3D rendered artwork

[nicholas-ochoa]

3D rendered artwork

[TimonTheMicro]

Progress post:
https://imgur.com/a/E8uFtbF

[dfloer]

Those look pretty similar to the original sprites, so EA could probably argue they're a derivative work. To be completely clear, you'd need to come up with completely new, non-derived sprites. I'm not a lawyer, so take this with a grain of salt.

[TimonTheMicro]

I use completely different textures, none is from them.

for more:
https://imgur.com/a/cs9XvX0

I wasn't sure if you meant the style, because 3D is a lot much work and effort than drawing something like they did from 16 colors palette, These buildings let's say, could look similar by their style.

Not sure if they can tell it is something related to their 90's pixelated (but nice looking) art. It look similar when zoomed out, but not too much in real size. I always could tell my buildings are based on real life ones, although not all of them would be possible to recreate I guess due to one with big MAXIS text.

[Tormentor667]

From a designer I can tell you not to worry: If you render them completely new, it’s all okay in terms of copyright.

[dfloer]

@TimonTheMicro I'm not qualified to say that rendering something in 3D is easier than doing it in 2D, but talking to people who do pixel art, they don't agree that 3D is harder than doing pixel art. As the aim of this project is to recreate SC2k, it has a very particular 2.5D style that's a big draw for the game.

Creating new sprites from scratch, even based on the existing ones, should probably be fine. Except, as you note, the one with Maxis text that's (probably) covered by a trademark as well as copyright.

@Tormentor667 Unfortunately, this is the purview of lawyers, not designers. Given how EA has shown a willingness to issue a takedown for a version of game they aren't selling in any form (except maybe old boxed copies), I doubt they're going to listen to any sort of fair use claim.

Can you expand on how you think sprites based off of 3D renderings of copyrighted 2D sprites passes the 4 fair use tests in US copyright law? I'm having a hard time seeing how this'll pass the 3rd test.

[TimonTheMicro]

Not sure if it would pass it or not, but bear in mind 3d shows you hidden perspectives which isometric plane cannot show you, in sc2k case, there is no any alternative perspective after changing the view.

[dfloer]

@TimonTheMicro I feel like they designed the sprites originally so that the most interesting side was out. Putting a different side in the sprite out is probably going to be less interesting, and arguably may still be a derivative work.

[TimonTheMicro]

Finished "Office tower". Visible and invisible stuff.
https://imgur.com/a/OBw0gVq
I may post some progress here recently if it is ok.

[Tormentor667]

@Tormentor667 Unfortunately, this is the purview of lawyers, not designers. Given how EA has shown a willingness to issue a takedown for a version of game they aren't selling in any form (except maybe old boxed copies), I doubt they're going to listen to any sort of fair use claim. Can you expand on how you think sprites based off of 3D renderings of copyrighted 2D sprites passes the 4 fair use tests in US copyright law? I'm having a hard time seeing how this'll pass the 3rd test.

@dfloer - Well, I can only tell you how the european copyright works, this is what I am aware of. I am notused to the US market though so things might be different here. But considering on how many projects out there use the same or a different technique (e.g. Classic Doom sourceports have 3d models based on 2d sprites; game ports from one engine to another with rebuild assets), I can imagine that rebuilding 2d sprites in 3d models from scratch and saving them as 2d sprites might be fine.

By the way - imagine OpenSC2K with hires sprites ;)

[TimonTheMicro]

@Tormentor667

By the way - imagine OpenSC2K with hires sprites ;)

You know that geometry of 3d perspective differs from isometric perspective? In isometric view there is no depth.

[Tormentor667]

Which doesn't change anything about the fact that even in isometric perspective, hires sprites are doable :P

[TimonTheMicro]

Which doesn't change anything about the fact that even in isometric perspective, hires sprites are doable :P

Tried to find a mod to sc3k which brings hd 2k sprites into the game but without success. Thought it was already done, so many years passed and it is interesting no one wanted to recreate stuff.

[Tormentor667]

This absolutely brilliant man, awesome work! Keep it up :) Totally in the spirit of the original!

[Tijgerd]

Looks great!!

[nicholas-ochoa]

This is absolutely awesome - I love the art style as well - sort of a retro N64-era fidelity. I'm not sure if you're still working on this, but if you are I'd love to try and convert these to 2D sprites and offer it up as a default higher resolution tileset.