Figure templates in vector from traced renders (Concerns)

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Figure templates in vector from traced renders (Concerns)

Postby alex_farlie » Fri Sep 08, 2017 11:35 am

(I will be posting a followup later, when I've had a chance to rethink things, It seems that this posting below was motivated by an over-abundance of caution, that based on some apparent misconceptions. Feedback is welcomed in support of proving that I was in fact wrong. I'd like to apologise and hope that further debate on this issue can be to the standard the community expects.)

This is posted in follow up to the topic here - viewtopic.php?f=6&t=14866

In that thread a use-case of using a combination of Make Human , (potentially Blender) and a vector drawing tool to create 'figure templates' was identified. However, the conclusion was reached that it wasn't possible to use Make Human as the first step for this, because of the strong licensing model currently used.

I am therefore opening a new discussion here so that there can be a further debate and possibly a fix to the licensing model implemented to make what is and what is not allowed explicitly clear.

Currently, the licensing advice in the FAQ states that some exported models can be used under CC-0, and it's strongly hinted in the fuller licensing explanation that individual 2D renders could potentially be CC-0 as well (provided that neither use third party assets under a different license), It doesn't however to my reading clearly and explicitly state that rendered 2D "program output" is CC-0 directly in all instances.

Once a set of 2D renders is obtained, the next step in the use case would be to trace these in an appropriate vector tool ( the industry leader would be the proprietary Adobe Illustrator). A personal view expressed in the earlier thread was that SVG/EPS should be treated as 2D render. I wasn't necessarily convinced by this and expressed a view that an explicit "license to trace" needed to be indicated.

Additionally in a tracing into a vector format it would be possible to create 'generic' figure templates ( by identifying muscle groups and joint points) building up a figure pose as a hierarchy of paths and linked rotation centres, which in it's ultimate implementation could be a digital analogue to the real-world figure templates used by designers on drawing boards. My conclusion was that despite the intermediate step of a render, this was getting unacceptably close to the sort of 'workaround' engineering that someone with ill intent could use to replicate an AGPL covered asset. Providing the whole of the Make Human source code (many MB) in order to have a usable and complaint (with AGPL) vector figure template which is typically a few K in size would be laughable, and hence it was concluded that without an explict "manual trace and pose" grant under Creative Commons terms it was impossible to safely make "usable" generic figure template using MakeHuman as the first step.

Without a "fix" to the licensing model to allow "manual trace and pose" on the vector side of things (without the AGPL terms becoming involved), the use of MakeHuman for this use case is suppressed (even where the intent would be for the 'generic' figure template to licensed as CC-BY-SA for example), and because there is no actively available "free" alternative, the use of proprietary tools (e.g Poser) is inadvertently encouraged. There also being very few 'figure templates' available that are license compatible with a 'free' (i.e Creative Commons) design infrastructure, the use of proprietary resources is also encouraged in preference to "free" ones. This is NOT and should NOT be a situation that an item of "free software" should be encouraging (however inadvertently).

The "fix" for this usage case "bug", (as opposed to a bug in the source code) would be to explicitly :
* State renders (as opposed to 2D "assests" are covered under CC-0 (provided that user contributed resources under other licenses are not involved.)
* Permit "manual tracings" to be made from 2D renders into vector explicitly. (I'm excluding automatic tracing with good reason here, for broadly the same reasons as given in the explanation given in the licensing advice.)
* Permit the use of "manual tracings" in the creation of generic figure templates for use in 2D artwork EXPLICITLY, and to allow that artwork to be distributed. (This would essentially be a clarification of the 'modify' clause the FAQ already indicates.) . The 'model' effectively being a 2d one instead of a 3D one.
*Potentially Change the licensing model so that "program output" (e.g exports and renders), underlying data model are under CLEARLY SEPARATE and EXPLICITLY stated licences from the source code, (OpenStreetMap for example, has a licensing model where the platform's source code is mostly GPL, MIT etc.. , the database model and data is under ODbL, and derived renders are under CC-BY-SA.) This to me seems to be a much cleaner approach, then the AGPL/CC-0 "exception" model currently used for MakeHuman.)

These changes would greatly assist the use case concern, and help make it more attractive compared to proprietary tools.
Last edited by alex_farlie on Fri Sep 08, 2017 8:35 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Figure templates in vector from traced renders impossibl

Postby wolgade » Fri Sep 08, 2017 3:56 pm

alex_farlie wrote:In that thread a use-case of using a combination of Make Human , (potentially Blender) and a vector drawing tool to create 'figure templates' was identified. However, the conclusion was reached that it wasn't possible to use Make Human as the first step for this, because of the strong licensing model currently used.

I'm not entirely sure whether I'm feeding a troll. In case I'm not: You can use your rendered images as you like as long as no assets from the user repo are involved.
alex_farlie wrote:Currently, the licensing advice in the FAQ states that some exported models can be used under CC-0, and it's strongly hinted in the fuller licensing explanation that individual 2D renders could potentially be CC-0 as well (provided that neither use third party assets under a different license), It doesn't however to my reading clearly and explicitly state that rendered 2D "program output" is CC-0 directly in all instances.

No one will claim copyright on your work. The license exists in this specific way to avoid getting ripped of by some assholes.
alex_farlie wrote:Once a set of 2D renders is obtained, the next step in the use case would be to trace these in an appropriate vector tool ( the industry leader would be the proprietary Adobe Illustrator). A personal view expressed in the earlier thread was that SVG/EPS should be treated as 2D render. I wasn't necessarily convinced by this and expressed a view that an explicit "license to trace" needed to be indicated.

WTF? If you own the copyright of your creation, and that's what CC0 makes sure, you don't need a "license to trace". You can do what you want with the image.
alex_farlie wrote:My conclusion was that despite the intermediate step of a render, this was getting unacceptably close to the sort of 'workaround' engineering that someone with ill intent could use to replicate an AGPL covered asset.

And this conclusion is plain wrong. Your vector graphics are in no way derived work of the MH code and models.
alex_farlie wrote:the use of proprietary tools (e.g Poser) is inadvertently encouraged.

Good luck, but be sure to read their license terms. I read the DAZ license a while back. That's quite a bit more restrictive than MH.
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Re: Figure templates in vector from traced renders impossibl

Postby blindsaypatten » Fri Sep 08, 2017 4:42 pm

The way that I read it, the exported model is CC0 and you can do whatever you want with it, but, it states that just because the export is CC0 does not allow you to reverse engineer MakeHuman assets using the generated exports. I don't think that the ban on reverse engineering is actually part of the export license, the CC0 license is what it is and can't be modified by other sections of the MakeHuman license. They are simply informing you that if you believe that reverse engineering is allowed just because the export is CC0, in their opinion you are wrong.

In the referenced thread, you express a concern about a third party using your vector output to create something that violated the reverse engineering prohibition. I don't think that is something you are required to be concerned with, as long as you don't recreate the MakeHuman assets yourself you are in the clear, it is the recreation of the MakeHuman assets (i.e. reverse engineering) that is prohibited.

I am not familiar with figure tracing specifically, but it is hard to imagine that the figure tracing would even be a useful intermediate step when the exported model itself is already available.

In short, the acid test is, have you recreated a MakeHuman asset? How convoluted a sequence of intermediate steps you have taken isn't relevant, only whether you have recreated a licensed asset. Your figure template, regardless of whether it could be useful for reverse engineering, doesn't involve recreating a MakeHuman asset so it is entirely in the clear.

I'm not a lawyer, and neither do I play one on TV.
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Re: Figure templates in vector from traced renders impossibl

Postby alex_farlie » Fri Sep 08, 2017 5:08 pm

wolgade wrote:I'm not entirely sure whether I'm feeding a troll. In case I'm not: You can use your rendered images as you like as long as no assets from the user repo are involved.


Not a troll, just someone that got overly concerned (to apparently paranoid levels) about ensuring something was acceptable. Your feedback in support of renders (and by extension vectorisations) being usable under any appropriate license is appreciated. I'll wait and see what other views are expressed before I make a fuller follow-up post, when I am in a better mood to do so.
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Re: Figure templates in vector from traced renders (Concerns

Postby alex_farlie » Fri Sep 08, 2017 6:18 pm

For context, I will attempt to add some background to use case and why I was trying to figure (sic) things out. (I've got no objections to this being split out or moved to another forum if it's more appropriate.)

In "fashion illustration", in 2D formats sketches explanations and "plates" are often based on stylised human forms.

Whilst there are sites like http://www.designersnexus.com/fashion-d ... -template/ that offer a myriad of templates for example, the resources they offer are in no way compatible with a Creative Commons based design infrastructure.

It was hoped that it would be possible to use Make Human and a vector tool to make a set of 2D fashion pose/ figure template artworks that were :

* "Freely" licensable as Creative Commons, ( Compatibility with CC-BY-SA was the key requirement)
* Which could be posed in the relevant vector tool directly, (Not all Vector tools have support for the relevant 'connectors/constraint' functionality needed though.) to accommodate the infinite variety of variant poses, that it would be impossible to design artwork for directly.
* Over which additional artwork for clothing/ accessories and so on could be added to create designs/sketchs and so on.. that could be used for the same purposes as hand-drawn fashion sketches and illustrations would be.
* Able to be exported to appropriate formats such as EPS/SVG.

I'd not found ANY "freely licensed" tool to generate such template poses, and was told on another forum that even getting a flash based web tool for generating them developed independently would involve a substantial capital outlay.

If the licensing of MakeHuman exports/renders does permit the creation of such templates (by tracing from CC0 renders for example) then I would very strongly like to see them created, as I strongly felt there was a need for free resources in this area to document certain things related to costume design, such as various cat-suit designs for example. (I felt more comfortable doing this in 2D with suitable template artwork, then I did in trying to build a complete 3D catsuit model in a tool like Blender.)

The input of the MakeHuman (and Blender users) here on how a set of "MakeFashionPose" or "MakeCroquiPose" artwork could be generated, would be greatly appreciated. You are probably more aware of what the tool-chain can do compared to someone more used to 2D artwork and hand-sketching such as myself.
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Re: Figure templates in vector from traced renders (Concerns

Postby alex_farlie » Sat Sep 09, 2017 10:26 am

See also https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Comm ... creenshots.

Unless there's an 'explicit' and clear provision in the licensing separating "program output" from the source code license (as there is with exported models), (the crux of this being the clause mentioned here viewtopic.php?f=6&t=14866#p41357. as to what exactly constitutes an asset), the current situation is that screenshots and renders (As opposed to models) directly from MakeHuman cannot be relied upon to be CC-0. (This is despite the fact that a render from MakeHuman, would avoid the intermediate step of exporting a CC-0 model into another open source tool like Blender, where it would ultimately be rendered anyway.).

Thusly, until the licensing is 'fixed' to make the CC-0 exception explicit with regard to "program output" in 2D form as suggested in the first posting to this thread, I will continue to hold the view that it is NOT possible to make 'usable' renders or traces from it's output, relying on the CC-0 exception for exported models and 2D 'assets'. Whilst the CC-0 clause is stated to cover models, it should be amended to also cover renders of the relevant models.

I won't now be using MakeHuman, until this issue is satisfactorily resolved. I would strongly urge that the licensing is amended as suggested previously.
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Re: Figure templates in vector from traced renders (Concerns

Postby alex_farlie » Sat Sep 09, 2017 10:56 am

alex_farlie wrote:.. the crux of this being the clause mentioned here viewtopic.php?f=6&t=14866#p41357. ..]


If this was amended from the current reading - "b) the asset solely consists of a 2D binary image in PNG, BMP or JPG format." (which was stated to cover 2D renders)

to ..

"b) the asset is a 2D binary image , being a provided texture in the official distribution of the software, rendering generated from an official version of the software, or screenshot of the software in use , in PNG, BMP or JPG format.; or is 2D vector artwork in an appropriate format such as EPS or SVG, derived or created from the same or a model (a), by manual means."

Then the issue would be satisfactorily resolved. I've no included DWG or AI as vector formats as they are Proprietary.
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Re: Figure templates in vector from traced renders (Concerns

Postby Aranuvir » Sat Sep 09, 2017 12:23 pm

TL;DR, sorry, so I might have missed the point. And I'm just a moderator. But first of all, did you read the explanation http://www.makehuman.org/license_explanation.php ?
AGPL applies to anything which is a combination, derivate or aggregate. However, there is also limit to this. Once there is no trace whatsoever of any AGPL:ed original data in an asset, it can no longer be counted as a derivate. When exactly this happens is something of a philosophical question, but as a few guidelines, we think that the following examples no longer actually contain any traces of target data or the default mesh:

A rendered 2D image
A screenshot
A video posted on youtube

They do (in all likelihood) still contain traces of things such as skin textures. These are originally 2D images. Which is why we explicitly give the permission to use such assets under a CC0 license.

So in summary: As long as you're not doing something very odd (such as reverse-engineering target data, or building aggregate software with the MakeHuman application) you can be pretty sure that any 2D graphical end result of a pipeline is outside what we claim license control over.

Though the website is considered outdated, this still applies. We should copy this explanation to the current website...

alex_farlie wrote:Currently, the licensing advice in the FAQ states that some exported models can be used under CC-0, and it's strongly hinted in the fuller licensing explanation that individual 2D renders could potentially be CC-0 as well (provided that neither use third party assets under a different license), It doesn't however to my reading clearly and explicitly state that rendered 2D "program output" is CC-0 directly in all instances.

It isn't that easy. When creating your own MakeHuman assets or using other third party stuff you will have to take care of other licenses, trademarks, etc. Consider the case you are creating some clothing with a bitten-into windfall fruit logo on it, or a paw logo, you might get requests from some big companies. Or if you search the forums, you will find users who copied 3d-objects from some games, transformed that stuff in a way it fits into MakeHuman and uploaded it to the forums. This stolen data (sorry but it must be called in this way) will neither be CC0 because the user provided the stuff as CC0 nor because it was piped through MakeHuman.
In short words this is a problem of license mixing. And the result cannot always be CC0. And the MakeHuman Team cannot give a global CC0 absolution for things they do not own!
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Re: Figure templates in vector from traced renders (Concerns

Postby alex_farlie » Sat Sep 09, 2017 1:07 pm

Aranuvir wrote:TL;DR, sorry, so I might have missed the point. And I'm just a moderator. But first of all, did you read the explanation http://www.makehuman.org/license_explanation.php ?
AGPL applies to anything which is a combination, derivate or aggregate. However, there is also limit to this. Once there is no trace whatsoever of any AGPL:ed original data in an asset, it can no longer be counted as a derivate. When exactly this happens is something of a philosophical question, but as a few guidelines, we think that the following examples no longer actually contain any traces of target data or the default mesh:

A rendered 2D image
A screenshot
A video posted on youtube

They do (in all likelihood) still contain traces of things such as skin textures. These are originally 2D images. Which is why we explicitly give the permission to use such assets under a CC0 license.

So in summary: As long as you're not doing something very odd (such as reverse-engineering target data, or building aggregate software with the MakeHuman application) you can be pretty sure that any 2D graphical end result of a pipeline is outside what we claim license control over.

Though the website is considered outdated, this still applies. We should copy this explanation to the current website...

alex_farlie wrote:Currently, the licensing advice in the FAQ states that some exported models can be used under CC-0, and it's strongly hinted in the fuller licensing explanation that individual 2D renders could potentially be CC-0 as well (provided that neither use third party assets under a different license), It doesn't however to my reading clearly and explicitly state that rendered 2D "program output" is CC-0 directly in all instances.

It isn't that easy. When creating your own MakeHuman assets or using other third party stuff you will have to take care of other licenses, trademarks, etc. Consider the case you are creating some clothing with a bitten-into windfall fruit logo on it, or a paw logo, you might get requests from some big companies. Or if you search the forums, you will find users who copied 3d-objects from some games, transformed that stuff in a way it fits into MakeHuman and uploaded it to the forums. This stolen data (sorry but it must be called in this way) will neither be CC0 because the user provided the stuff as CC0 nor because it was piped through MakeHuman.
In short words this is a problem of license mixing. And the result cannot always be CC0. And the MakeHuman Team cannot give a global CC0 absolution for things they do not own!



I had read the explanation, the crux of the issue being what 'asset' meant, 2D renders (and by extension derived traces) were not explicitly mentioned in the license, the reasoning expressed in the explanation also wasn't explicitly encoded in the actual license, even if most of the community was following the explanation over the license itself. I prefer to work on a principle that unless something is allowed explicitly (and stated as such in a license), it's best to assume it isn't.

That third-party assets (i.e not those in the default distribution) would be under other licenses was clearly understood, I said as much : "..(provided that neither use third party assets under a different license).." , It could perhaps have been stated more clearly.

The short version: To me the license, needed to clearly and explicitly state that, PROVIDED third party assets are NOT involved, 2D renders from the program are allowed by the exception, and that they can be used, modified etc as is already stated for exported models. To me the current wording didn't do that, and hence as stated it wasn't "reasonable" to rely entirely on either the exception or the "philosophical" limit in the advice.

Changing the license would make explicit, the implied reasoning (and the advice) most of the community has been expressing. (Setting clearly defined limits to license scope as opposed to "philosophical" ones, is to me also a lot clearer to users.).

I'm sorry if this sounds like I'm being pedanatic or paranoid, but I felt caution was better then the attitude of the people that would quite happily use something "because it's from a "free" tool the render/screenshot etc is also "free"..." ( a logic that has frequently been rejected often on a wiki I contribute to.)

If it's felt that renders are acceptable (per the CC-0 exception, which only the developers, holders of the license could ultimately confirm, I felt) then the license, the explanation and FAQ should ideally be updated to reflect this. Currently the relevant FAQ section deals with models not renders, even though the same logic would in my view apply. If the FAQ was updated, I'd be happier, but I won't be fully convinced until the license itself is updated.

As to the issue of 'stolen' content, users that try to repackage 'proprietary' content as free, aren't helpful to communities trying to make "free" tools and resources. The number of images I've had to flag on a wiki site I contribute to, because a number of people don't understand content licensing issues is suprising :roll:

I am quite prepared to accept that "renders" are CC-0 (noting the third party asset issue naturally) and that traces would be fine, provided I can back up such a claim by showing people the relevant license text 8-)
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Re: Figure templates in vector from traced renders (Concerns

Postby joepal » Mon Sep 11, 2017 9:24 am

The reason the MakeHuman license doesn't mention third-part assets, and won't be modified to do so, is that the MakeHuman crew does not have any copyright/owner relation to the third part assets. Simply put: they're not ours to have an opinion about. We can't write license terms about stuff we don't own.
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http://www.palmius.com/joel
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