[Jason_Manley]

i received this email today.

after the whole chris runyon mess I am surprised to hear about another fraudulant artist trying to scam developers.

www.conceptart.org/fraud2 ....this may be some of your work.

ALWAYS CHECK REFERENCES. This is the ONLY way to know if you are being scammed.

here is the email i recieved.........along with a PM sent from the reporting member....................................................

Greetings, I need your help

I'm currently a part of a small game development group. Recently an artist has joined us and posted some sample artwork he claims to have done. I became a bit suspicious about some of the paintings but finally today I have some evidence that there is something wrong. He posted an artwork that is the same exact artwork found in this post:

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sh...&threadid=11798

I was wondering how I can try to track down some of the other paintings he's submitted to verify he is indeed stealing work from other artists?

Thank you.

..........................

Greetings,

Further investigations have confirmed at least 8-9 pieces having originated from conceptart forums. Here is an attachment of most the pieces he submitted.

The perpetrator's name is Harold Mahuguana. (hopefully the name is real since most of the other information he provided was false) He claims to originate from Manila, Philippines. He links to a website called www.nurvstudios.com.

He has used 2 forum names called nurvstudios or inferno on our boards. (HE IS USER NAME "diablo" on conceptart.org)

Here is the artworks were were able to match up.

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sh...light=sasquatch

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sh...20&pagenumber=1

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sh...p?threadid=2215

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sh...20&pagenumber=2

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sh...20&pagenumber=4

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sh...?threadid=11656

I would like to take the opportunity to say that conceptart.org is a great community/resource for artists. I love seeing the work displayed on the forums but I would also recommend that some sort of watermark be placed on artworks in the future to prevent theft. Alot of time and resources have been spent by my team dealing with this issue. I want to prevent other companies/teams from wasting valuable time in the future. (note----is it possible to have code that puts a CA/eatpoo/sijun logo on the image when it posts on the forums?----jason)

In regards to this thief, he has been ejected from the team.

I thank you for your response and help.

Kanhong
_________________
Jason Manley
www.conceptart.org

[Jason_Manley]

sorry..here are the links...


Here is the artworks were were able to match up.

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?threadid=11957&highlight=sasquatch

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?threadid=11798&perpage=20&pagenumber=1

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?threadid=2215

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?threadid=2215&perpage=20&pagenumber=2

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?threadid=2215&perpage=20&pagenumber=4

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?threadid=11656
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Jason Manley
www.conceptart.org

[Drunken Monkey]

uncool.

you can only do dynamic watermarks on central server... such as if every image on the forum was hosted off the same server. that would also need a lot of bandwidth. plus how hard is it to get rid of those watermarks in photoshop?

Maybe companies should consider having people bring a few real pieces of work to the interview... or something.
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"A fear of weapons is a sign of retarded sexual and emotional maturity" - Sigmund Freud

[Jason_Manley]

thanks...well companies are checking now..thats how this guy was caught.

i appreciate the input.

j
_________________
Jason Manley
www.conceptart.org

[Jason_Manley]

[email protected]

that is the email he uses to gain access to conceptart.org

if he contacts your studio...that is one of the places he may try to reach you from.


j
_________________
Jason Manley
www.conceptart.org

[Matthew]

Ohh another fraud, not nice.
Still thou some nice works in there, especially those india sketches.

I think it would have to be some kind of Encryption attached to the pictures to avoid this kind of things, still thou I think there will always be some people getting around that and keep stealing.
Maybe there could be some kind of register in the forums, the artist when he posts a picture have to check a box and then enter a name of the file or picture, that way the pictures could be documented, don�t know if it would work though, just an idea. :)
Good thing that the art-stealers are exposed in the forums.

Matthew

[Capt.FlushGarden]

hmm I'm probably not the only one who wonders what he's gonna do if he gets a job with the stolen art, or did he copy designs? the links dont work

[maxetormer]

Impr
Pant
Pet Sis
all tha the thief has to do is hit that key ant he will impress the screen
so any means to dot let the person download the images would not work,
the water-mark it the only way is see fit, but then the art suffers form it.
and any way that fella would never be albe to do the drawings on that quality
so wtf was that person thinking? grrrr it make me so angry grrr....
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