Paul McCain Cannot Claim Ownership of a Public Domain Work

Paul, you were a bad boy at Catholic High, too.

bruce-church (https://bruce-church.myopenid.com/) has left a new comment on your post "Answering Paul McCain's False Accusations. More Pr...":

Paul McCain is mistaken in claiming a copyright on a bare two-dimensional picture of a public domain work, i.e., a painting beyond copyright. Such images are not copyright-able under US and German law, even if printed in a copyrighted book. The only time it is copyright-able is if some special creative process was involved in taking the picture--special lighting. The metadata shows the Chemnitz picture in question wasn't even taken with a flash!:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image_copyright_(Germany)

"Because the technical reproduction procedure alone does not justify a photo protection...Rather a minimum of personal mental performance is necessary, which is to be denied if a photo or a similarly manufactured product is not any more than the bare technical reproduction of an existing representation."

In the United States, a Federal court decided, in its 1999 case Bridgeman Art Library vs. Corel Corporation, that original, faithful photographs of paintings were not copyrightable, since the originality is missing. (United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, 18 February 1999).....If a raw photograph and/or reproduction of a public-domain original is published in a book, then the predominant jurisdiction assumes this illustration can be reproduced at will, without agreement of the photographer and the publishing house.

The surprise is not so much about Paul McCain's varnishing the facts and stealing another man's work to claim as his own, but about unwavering support of dishonesty and stealing by SP Harrison and CPH CEO Kintz.

The crease down the face is on another photo, taken by a Russian,
so Paul McCain probably took the photo with a perspective correcting lens.
A photograph of a public domain image is not protected by copyright.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image_copyright_(Germany)

"Because the technical reproduction procedure alone does not justify a photo protection...Rather a minimum of personal mental performance is necessary, which is to be denied if a photo or a similarly manufactured product is not any more than the bare technical reproduction of an existing representation."

In the United States, a Federal court decided, in its 1999 case Bridgeman Art Library vs. Corel Corporation, that original, faithful photographs of paintings were not copyrightable, since the originality is missing. (United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, 18 February 1999).....If a raw photograph and/or reproduction of a public-domain original is published in a book, then the predominant jurisdiction assumes this illustration can be reproduced at will, without agreement of the photographer and the publishing house.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threshold_of_originality

Reproductions of public domain works

The requirement of originality was also invoked in the 1999 United States District Court case Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp. In the case, Bridgeman Art Library questioned the Corel Corporation's rights to redistribute their high quality reproductions of old paintings that had already fallen into the public domaindue to age, claiming that it infringed on their copyrights. The court ruled that exact or "slavish" reproductions of two-dimensional works such as paintings and photographs that were already in the public domain could not be considered original enough for protection under U.S. law, "a photograph which is no more than a copy of a work of another as exact as science and technology permits lacks originality. That is not to say that such a feat is trivial, simply not original".^[6]....

Germany

In German copyright law, the "Schöpfungshöhe" (height of creation) 

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Program AE mode:
http://www.digicamhelp.com/taking-photos/advanced-techniques/pshift/

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Canon EOS 5D manual (pp 84-85 on Program AE):

http://www.usa.canon.com/cusa/support/consumer/eos_slr_camera_systems/eos_digital_slr_cameras/eos_5d#BrochuresAndManuals

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LPC has left a new comment on your post "Paul McCain Cannot Claim Ownership of a Public Dom...":

Originality missing?

Ohh that is so so appropriate description of McCain.


LPC

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Paul McCain has left a new comment on your post "Paul McCain Cannot Claim Ownership of a Public Dom...":

You and your little gang of rascals are amusing, Greggy.

Please work up some more photoshops of me as the Pope. Love it. Keep 'em coming.

You guys don't understand the first thing about photography, apparently, at least nothing beyond point and shoot.

If you are ever in Braunschweig be sure to get your own photo of the beautiful Chemnitz painting.

You might want to investigate high quality digital camera, and lenses, with image stabilization, etc.

Thanks for another chuckle. Funny stuff. I like how it makes you get even more prickly.

:)