At what point does it become my own pattern?

[LowPolyRen]

There have been a handful of patterns that I’ve used as the basis for some creations, but Ive always managed to end up going in a wildly different-yet similar direction with the design.

This lady is one of them-
I didnt follow the pattern for more than 1/2 of her torso, and her cape is 100% just me having fun
I also didn’t end up following the rest of the pattern as it was written because it just kinda stopped working at a point.

Then there are my little spritlings, who Ive never followed the pattern through 100% even once
This is the Mushroom Sprite pattern from Little Knot of Horror:

And so is this:

I end up taking such incredible deviations from the patterns that it stops feeling like I’m following one at all.
Are they just mods?
I don’t know.
I know that it makes it much harder to post a journal about them though.

It’s something that Ive not understood for a long time. Much like gender, I find the concept of owning a design to be wild and foreign. Even if I create a pattern, I hope people make their own versions of them, have fun woth them, and go absolutely nuts with them.
A pattern, to me, is just a recipe. It can be modified to suit the taste of the individual… and at some point, it becomes a whole different recipe that gets shared, just to see the same thing repeat. It’s why we have so many kinds of bread and cheese.

I’ll happily pay for patterns that excite me.
But I also want to be able to share the changes I’ve done so people can see what potential the pattern can hold.

It’s a complicated question, with no truly correct answer.
These crafts have been around since the beginning. Swifts, spindles, hooks, needles- they are ancient tools. We are merely building on the skills that existed before we learned the craft ourselves.

Recipies are an imprint of experience
Recipies grow and change
Recipies are a historical document
But they are also meant to be shared, I think.

[LowPolyRen]

Here’s the other Mushroom child
I did this one while at an event this last weekend.

[CrochetCutesyCreations]

You have a good point…

[SapphireLilyCreations]

It’s an interesting question. I think changing a pattern for personal use is fine, but it becomes complicated if you wanted to share the instructions with others. Any part that was written by a person other than you would not be okay to claim as your own.

Basically, if you wanted to share a pattern then you would need to have crafted it yourself from scratch. Everybody builds from experience, but using basic techniques learnt from others is different from taking part of someone else’s work and expanding on it. It may be okay in some fields like scientific research, but patterns I think are more comparable to novels where it would be like taking the start of someone’s book word for word and changing the ending.

It might be okay to to share just the modifications that you made, if you don’t include any instructions from the original. That way the designer’s work is not being redistributed, but others could obtain the pattern by themselves and use your modifications to reproduce the same result.

My conclusion I guess, is that patterns in general are more like paintings or novels than they are like recipes or formulas.

[Hartme]

Here’s the thing, those patterns aren’t technically “yours” sure, it’s up for debate, but if you want to create a pattern, even if it has the same general idea as another pattern you need to create it completely from scratch for it to be “yours”

[Sharkyyy]

Did you free hand that!?!?!?!?!??!?

[tygger428]

Using any part of someone else’s pattern as part of “your” own pattern would make “your” pattern a derivative work. And the actual copyright owner would (possibly) have a case to sue you.

Of course a qualified intellectual property lawyer would have to advise you on the specifics. But it is best to create works that are totally and uniquely yours and not based on anyone else’s work

Using images or characters that you don’t own (Disney, Sanrio, POJ, Nintendo, Harry Potter, sports logos, Marvel Comics, etc) as “inspiration” will get you sued for copyright and/or trademark infringement

[LowPolyRen]

Yeah, I free-handed all the changes

[LowPolyRen]

in most cases, i only barely follow the basic outline of the pattern.
Most patterns are derivative of ones that have existed before, especially when people try to claim the basic granny squares or graphs.
It’s difficult to decipher where the line is I think.
Almost all dolls have the same starting points, and very rarely are there differences.
The variances between patterns vary only slightly and that’s why I’m wondering.
Im not going to point out patterns specifically, because thats just bad taste on my part, but more than 60 people have the same pattern available as something they designed. Its likely not something that they concocted themselves.
Many pieces of design theory for patterns are directly linked to historical patterns, including lace, hats, bags, and really bizarre plush.
My “Elephant in the room” uses a pattern from the 1970s as the inspiration. While altering the design almost entirely some things remained the same out of necessity to retain the “authentic” feel of the finished piece. Oh my a spoiler:

I also used part of a bird as the basis of my Biolante, but it’s difficult to tell how it was used. If you can figure out which bird pattern I used, I would be shocked in all honesty.

So again, at which point does it stop being derivative?
I have made many, many edits to existing patterns, to the point that the original pattern can’t be seen.
My concern is just that I would like to be able to share the things that I have come up with without feeling like I’m stepping on people’s toes.

The other thing, abput crochet patterns being IP, is that it is a very, very difficult thing to prove in any way unless a direct liscence is owned. The issue with that is how the ability to copyright math and stitch order falls apart due to how those laws are structured.

I am a painter. I am an illustrator. I am a sculptor of sorts. I am also a writer.
It’s something that I am very filiar with, which is why it becomes muddy for me. I know how painful it is to see hard work stolen, but I also have no problem with people learning skills from experiencing my work or seeing my creative process.

At the event I went to last weekend, not a single person credited the designer of the patterns they used. Which is such a shame. But its difficult to credit people if 60+ people claim to own the same design.

That’s why i’m wondering.

[TheForestFrog]

I think that whatever you modified is yours, but anything that you did when following the pattern exactly is theirs. if that makes sense.

[SapphireLilyCreations]

I’ve heard that there is a bit of an established precedent regarding this topic in the world of program coding. If lines of code were used from someone else’s work then it is considered liable to be sued, even if 99% of the program was your own coding.

There are different ways of achieving of the same result (even if they are only slight differences). While a single line might be basic enough to be coincidental, several lines can be a clear link to another person’s work (especially if they achieve a certain result that you were struggling to obtain).

The safest way is if you saw something you would like to create, and designed something similar stitch by stitch yourself rather than using some of their instructions to get yourself started. It also comes down to a moral standpoint, as you will know that you didn’t take any of their pattern to create yours even if it looks similar. Sometimes what people make are very basic and the way to create those shapes are relatively standardised (for example, crocheted bees), but in these cases designers can create differences to make their pattern more distinct such as how they achieved clean stripes or the shape / attachment of the wings.

The idea of people trying to claim simple stitches or concepts like granny squares isn’t realistic. There’s always going to be a certain amount of basic knowledge that can’t be copyrighted otherwise people wouldn’t be able to create new things. The key thing is to use these basic concepts to build your own unique creation which you can claim.

Essentially, if you wanted to share a complete pattern and maintain a moral high ground then you’d need to approach it from scratch. You would know if you took part of your work from someone else’s and unethical people might be okay with that, but a designer would feel more confident about their pattern if they knew that although it is emulating basic shapes, they wrote down independently which combination of stitches they used and in which place. Learning skills and how to structure things from someone else is different from taking part of their creation to build your own. If your own pattern looks different enough from the original that you can’t see a resemblance anymore, then you didn’t need to use that pattern as a framework in the first place. Once you have the idea for how to form a shape, without looking at other people’s instructions just start trying to sculpt what you want and write it down as you go. There will be differences between how you create it and how someone else would have (e.g. where you placed an increase or how many rounds you did). Even for modified designs you have already made but want to share, just start crocheting from scratch adding in your established modifications as you go (try to avoid remembering how the other patterns built those sections and go with your own instinct)

[TheForestFrog]

You put that so perfectly
Something I wanted to add:
A majority of amigurumi patterns will start something like this:

1. 6 sc into mc
2. 6 inc
3. (sc, inc) x6 (18)
4. (2sc, inc) x6 (24)
5. (3sc, inc) x6 (30)

And it keeps going. This is so common that using this method isn’t stealing at all, very similar to the granny square thing. This is just a simple way to make a circle/hexagon. And many people will then do rows of sc and then rows of dec, this is just how to make a circle. So if you are using this method: don’t feel bad at all, this is very common and has been normalized.
If that made sense

[LowPolyRen]

As a result of this conversation, I decided to pattern out my own doll body completely.
I structure feet differently than a lot of people with an offset circle to start. It allows me to add toes which i love to do.
I’ll be sharing this pattern later on after I figure out how my math got messed up but still worked.
Mushroom hats become easy to share design-wise after this point as a result.
The head on mine is smaller, but I think its a net good for the hats I make anyways.

[aeryneso]

ooh, it looks great!!