Canada's 10 Tallest U/C

[Gresto]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

I mean it would almost certainly be covered under fair use. It's pretty clearly an artistic re-creation of any copyrighted product to report on and visually represent data on buildings, and does not overstep the copyrighted purpose of proposed architectural drawings that any architectural firm may have prepared.

The likely problem is SSP got slapped with a lawsuit threat and the solution was to blur proposed buildings, rather than risk a court proceeding, even if they likely would have won at court under fair use. This site is basically run on a volunteer basis from what I remember, they likely just didn't want to deal with it.

How this website operated for 20 years without issue on this is probably a better question, and the easier solution would likely have been to simply blur the buildings that the architectural firm or developer who complained is responsible for.

Thanks for that, and yes, I imagine Fair Use would apply, but as you pointed out, the site is not deep-pocketed enough to bankroll a defence to a lawsuit, however frivolous. I do prefer your solution, of only censoring the buildings of the pathetic complaining party.

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by Gresto

Thanks for that, and yes, I imagine Fair Use would apply, but as you pointed out, the site is not deep-pocketed enough to bankroll a defence to a lawsuit, however frivolous. I do prefer your solution, of only censoring the buildings of the pathetic complaining party.

My guess is some cheapo greedy developer who VE’d a good design that appeared on the diagrams page and got pushback after the fact. Funny enough the only 2 cities I noticed it with were Toronto and NYC. Calgary still shows the few proposals that were drawn.

Somewhere there is a goiter faced, jowly man yelling at his lawyer on the phone to stop the internet geeks from ridiculing his hamfisted redesign of a building.

[WhipperSnapper]

The intent of the drawings is to license them out to raise funds to support the site.

I'm surprised and not surprised that this hasn't come to this point earlier. It's advertisement to have an SSP drawing appear in the local newspaper during preleasing. It's not necessarily desirable for an artistic impression to be publicly released before the development has been finalized.

[Maldive]

I posted this in a Diagrams thread:

I would venture that those drawings, which are accurate-to-scale, re-imagining of u/c and proposed projects... not absurdly mis-leading developer render-promises that are rarely delivered, have also amounted to free advertising and promotion of those projects... and likely contributed, on occasion, to developers' bottom-line (sales).

[WhipperSnapper]

It's perfect sense but, what does it mean? It doesn't discourage someone from taking legal action. One also must consider, as unlikely as it may be, that a developer used a drawing without permission and SSP made them aware of this sparking the situation.

By the numbers.

174 out of 1151 under construction drawings come from the GTA (blur is temporary in any case)
662 out of 1389 proposed have drawings come from the GTA
1059 out of 2540 have primary drawings by koops.

the all time low in active membership centres this on one location and one editor.

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

The intent of the drawings is to license them out to raise funds to support the site.

Yeah that's probably the central issue. Fair use tends to be meant for either news reporting, analysis or critique in which someone is creating new content based on someone else's copyrighted material and is limited to using the minimum necessary sample of the original creation. But in this case we're talking about basically a full recreation that's intended to be as close a reproduction as possible which is then copyrighted by the site for commercial use. Before the building exists, the design is solely the product of the architecture(s) and rendering artists' creative design.

If we were to compare that to other intellectual creations like music, if you attempted to reproduce a song as closely as possible, credit the name of the artist who did the reproduction rather than who created the original work, then claimed ownership under your own commercial copyright, obviously that wouldn't be allowed either. You could perhaps make an argument under the news reporting angle, but that would be more like if you just included a sample of the original rendering in a story about the project and cited and original copyright holder like you'd see on UT. Much different than reproducing something that you're calling your original work.

So while it kinda sucks, it also makes some sense.

[Maldive]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

Fair use tends to be meant for either news reporting, analysis or critique in which someone is creating new content based on someone else's copyrighted material and is limited to using the minimum necessary sample of the original creation.

I’ve been doing future renderings for many years, mostly for fun but occasionally commissioned (koops and I collaborated on a double page spread of Toronto Life’s 50 Anniversary Edition) and I’ve never heard from a developer (despite earning over $2 per hour for ‘paid work’ ;-).

Not what I'd call a "minimum necessary sample" mind you (some buildings feature prominently)... and of course the media client is also earning$ via the editorial and image content. In a sense it's a bit of "free advertising and promotion" for projects (rather like SSP illustrations) and I'm sure most developers wouldn't take issue... but it only takes one I guess and Dylan got the message.

The Toronto development models from steveve, koops' drawings and my scribbles all rely a great deal on public documents from places like the Application Information Centre (building elevations and other plans).

Low res example: Future Toronto (drawn in 2020)
https://urbantoronto.ca/forum/attach...rp-jpg.281459/

I'd be curious to know how many rolled pennies have been distributed to illustrators via SSP licensing of drawings. I'm betting the "draw" of the city diagrams has certainly helped SSP attract advertisers to the site (and the many more eyes of the forum threads)... so this could be a bit of a mes$.

[Maldive]

The One | 338.3m | 94s | Mizrahi Developments | Foster + Partners l u/c

Walls and columns were poured last Wednesday evening, and today (Wednesday) they are pouring the the next floor … never seen that accomplished here in one week.

They have also placed the rebar cages for the next mega-columns and inner core (elevators). Gob-smacked lol.


Benito

Benito

[JHikka]

Not sure what we're going to do once it passes Benito's floor.

[TorontoDrew]

Drone time after that.

[JHikka]

I think the joke at UT was that Benito would have to hang out off of the roof.

[Maldive]

That was quick. The perfect cure for all the waiting for concrete progress.


Benito

[GeneralLeeTPHLS]

The following were taken 2 days ago, except for the images of the One (taken today)
1. Sky Tower at Pinnacle One Yonge (Toronto): 312.5m / 1025ft
10. The Prestige at Pinnacle One Yonge (Toronto): 217m / 712ft
Condtruction by Union Station by Draulerin Photographics, on Flickr
2. The One (Toronto): 309m / 1014ft
20220811_130252 by Draulerin Photographics, on Flickr
20220811_130259 by Draulerin Photographics, on Flickr
4. 160 Front (Toronto): 240m / 787ft
Condtruction by Union Station by Draulerin Photographics, on Flickr
Condtruction by Union Station by Draulerin Photographics, on Flickr
5. CIBC Square II (Toronto): 237.8m / 780ft
Condtruction by Union Station by Draulerin Photographics, on Flickr
Condtruction by Union Station by Draulerin Photographics, on Flickr

[WhipperSnapper]

Art, photos and, trademarks appear in public sources across all media. The application info centre for 160 Front had renderings with TD Logos. It doesn't make it free use. I haven't been throughout the entire urbantoronto building database. A glaring omission considering their importance to the historical record (as the city takes them down once the application has been closed) is the complete lack of elevation drawings. Perhaps, there is reason to it. There's not the same marketability to the other material they post.

I don't know the situation at SSP. Emporis shares the rolls of pennies with contributors when they sell the license to use the contributor's photos or, at least, they did at one time.

[Maldive]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

Art, photos and, trademarks appear in public sources across all media. The application info centre for 160 Front had renderings with TD Logos. It doesn't make it free use.

Renderings, often with absurd angles (drama!) can be a reference point for colour, cladding and other clues/details... but usually useless for a properly-scaled ssp drawing... that's why elevations/architectural drawings are referenced.

I haven't been throughout the entire urbantoronto building database. A glaring omission considering their importance to the historical record (as the city takes them down once the application has been closed) is the complete lack of elevation drawings.

Elevations/architectural drawings are indeed posted on the AIC ... that's how you measure stuff... are you saying that UrbanToronto should be archiving* elevations in their database before AIC takes them down? (*this often happens anyway in the UT "photos" section when an elevation is posted in a thread).

Perhaps, there is reason to it. There's not the same marketability to the other material they post.

??? huh?

I don't know the situation at SSP.
koops would know.

I find some of your posts rather bewildering lately. Maybe it's me.

[Maldive]

160 Front West | 239.87m | 46s | Cadillac Fairview | AS + GG l u/c

The swoop(s) from grade.


Riseth

Close-up of the stepped/angled curtain-wall that will cover the tower ().


CanadianNational

tstormers

Riseth

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by Maldive

I find some of your posts rather bewildering lately. Maybe it's me.

My point was that that the publicly release architectural drawings in the AIC doesn't make them free use. The TD logos was supposed to be a jarring example of this.

I specifically referenced urbantoronto and not the AIC. Yeah, The AIC wouldn't make any sense. I haven't posted in the UT forum for a long time. I don't know what gets posted there. I do use the database and have seen few if any references to elevation drawings which I find weird. (therefore conspiracy!) Maybe it's just me that sees value in the specifications they offer compared to all the marketing material they get permission to use. I also find it unfortunate that the community loses access to those.

[Maldive]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

My point was that that the publicly release architectural drawings in the AIC doesn't make them free use.

And my point all along is that (most?) ssp illustrators are referencing public documents for information, not to photo-copy architectural drawings (and certainly not renderings). Original drawings based on public information, full stop.

The only infringement I could see might be including a corporate logo (like TD) which should simply be omitted... but not entire proposed and u/c drawings being blurred.

100 or so years ago the CN Tower folks actually made some lame attempts to actually block photos(!) of their trademarked tower. Ridiculous.

[Metro-One]

So on this list does excavation count as U/C? If so Concord Metrotown Tower One should be on the list (230.1m).

[Maldive]

CIBC SQUARE | 241.39m | 50s | Hines | WilkinsonEyre l Phase u/c

CIBC Square Phase 1 in the centre, with its slightly taller Phase 2 twin rising to the right in the background.

wmedia

Phase 2 core now well above grade, rising among its maze of cranes.

Northern Light

Phase 2 on the left (u/c), Phase 1 on the right (complete).

ellisdon.com