A Thai Monster Hunter fan has found his artwork stolen and sold online, according to a post in the Monster Hunter Asia Facebook community.

Akkpark Youngkhun ( @ Suchat Go Everywhere) is a talented 3d artist, who posted many videos and photos online of 3d sculptures he made based on Monster Hunter Rise, the latest series of the game. These included new monsters such as the flagship Magnamalo, as well as the two endgame monsters Wind Serpent Ibushi and Thunder Serpent Narwa.

Youngkhun posts the process of making these in Zbrush on his YouTube channel, listing them as tutorials since he showcases the process of sculpting the monsters.

However, Youngkhun soon found out that someone had stolen his designs, selling them on the Chinese market site Taobao. The designs were being sold as figures on the cheap, using thumbnails from Youngkhun’s videos.

Youngkhun even commented on it in the replies for the Facebook post, offering the 3D files for anyone who wanted the designs as figures so that they wouldn’t buy them off of Taobao instead.

“Thank you for being the voice for me. I am very grateful that you liked my work. If anyone is interested in really wanting to get the files to print Can say at my page”, he says.

Of Fanartists And IP Rights

Fanartists have always lived in a grey area when it comes to producing their work, since it’s always derived from someone else’s IP. The unspoken rule of thumb has always been typically that fanartists continue to create products with minimal interference from big companies, on the condition that they don’t monetize it or don’t use it to rival anything that the IP holder might want to make.

For example, Capcom’s Figure Builder series produces highly detailed art statues of Monster Hunter creatures that they then sell. Naturally, someone else selling their own sculptures would be crossing this line.

Suffice to say, someone who steals someone else’s not-for-profit design and then monetizes it is a double whammy of bad behavior, since it also makes the actual artist look like they’re trying to make a quick buck when they might have been playing by the rules the whole time.