Art Policy

Short version: art you give us stays yours. Art we make for you comes with one of three licenses, and you pick the one that matches how you actually plan to use it. We keep a record of every piece we've produced so we can reprint it cleanly if you come back, no matter which license you bought.

Art you give us

When you send us a logo, a sketch, a Photoshop file, or a back-of-a-napkin idea, that art stays yours. We don't claim ownership of anything you upload. We use your files solely to prepare and produce your order, nothing else.

Art we make for you

When we design a logo, an illustration, or print-ready apparel art as part of a paid project, the final approved artwork is delivered under one of three licenses. It's one framework for every kind of art we make, not a separate system for apparel and another for design work. You choose the license that matches how you plan to use the work, and you can ask about any of them at any time, including after the project is finished.

Standard License (the default)

You get the right to use the artwork for your brand: your website, your marketing, your signage, your business cards. Merchandise production runs through Hardiewear. So if the art was made for an apparel order, it goes on the shirts in that order, and when you want to reprint or run more later, the reorder comes back through us.

Hardiewear keeps ownership of the artwork and the original working files.

Included with the base package price.

Extended License

Everything in the Standard License, plus the right to print merchandise through any vendor you like. Take the art to a promo shop, an online printer, or a manufacturer overseas. You still don't own the IP, and Hardiewear can still license the work to other (non-competing) clients, but your production is no longer tied to us.

An upgrade of +100% of the package price, so your total is 2× the base package. It is not an extra 2× added on top of the base.

Full Buy-Out

You own the IP outright. Full transfer of rights in writing. You can reproduce it, modify it, relicense it to others, build derivative works from it, run it through AI tools, and put it on anything, through any vendor. Hardiewear won't resell or reuse the design.

Used most often by publishers, studios, and brands buying characters or identities they intend to build a business around.

3× the base package price. Industry standard for a full buy-out is 3 to 5×; 3× is the honest minimum.

How to choose

If you're not sure which license you need, ask. The default for most apparel projects is the Standard License. It's the most affordable and it covers what most people actually need. If you find later that you need broader use, you can upgrade at any point, even months or years after the original project. An upgrade costs the difference between the two licenses, not a new full fee.

Either way, we keep a copy of the production-ready files so that when you come back in two years and want another run, we can print the exact same shirt (same placement, same color, same fabric) without making you dig through old emails.

What we will never do

• Sell or transfer art you gave us to another client. Your logos, your sketches, your files, they stay yours, period.
• Use art you gave us in our portfolio without asking you first.
• Hold your files hostage if you decide to take your project somewhere else.
• License art we made for you to a direct competitor of yours, under either the Standard License or the Extended License. "Non-competing" is the rule, and we apply it honestly.
• Misrepresent the license you bought. If you bought the Standard License, the written scope and the invoice will say Standard License. There are no surprise terms.

Confidentiality

By default, we can show finished work publicly once it's delivered. If your launch isn't public yet, tell us and we'll hold display until it is. That one is free, and we do it all the time for rebrands, product launches, and openings.

Permanent Confidentiality

If you need the work never shown publicly, that's a paid add-on called Permanent Confidentiality, currently +25% of the package price. We agree in writing never to display the piece: not on the site, not in social posts, not in a portfolio review, not in a book.

This is the only thing that removes our right to display the work. You can add it on top of any license, including a Full Buy-Out. The courtesy below, where we ask before featuring your project, still stands on every project; Permanent Confidentiality is the formal, priced, permanent version of it.

Portfolio display

We keep the right to show work we created in our portfolio, on our site, and in our social posts. That holds under every license, including a Full Buy-Out, and it isn't something a buy-out takes away or something a client purchases. Showing the original piece we made doesn't limit anything you do with your copy of it. The only way that right goes away is Permanent Confidentiality.

If we want to feature your project in our portfolio or on social media, we'll still ask first. Always. If you'd rather we keep it quiet, just say so. That's the end of the conversation, and if you want that locked in permanently and in writing, Permanent Confidentiality is how.

Under the Standard and Extended Licenses

The two rules below apply to the Standard License and the Extended License only. They do not apply to a Full Buy-Out. If you buy out the work, these rights transfer to you along with the IP.

No derivative works without permission

Under the Standard and Extended Licenses, you don't get the right to make new artwork based on the artwork we made. That includes redrawing it, adapting it into a different logo, hiring another artist to "do something like this but with a few tweaks," or producing variations of it for new products.

If you want a new piece in the same style, or a variation of an existing piece, that's a separate commission. Come back to us. Repeat clients get a head start and a familiar process.

No AI-modified versions

This is the modern version of the same rule, and under the Standard and Extended Licenses it matters enough to spell out. Unless you have purchased a Full Buy-Out, you may not:

• Feed our artwork into AI image generators (Midjourney, DALL-E, Stable Diffusion, Sora, or any other model) to produce variations, derivatives, "upscaled" versions, or new pieces based on the original.
• Use our artwork as part of a training set, reference set, or style-transfer source for any AI tool.
• Claim ownership or authorship of any AI output that incorporates, references, or was generated from our original work.

Under those two licenses, any AI-derived output from our artwork, no matter how heavily modified, remains our intellectual property. The reason is simple: if a license fee could be turned into a hundred machine-made variations, the work loses every boundary it had.

Under a Full Buy-Out, all of that is yours. Modify it, generate from it, train on it, build a family of derivatives around it. You bought the IP, and that's what buying the IP means.

What a Full Buy-Out transfers

A buy-out is a real transfer, and the price reflects real losses on our side. When you buy out a piece, we give up:

• The right to print it on our own merchandise (Hardiewear, Cryptid Empire)
• The right to license it to other non-competing clients
• The right to include it in future books, prints, or collected editions we publish

Those permanent, compounding losses are what the 3× price pays for. Portfolio display is not part of that list and never has been.

Authorship and credit

Two small things hold true even after a Full Buy-Out, and neither one limits what you do with the work.

First, authorship is a fact. David Hardie drew the original, and we can truthfully say so and show the original piece we made (unless Permanent Confidentiality was purchased). That's credit, not control.

Second, no false attribution. If you modify the work, generate new versions from it, or build derivatives, those are yours, and you're welcome to them. Just don't present them as work David made or endorsed. Your changes, your name on them.

If something goes wrong

If artwork we created shows up somewhere it shouldn't, reprinted by a competitor, used outside the license that was purchased, sold as a print without permission, we have legal standing to act on it. That includes DMCA takedowns, cease-and-desist letters, and formal legal action where warranted.

This isn't a threat aimed at clients. It's a promise to clients: when you commission work from us, the work doesn't get pirated out from under you either. Your artwork stays distinctive because it stays protected.

Third-party trademarks

If you send us art that uses someone else's trademark, logo, or licensed character, we'll assume you have the rights to use it. If you don't, we may decline the project. We're not in the business of helping anyone get sued.

Questions

Use the contact form to ask. We'd rather answer the question now than guess later.