Topic: Tagging character_(modeller) for 3D image

Posted under General

This is very 3D specific.

We have a situation where there are multiple Loona/FNAF/other models that I feel should have modeller tag. My argument for tagging modellers is that people may like a character but not like a specific model of said character or they might want to see a specific model.

For major characters like Loona, it's unnecessary to use Loona_(owner) since the owner is in the copyright section. For smaller characters, there is an issue where there can be 2D art of them 3D art such as is with medivh_(soundvariations) which is character_(owner) so you could make the argument on should the owner be in the tag or modeller, however for small characters like this it's unnecessary to have any parenthesis tag as they would almost never have a second model of their oc. For those specific rare cases, it would have to be taken as they come.

There is also an argument that what if you have, say, a 3D model Link but it's not Nintendo's Link but an OC Link not related to the Zelda universe a all. You wouldn't be able to tag it as Link_(modeller) because that assumes that it's Nintendo's link since there's no owner [Link_(owner)] and you also can't tag both. A solution to this would just use Link_(owner).

But now you see a new problem. Can we agree to use a character_(owner/modeller) in the same format? I think that's the best compromise vs not having a modeller listed at all thus not being able to blacklist/search for a specific model, and not having to figure out how to put the modeller in the meta tags since you're not supposed to put the modeller in the artist tag since they're not the one who made the image.

bdanimare said:
We have a situation where there are multiple Loona/FNAF/other models that I feel should have modeller tag. My argument for tagging modellers is that people may like a character but not like a specific model of said character or they might want to see a specific model.

This wouldn't work very well, for cases where a modeller makes different versions of a model for the same character (or for different characters of the same name). Or if someone makes a model, and someone else modifies the model such that you can tell it's that model as the base but not exactly the same.

There's also a more general issue where a modeller makes a model, and different people use the same model for different (or generic/unnamed) characters. For example, if someone makes a Toothless model, someone else does a small modification to (e.g. changes the body texture) and says it's their character not Toothless.

watsit said:
This wouldn't work very well, for cases where a modeller makes different versions of a model for the same character (or for different characters of the same name). Or if someone makes a model, and someone else modifies the model such that you can tell it's that model as the base but not exactly the same.

There's also a more general issue where a modeller makes a model, and different people use the same model for different (or generic/unnamed) characters. For example, if someone makes a Toothless model, someone else does a small modification to (e.g. changes the body texture) and says it's their character not Toothless.

...modeller makes different versions of a model for the same character...

loona_(aeridiccore) and loona_(carbiid3) have that exact issue but the compromise is to just use the modeller name and not worry about the different versions.

Or if someone makes a model, and someone else modifies the model such that you can tell it's that model as the base but not exactly the same.

That's up for discussion.

There's also a more general issue where a modeller makes a model, and different people use the same model for different (or generic/unnamed) characters. For example, if someone makes a Toothless model, someone else does a small modification to (e.g. changes the body texture) and says it's their character not Toothless.

That's also up for discussion. I've seen it with the fnaf models with recolours but the tags show that they just tag both the base model's name and the oc's name so it's another compromise. Also up for discussion.

I don’t have much to add, but I’m in favor. We need to have a way to blacklist certain models, like some of those fnaf models that are very popular but (imo) extremely ugly. If there’s no way to blacklist them, then it doesn’t make much sense to cite the “refusal to use blacklist” rule against people when they go to the comments to complain about them, and I can definitely imagine people wanting to blacklist those.

I personally feel it's especially critical that we work out a means to allow searching/blacklisting on the basis of a specific 3D model.
3DCG is unique in that it can make perfectly consistent depictions of the same character, even when the same asset is used by different creators (and in fact they'll even propagate in a way that isn't true for 2D art because of how easy it is to reuse a model.)

scaliespe said:
I don’t have much to add, but I’m in favor. We need to have a way to blacklist certain models, like some of those fnaf models that are very popular but (imo) extremely ugly. If there’s no way to blacklist them, then it doesn’t make much sense to cite the “refusal to use blacklist” rule against people when they go to the comments to complain about them, and I can definitely imagine people wanting to blacklist those.

I could tag them as character_(disembowwel or redeye) but the problem is, there's 3 versions of the model. disembowwel's is easy to tell (at least if you can see the feet) and is the oldest. redeye's update is what the vast majority of those models are and psychojohn made an update to that but it's close enough to the redeye version that I'd might as well label it as redeye.

lafcadio said:
I personally feel it's especially critical that we work out a means to allow searching/blacklisting on the basis of a specific 3D model.
3DCG is unique in that it can make perfectly consistent depictions of the same character, even when the same asset is used by different creators (and in fact they'll even propagate in a way that isn't true for 2D art because of how easy it is to reuse a model.)

Exactly. We need a standard though, and I think my solution is the best compromise.

scaliespe said:
I don’t have much to add, but I’m in favor. We need to have a way to blacklist certain models, like some of those fnaf models that are very popular but (imo) extremely ugly.

lafcadio said:
I personally feel it's especially critical that we work out a means to allow searching/blacklisting on the basis of a specific 3D model.
3DCG is unique in that it can make perfectly consistent depictions of the same character, even when the same asset is used by different creators (and in fact they'll even propagate in a way that isn't true for 2D art because of how easy it is to reuse a model.)

These really look like they're talking about the style someone depicts a character as, and wanting to blacklist or search a specific style of character. It's more akin to on_model as an indicator for the style a character is depicted in, and expanding that to include potentially every artist/modeller seems untenable. Yes, models may make the process of sharing a particular style of character easier, but it is still possible with 2D art (as well as 2D depictions of 3D models). People have gotten very adept at emulating Ken Sugimori's depictions of pokemon and pokemon characters, for example, and there is plenty of 2D art based on 3D models. This would be akin to adding tags like misty_(ken_sugimori) and pikachu_(kosaku_anakubo) and piccolo_(akira_toriyama). Since a style isn't a character (the same model/depiction can be used for different characters, e.g. my Toothless example), it would create confusion to tag them as characters. Model and style inspiration information has typically gone into the post description, as there isn't a way to tag that stuff without creating thousands of tags from every model or design used by more than one artist, on top of such information not fitting into the existing tag categories.

And as we see both here and in the FNAF model thread, the delineation of when it counts for a "different model" after edits are made isn't clear, nor is finding out who the true source is. An animator can say where they got a model from (if they remember), not necessarily who the true source is.

Thanks to an update for how description searches work, can't we blacklist by phrases in description, now? Say, to avoid a voice artist.

alphamule said:
Thanks to an update for how description searches work, can't we blacklist by phrases in description, now? Say, to avoid a voice artist.

The problem is that most people don't write anything in the description so it wouldn't work as well.

bdanimare said:
The problem is that most people don't write anything in the description so it wouldn't work as well.

That begs the question, would it be allowed to edit the description to include such information? Even if the original artist's description didn't include it?

I think that may solve the issue for the time being

m3g4p0n1 said:
That begs the question, would it be allowed to edit the description to include such information? Even if the original artist's description didn't include it?

As far as I know, yes. As long as it's relevant to the post and you didn't make it up as a third-party.

m3g4p0n1 said:
That begs the question, would it be allowed to edit the description to include such information? Even if the original artist's description didn't include it?

I think that may solve the issue for the time being

descriptions are allowed to include any additional information or metadata about the post itself that would otherwise go unserved by tags and source links.

be sure to keep the original artist's post description and any additional information separate, though.

m3g4p0n1 said:
That begs the question, would it be allowed to edit the description to include such information? Even if the original artist's description didn't include it?

I think that may solve the issue for the time being

I did that just recently, so I sure hope so! Put in a note that the source link only works with http and not https.

sipothac said:
descriptions are allowed to include any additional information or metadata about the post itself that would otherwise go unserved by tags and source links.

be sure to keep the original artist's post description and any additional information separate, though.

Good ol' section D-tag.

m3g4p0n1 said:
That begs the question, would it be allowed to edit the description to include such information? Even if the original artist's description didn't include it?

I think that may solve the issue for the time being

It could but as a more permanent solution only allowing it in descriptions would mean that a lot of models would go untagged and it only creates friction in both not being able to easily see that it's a suggested tag and adding an extra step to uploads.

I still think it's crazy that the modeler, the literal sculpter of the figure, isn't allowed to be credited as an artist along with whoever posed the model to created the final image. The modeler did a very large portion of the work!

cloudpie said:
I still think it's crazy that the modeler, the literal sculpter of the figure, isn't allowed to be credited as an artist along with whoever posed the model to created the final image. The modeler did a very large portion of the work!

yeah, I'm not sure I totally jive with any of the reasoning given against tagging modelers as contributing artists to a render. I've only ever seen the arguments for this made by a janator and a now former admin.

it seems really strange to gimp the core functions of a tag because the tags existence on the tag list might contribute to some minor confusion as to the level of an artist's participation in a given piece.

sipothac said:
yeah, I'm not sure I totally jive with any of the reasoning given against tagging modelers as contributing artists to a render. I've only ever seen the arguments for this made by a janator and a now former admin.

it seems really strange to gimp the core functions of a tag because the tags existence on the tag list might contribute to some minor confusion as to the level of an artist's participation in a given piece.

Yeah. Like with any other collaboration, if there's confusion, the "who did what" information can be included in the description

sipothac said:
yeah, I'm not sure I totally jive with any of the reasoning given against tagging modelers as contributing artists to a render. I've only ever seen the arguments for this made by a janator and a now former admin.

it seems really strange to gimp the core functions of a tag because the tags existence on the tag list might contribute to some minor confusion as to the level of an artist's participation in a given piece.

It should go in the character tag as character_(modeller) I think, because sticking it in the artist tag only leads to confusion. If you wanted to search for models that were made by someone specific, you'd always be able to do *(modeller) as a search.

Updated

cloudpie said:
Yeah. Like with any other collaboration, if there's confusion, the "who did what" information can be included in the description

Like I said, the problem with putting it in the description is that it adds friction and leads to posts not being tagged with it at all and makes it harder for people to search for things.

cloudpie said:
I still think it's crazy that the modeler, the literal sculpter of the figure, isn't allowed to be credited as an artist along with whoever posed the model to created the final image. The modeler did a very large portion of the work!

I could see an argument for keeping a modeller and animator separate, at least. If someone's a really good animator and modeller, and their models are used a lot by less good animators, you'd want to be able to search for their animation work without having it flooded out by other less good animators using their models.

bdanimare said:
It should go in the character tag as (character_(modeller) I think

You'll run into problems with that when the modeller does more than one model for the character. Or does a model for a character that is already using a suffix for disambiguation.

bdanimare said:
It should go in the character tag as (character_(modeller) I think, because sticking it in the artist tag only leads to confusion. If you wanted to search for models that were made by someone specific, you'd always be able to do *(modeller) as a search.

for browsing and blacklisting purposes having the modeler's tag added to posts featuring their model would be much more useful than not, which is kind of the reason that tags exist. I don't think that the case of a user being confused is really a good enough argument to impare a tag's function.

also, having to deal with creating a new tag for every time a 3D modeler creates a model of a new character seems extremely clunky if not entirely untenable.

bdanimare said:
Like I said, the problem with putting it in the description is that it adds friction and leads to posts not being tagged with it at all and makes it harder for people to search for things.

Sorry maybe I wasn't clear, I meant that I think the modeler AND animator/person who rendered the image/whatever should both be tagged as artists, and then the description could say like "models by PersonA, animation by PersonB"

watsit said:
I could see an argument for keeping a modeller and animator separate, at least. If someone's a really good animator and modeller, and their models are used a lot by less good animators, you'd want to be able to search for their animation work without having it flooded out by other less good animators using their models.

You'll run into problems with that when the modeller does more than one model for the character. Or does a model for a character that is already using a suffix for disambiguation.

I thought I mentioned that in my original post but I guess not. My solution to that would be to just tag it as the same modeller. The instances are so rare (I can only think of loona_(aeridiccore) and loona_(carbiid3) that doing so wouldn't be an issue. I highly doubt one modeller is going to make 5 different versions of a model.

sipothac said:
for browsing and blacklisting purposes having the modeler's tag added to posts featuring their model would be much more useful than not, which is kind of the reason that tags exist. I don't think that the case of a user being confused is really a good enough argument to impare a tag's function.

also, having to deal with creating a new tag for every time a 3D modeler creates a model of a new character seems extremely clunky if not entirely untenable.

My confusion comment was for putting it in the artist section. It should still be implemented but in the way I described.

cloudpie said:
Sorry maybe I wasn't clear, I meant that I think the modeler AND animator/person who rendered the image/whatever should both be tagged as artists, and then the description could say like "models by PersonA, animation by PersonB"

That would lead to confusion on who animated it and who modelled it because a non-insignificant amount of modellers also animate.

The correct solution to the "who animated" issue is to create a new category of tag for "contributors", people who worked (directly or indirectly) on a post's contents without meeting the current definition of "artist". This category would then also include voice actors. Artists who both model and animate would have two separate tags. This has been suggested on multiple previous occasions and usually shot down on the basis that it would be too much work to define a new value of an existing enum, despite the fact that the enum in question isn't even fully populated (category 2 is currently unused).

bdanimare said:
That would lead to confusion on who animated it and who modelled it because a non-insignificant amount of modellers also animate.

The description would go into further detail about who did what. "model by PersonA, animation by PersonB" "model and animation by PersonA" etc.

wat8548 said:
The correct solution to the "who animated" issue is to create a new category of tag for "contributors", people who worked (directly or indirectly) on a post's contents without meeting the current definition of "artist". This category would then also include voice actors. Artists who both model and animate would have two separate tags. This has been suggested on multiple previous occasions and usually shot down on the basis that it would be too much work to define a new value of an existing enum, despite the fact that the enum in question isn't even fully populated (category 2 is currently unused).

I feel like this has the problem of situations where the person creating a render also is using their own publicly accessable models. should they be tagged as both the artist and a contributor? if we don't then the modeler's own posts won't show up under their contributor tags, and we've kinda just circled back to the start but now with the problem inverted.

the best solution imo would be to tag all artists whose work is visible in (or at least the focus of) a piece under the artist tags, and then use the the description to properly distribute the credit.

Updated

sipothac said:
the best solution imo would be to tag all artists whose work is visible in (or at least the focus of) a piece under the artist tags, and then use the the description to properly distribute the credit.

^^^ I agree with this. I understand why VAs aren't tagged, because they're not part of the visual component, but modelers are visual artists and they created a large amount of the visual portion of the work. In still images where someone else just posed the model and rendered it, the modeler did MOST of the work.

wat8548 said:
The correct solution to the "who animated" issue is to create a new category of tag for "contributors", people who worked (directly or indirectly) on a post's contents without meeting the current definition of "artist". This category would then also include voice actors. Artists who both model and animate would have two separate tags. This has been suggested on multiple previous occasions and usually shot down on the basis that it would be too much work to define a new value of an existing enum, despite the fact that the enum in question isn't even fully populated (category 2 is currently unused).

It would be the best option, and I remember seeing it, but since it won't happen that's why I devised my suggestion.

cloudpie said:
The description would go into further detail about who did what. "model by PersonA, animation by PersonB" "model and animation by PersonA" etc.

It still has the same problems I listed.

sipothac said:
I feel like this has the problem of situations where the person creating a render also is using their own publicly accessable models. should they be tagged as both the artist and a contributor? if we don't then the modeler's own posts won't show up under their contributor tags, and we've kinda just circled back to the start but now with the problem inverted.

the best solution imo would be to tag all artists whose work is visible in (or at least the focus of) a piece under the artist tags, and then use the the description to properly distribute the credit.

But then if said modeller also animates and you only want to see *their* art, you can't, hence my suggestion with the tags.

sipothac said:
I feel like this has the problem of situations where the person creating a render also is using their own publicly accessable models. should they be tagged as both the artist and a contributor?

I don't see why not, though I also don't think this is that big of a problem - if you're interested in the artist's work as a person, you're more likely to be browsing the artist tag anyway.

bdanimare said:
[...]

You know you're allowed to reply to more than one person in the same post, right?

bdanimare said:
What's that?

it only shows posts that contain one artist tag, so if you search for an artist with this in your search it would only show animations and renders made by the artist that made the models and none of the posts made by other artists using those models in their own works.

sipothac said:
it only shows posts that contain one artist tag, so if you search for an artist with this in your search it would only show animations and renders made by the artist that made the models and none of the posts made by other artists using those models in their own works.

I double most people know about that. I'm trying to reduce friction as much as possible.

watsit said:
You'll run into problems with that when the modeller does more than one model for the character. Or does a model for a character that is already using a suffix for disambiguation.

Artist tags already have that issue. Ive seen artists depict their own characters differently between images and some secondary styles i dont like. Just being able to narrow down searches is a good option and also giving credit to the modeler is good too
Maybe if the models are distinct enough that a version number would be warranted. 3D modeling is hard and doesnt need remaking every month so new distinct versions wouldnt be common

Picking the discussion back up, because we still need a solution.
While I understand the problem with the changes to the models making it more difficult to tag them, I say we do it anyway (for a lack of a better alternative). Even if edited, the original model should still be somewhat recognisable (or the editor mentioned somewhere whose model they used? I don’t know if they have to do that in terms of copyright.) And maybe add notable variants to the description of the tag?
Warfare_Machine and Petruz already have separate tags for art they themselves made (warfaremachine and petruz) and when their models are used (warfare_machine and petruz_(copyright) ). The latter are parked in the copyright section of the tags. If we can’t agree on making tags for the models themselves, we could at least tag the modelers and also put them in that section. But we should make it VERY clear that these tags are for the modelers. I remember that especially in the case of Warfare_Machine the tags got mixed up.
Personally, I would be in for tagging the models, at least if they have reached some level of popularity/infamy. I can definitely see people searching for a specific model made by Cally3d (especially with version 3 soon to be released) or wanting to blacklist disembowell’s FNAF models. It could very well be that someone just dislikes specific ones made by the modeler and not all of them. Edit: Changed my opinion on that matter.

Still, if anybody has a better idea, I’m willing to hear it.

Another question that came to my mind while thinking about all this and maybe someone on the staff could answer: Can modelers make a takedown request for models they created? I mean, they made the model, it is their work.

Updated

demonthedarkhound said:
Picking the discussion back up, because we still need a solution.
While I understand the problem with the changes to the models making it more difficult to tag them, I say we do it anyway (for a lack of a better alternative). Even if edited, the original model should still be somewhat recognisable (or the editor mentioned somewhere whose model they used? I don’t know if they have to do that in terms of copyright.) And maybe add notable variants to the description of the tag?
Warfare_Machine and Petruz already have separate tags for art they themselves made (warfaremachine and petruz) and when their models are used (warfare_machine and petruz_(copyright) ). The latter are parked in the copyright section of the tags. If we can’t agree on making tags for the models themselves, we could at least tag the modelers and also put them in that section. But we should make it VERY clear that these tags are for the modelers. I remember that especially in the case of Warfare_Machine the tags got mixed up.
Personally, I would be in for tagging the models, at least if they have reached some level of popularity/infamy. I can definitely see people searching for a specific model made by Cally3d (especially with version 3 soon to be released) or wanting to blacklist disembowell’s FNAF models. It could very well be that someone just dislikes specific ones made by the modeler and not all of them. Edit: Changed my opinion on that matter.

Still, if anybody has a better idea, I’m willing to hear it.

Another question that came to my mind while thinking about all this and maybe someone on the staff could answer: Can modelers make a takedown request for models they created? I mean, they made the model, it is their work.

The last point is valid I wish we could agree on a common tagging scheme.

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