This week saw the launch of ten of my images on an app called Happy Color by X-Flow Games. A couple of days ago, a collector sent me a message about it, concerned about the legality of the usage.
That’s understandable and appreciated, considering my recent post. My friend, Christine, in Montana, found two other breaches on Etsy earlier this week. A cease-and-desist message took care of both of those. Again, just because you can find images online doesn’t mean they’re free to use without permission, especially for commercial use. Share them, sure, but let people know who created them. Spreading the word about art you like helps keep the artist employed, which means they can make more art.
But back to the Happy Color app! Several people emailed me in the last couple of days to ensure I was aware of the Charmers’ Club on the app, where they’re releasing one of my whimsical wildlife paintings daily.
Happy Color is a free paint-by-numbers colouring book app that seems to be very popular. Like many free apps, there are ads within, but that’s how they earn enough to bring their audience top-notch artwork and pay those artists for their creations. Then, they must convert the paintings into a paint-by-numbers format. I’m impressed with how well they did that with my work.
For the record, Happy Color’s usage of my work is 100% legitimate. A very nice rep from X-Flow Games contacted me over a year ago about using a selection of my work for the app. We negotiated the contract and agreed on fees, and they paid me some time ago for this use. It was a textbook professional and friendly process, and I would welcome the chance to work with X-Flow again.
As often happens with licensing, I have no idea when the company will use the images, and most of the time, I can’t talk about it until they do. Since companies don’t always keep me in the release-date loop, your emails brought the launch to my attention.
If you see my critters out there in the wild and you’re unsure if it’s legit, please don’t hesitate to email me. Sometimes, I have to deal with a breach, but most of the time, it’s on the level. But I still love to see where people find my work, as licensed products often end up in places I’ve never been.
Try out the Happy Color app! You can download it from Google Play or the Apple App Store. You can also follow on Facebook and Instagram.
Happy Colouring!
Cheers,
Patrick
