Preston Blair Ripoffs

[theoldwolf]

Almost anyone who has studied Disney animated movies or who is interested in animation as an art form has encountered the work of Preston Blair.



Blair animated the dancing hippos in "Fantasia," and many other characters through his career; he worked not only with Disney but with Warner as well. Some images from his book:


Facial Expressions






The "Screwball" Characters

I've had this book in my library for over 40 years; so you can imagine my surprise when we walked into a McDonald's somewhere in Florida and found this:







Wholesale ripoff of Blair's work. Artists are not supposed to do this; using someone else's work as a model is one thing, but outright plagiarism is another.

Blair's work is probably some of the most pirated ever; all you have to do is go to a Google image search and look for "Preston Blair Ripoffs" - there is no end of examples.

Blair may be long gone, but his work is his, and should not be so blatantly appropriated - especially not by a company as large as McDonald's.

The Old Wolf has spoken.

Comments

[stevenroy.livejournal.com]

Yeah, total "boo" for blatantly copying the art like that. That's terrible. That's "summon the lawyers" terrible!

I gotta admit, though, at least they used it in an interesting way!

[r-caton.livejournal.com]

Think of all the Ice Cream Vans with Mickey & Donald on the back.....

[deckardcanine.livejournal.com]

Are you sure that this restaurant isn't itself a ripoff? It looks nothing like the McDonald's I know.

[kusanagi-sama.livejournal.com]

It could be one of the many 60's themed McDonalds (with a 50's or 60's designed building.)

[ccdesan.livejournal.com]

It's really a McDonald's. An odd one, to be sure - I wonder if the decor is not the doing of an individual franchisee who is stepping outside the normal boundaries.

[torakiyoshi.livejournal.com]

They probably assumed that since the Mouse is now public domain, that these are as well.

I find it interesting how these characters have the Disney look, but they remind me more of Warner Brothers.

[secoh.livejournal.com]

Mickey mouse is not in the public domain. Disney lobbies reguarly to have copyright laws changed to ensure this does not happen.

[torakiyoshi.livejournal.com]

What was that media blitz two years ago when the last copyright extension expired?

[secoh.livejournal.com]

It all came up again during the SOPA and PIPA debates recently.

[secoh.livejournal.com]

Who knows maybe the building or franchise owner has an actual connection. Not all random art is stolen.

[ccdesan.livejournal.com]

There's always that possibility. My gut tells me, however, that this is not the case.

[secoh.livejournal.com]

Occam's razor and experience agrees with you. It would be good to find out for sure.

[thefoxaroo.livejournal.com]

I hope *my* characters will live on after I'm dead.