Outlaw Press uses stolen art

[chiguayante]

So I was browsing through RPGnow today and I came across something that really pissed me off. The game on called "Hot Pursuit" by Outlaw Press has a cover that uses copyrighted art. The person claimed as the artist on the page is one Kevin Bracey, who is even complimented in the summary for his really cool art.

The ACTUAL artist is a man named Mauricio Herrera, a famous Chilean fantasy artist who works for the chilean equivalent of MtG known as Mitos y Leyendas. In fact, the art used on the cover of Hot Pursuit is from one of those cards, "Selkis" from the Dominios de Ra expansion set.


I could not find any actual contact information for the publisher on their site (not even an email address, wtf?) nor on RPGnow, so I'm getting the word out here instead. Just so anyone who cares about artist integrity, copyright and so on can know what's going on over there. And to let other artists know, you might want to take a look around to see if your art has been used as well.

[Kythras]

Hmm, taking the name Outlaw Press a little too seriously methinks.

It could be that Kevin Bracey sourced the art, rather than created it himself, and Herrera is credited somewhere else in the book, but that's a slim possibility, I'd say, especially as it's already been used on that card...

[Father of Dragons]

I have no idea about the art, but there's an e-mail address on their main page, near the bottom, in the section labeled "Customer Service".

[Zap Branigan]

Shouldn't someone take the initiative and contact Mr. Herrera? I know if someone stole my art and tried to pass it off as their own, I'd want to know.

[A Letter From Prague]

Here's the image biggified at Herrera's epilogue.net page.

A cursory googling didn't find any portfolio sites for Kevin Bracey.

[Nomad4life]

Could "Kevin Bracey" be a pseudonym?

[chiguayante]

Originally Posted by Zap Branigan

Shouldn't someone take the initiative and contact Mr. Herrera? I know if someone stole my art and tried to pass it off as their own, I'd want to know.

I did, before I posted anything here. I also contacted RPGnow with the links and info.

[chiguayante]

Originally Posted by Kythras

Hmm, taking the name Outlaw Press a little too seriously methinks.

It could be that Kevin Bracey sourced the art, rather than created it himself, and Herrera is credited somewhere else in the book, but that's a slim possibility, I'd say, especially as it's already been used on that card...

Herrera is credited no where in the credits viewable in the preview, and Bracey specifically is complimented for "his" cover in the summary. Further more, it's art made for a card game. If any of my inquiries into freelance illustration for card companies have taught me anything, it's that 99.99% of the time they own right to the work and you're allowed to use it as a portfolio piece and only sometimes sell prints. I doubt Mr. Herrera even owns the rights anymore, frankly, but I thought it'd be important to contact him anyways.

[Jack of None]

I'd contact Outlaw Press if they have a customer service email...if it's anything like similar art theft incidents in the RPG community, the people who hired the artist probably have no idea.

[MGibster]

For some reason I want to have sex with a scorpion now.