It's not about the body, it is about the design. It is the "exact replica" the artist is getting worked up about.

What would've been crazier is what I initially thought when I saw this thread - that many people were getting sued because they were tattooed with copyrighted material.

This is pretty inane though - I would think the tattooist would consider this free publicity and advertisement.

This baffles me a bit. Let's say I was an artist and I was drawing the guy with the tattoo, and he's modeling nude. For the purpose of this conundrum, suppose I'm a great artist and draw an almost photographic pencil sketch of him.
1. Is the drawing somehow offending that copyright, since it has the tattoo?
2. If it isn't because I'm drawing his likeness and not the tattoo, does the situation change if I have a weird style of drawing and start by drawing the tattoo?
3. How about I draw his body without the tattoo first, then draw the tattoo on the drawing of the body?

Relax. This lawsuit has no substantial merit. It is clearly a transformative work, there is no negative effect on the tattoo's value, the work is already publicly known, on account of being prominently displayed on TV on the body of a UFC fighter, and it is a prominent identifying feature necessary to depict him accurately.

Clearly qualifies as fair use in the US under the 4 factor test. Chris Escobedo, please go away.

A photograph is an exact replica.

No it isn't.
In this case it goes beyond the likenesses. Their are putting the tattoo in a way into the game that violates the copyright. I can think of putting it in as a "mash"/"texture" that is an exact replica. Even if this is modelled onto the boy later, the exact replica is in the game. (at least otherwise there is no claim).
It's not about the drawing. It is about the finished product. The game is using an exact replica of the tattoo, which is under copyright.

This might come of as very nitpicky, but if they eg, would have used a tattoo that looked similar or in other ways avoid the exact replica, there wouldn't be an issue.


Remember, this is a recreation of the tattoo, not a picture of the person!

How do you know? What if the texture used is actually a photograph? What if they stuck him in a 3D color scanner? Then it is, in every modern sense of the word, a photograph. You keep repeating the words "exact replica", but the only place those words are mentioned is in a statement by the artist, with absolutely no documentation to show for it.

Doesn't really matter, a texture created as a component part of a model design (which is itself part of a larger game), even if created separately, would qualify as transformative. Also, I really don't get your argument that a photo is not a replica, but a drawn texture is. Suppose they had simply pasted the photo tattoo directly onto the model - infringing / not infringing?

Copyright does not give absolute and total control over the use of an image. And yes, obviously they wouldn't have violated copyright if they used a different tattoo, but then it wouldn't have been a model of Condit. Copyright tends to give a bit of leeway as long as there is only as much copying as is necessary for the intended use - in this case making an accurate model of Condit, not his tattoo.

A picture is a composition of many elements coming together. It is not a recreation of the art you are photographing. The recreation of an copyrighted piece of art is not. They created a 3D replica of the fighter and recreated copyrighted art while doing so.

The devil is in the detail in this case. As they are recreating a copyrighted piece of art. It is a borderline case, and I'm not sure if the artist will win, but even in those cases it is important that an artist gets the money of his creative work. And not some big company exploiting it.
In this case the plaintiff disagrees. And with his claim can be plausible. What comes out in the end is for the judges to decide. But his claim remains plausible.

You seem to be unable to articulate exactly what you mean. You keep saying they are "recreating a copyrighted piece of art", even if what they actually did was to photograph it, and before that you said that photographing it was not recreating it. You say a picture is a composition of many elements coming together, and so is not a recreation, and yet you also seem to think that a computer game is not a composition of many elements coming together, since you insist that that is a recreation.

You made my point for me - the model and the game are not recreations of the tattoo, they are compositions, they are transformative and fair use under the law.

Quick question - why? The artist is losing nothing - in fact the greater publicity likely enhances demand for the design and his other work (another key factor in the legal definition of fair use). Plus, does anyone really believe that people are buying a UFC game to see a grainy texture of a tattoo on a digital model? The only reason it is there is because Condit got that tattoo. The big company is not taking advantage, they are being shaken down.

Sorry, but there is nothing borderline here - the tattoo artist's suit fails on each and every factor of the fair use test. You can debate whether he deserves to get a handout from a moral point of view (though I say no), but the lawsuit is a dog from start to finish.

Honestly, you are nitpicking away from reality.

They recreated the tattoo for the game. That is a violation of copyright, as the copyright owner of the tattoo is the artist, not the guy who has it.

How that copyright violation was done is to prove by the claimant. He says he can do so, and if he can, which is plausible, so is the claim.

The exact circumstances are to decide by a court. What I am saying is that the claim is plausible and correct to pursue.
That is your opinion. The artist has a different. We don't know the details, but the claim remains plausible and the judges will decide. (They actually won't. An agreement will be made).

Edit:

For the record: Plausibility of a claim means that if the facts brought forward by the claimant remain unchallenged, the claim is valid. And that is the case here. If they recreated an exact replica of this copyrighted artwork, which can be a tattoo, he has a claim. And defence statements and funny "what if scenarios" are not part of the plausibility.

No, you are.
Plausibility means that it cannot be dismissed out of hand. That is not the same as saying "this is a fact", which is what you've been doing all along. All it means is that it has to be tested in court to be dismissed. It may well be. So when you say "That is a violation of copyright", that is for the court to decide, not you. It may be a violation of copyright, but then again it may not. If the court decides it is covered by fair use, then there is in fact by definition no violation taking place, is that not so?

While I think it's lunacy, I wonder why WWE omitted CM Punks tattoos in their recent videogame...maybe there is something to this.

Still, I would think a tattoo artist would need to imform their client of the copyright retention for it to be vallid.

In a sense, the tattoo artist "prostitutes" his art for money. The hairdresser example holds, I think. There is an inherent difference between a tattoo or hairstyle and a painting, sculpture, advertisement, brand mark, etc.