Artwork rip offs

[inkworm]

Had an enquiry from someone yesterday who claimed to have bought a load of my prints from an air show (they were very complimentary about my work). I didn't even know they were being sold at air shows! I'm concerned about where my work is being lifted from and what sort of quality it is. Plus I've not seen any money.

Waiting to find out more details but has anyone else had a similar experience?

[Serval]

Can't the person who contacted you give more details about where he has bought the prints? Any details? Which show, which merchant. Maybe the organisation of the show can give a list of Merchants, so you can try and find the one(s) who sell your work.
And try Google for any tags that might lead to your work.

[inkworm]

Waiting to hear back from the person who got in touch but just thought I'd ask on here as well.

[BLOWHARD]

That really sucks

[JMSmith]

hi chris,
it is either someone you know whom you have sent a full size version of your finished artwork, or they have scanned it from a magazine and refined it, either way they are BASTARDS.

now slipping back into oblivion

[BLOWHARD]

Is that JM who was just here? HEYA JM!

[Supah]

It sucks to have your artwork used without permission, I have had it happen a few times. Most of the time it is done by no talent clowns who can't do anything themselves so they resort to stealing other peoples stuff.

[Clint Mitchell]

Sadly the aviation art/profiling/relic world is quite literally bursting at the seems with untalented frauds to the point of making 99.9% of it a farcical joke. What's even more astonishing is the amount of ignorant and naive muggs that buy it. I'm slowly losing faith in the whole scene but I'm rapidly gaining faith in the very small amount of great talent out there.... Keep it real guys. The cream always rises to the top but unfortunately in the eyes of the naive consumer so does the scum.....

[Jesters-Ink]

Sadly one more reason not to post any work online what so ever.
But what do you do? Keep it all to yourself and the the world never knows who you are, or do you take a punt, show it off and hope that the bastards only get a small percent out out of it?

Sad days Chris, your work deserves better.

[Clint Mitchell]

It's getting beyond a joke, so these days I really wouldn't worry about who sees it online. Do your research and find out who the publishers/researchers are in your field. Mingle and network so to speak. Approach them or it's not unheard of for artists to just down right pester publishers until they get the work. Looking at some of the stuff that gets published it wouldn't be hard, simple as that. Posting it online tends to in more cases than not attract unconstructive criticism from armchair experten who think they know what they are talking about anyway. Go it alone and directly chase the work theres no need to show it off online to every Tom, Dick, and Harry.

A good safe way to show it off to your friends and trusted associates is a closed Facebook page.