Matt Buck's Hack Cartoons

Regrettably, my Hack cartoons Northern Rocky animated political cartoon for Channel 4 has run into some legal issues. Click the picture to see more.

Matt Buck’s animated drawings

One of the most difficult things about making things is knowing what your rights are when you try to sell them. I know lots of very experienced professionals who are in ignorance of this basic business issue. This ignorance can lead to a lot of difficult financial and legal problems. The most basic confusion I come across is that between possession of copyright and the licensing of rights.

Briefly, at any time an artist makes a piece of art he has copyright automatically, without doing anything. It is an 'implicit' right earned by the skill and time and labour which the artwork has taken. There's a link explaining more about it here. You can download a pdf factsheet here. Importantly, before any self-employed artist has no legal claim to copyright, they have to have signed it away, in writing. Once this basic legal idea is understood, things can seem a lot clearer.

Essentially, what creative people like me sell are the rights to use our artwork, usually, exclusively. I will write some more about this.

Matt Buck’s animated drawings