do "Care and Share", willingly and happily!

I would absolutely love to see any of the designs similar to mine made with the Mickey Mouse Balloon by Qualatex.
I have tried substituting the Mouse head on some and it didn't work for me.  
Partly I use the Big Bear Head because it is more economical to use since the one balloon comprises most the work.

Most the designs that I see taken and claimed by others are my son Dustin Queary's designs,  or others like Ken Stillman, Stretch, Debbie Verge, Mark Bryne and others.  

Since the Big Bear Head is relatively new and since I posted so many various designs with it, I am pretty lucky that a lot of people recognize my designs.   I love seeing people use my designs and adapted designs I just get a little miffed at the one guy who is pretty much copying them and saying he never heard of me.  It seems crazy when he has all the custom colors that only I had made and ordered and when he had originally tagged all my photos with his name.

Another women from a South American country had done the same.  She even looked like me.   It was very strange....

Anyway, I am so glad that there are these forums to discuss these issues and how to combat them.  
I would think it is so much worse for the decorators.   I drool over some of the their work and I can't wait until I can make it to World Balloon in 2014.   Next year I hope to make it to a decorators convention in Europe.

Thank you all for sharing and listening.  

SS

Something that I have often wondered about and I'm not sure that this is the thread to do it on, however it seems to have strayed away from the original topic slightly.  How do we know our designs truly are our designs?  This may not sound right but I unfortunately am a bear with very little brain, so please bear with me on this. I haven't researched many artists (the only ones I really know are the ones whose days I have attended at Graham's fantastic care & share days). But I tend to make most of my ideas come to life from drawings.  I've been working on a very simple but seemingly effective head design and use it for most of models I create but how do I know it's 'my design'. There may well be someone else who has had the same idea and to use the phrase 'coined it as there own'. Is there a way to make my idea mine? And to be fair should we really be that uncomfortable with people who take anothers idea and run with it?  I hope this makes sense to someone, who may be better informed than I.

I totally agree. I have also been working on a head design but was hesitant about posting it for fear that someone might say that is theirs. Personally I don't mind others using it and if it is claimed by someone else, so be it as long as they accept that I built it in good faith.
Create, build, but most importantly, enjoy