Copyright registration just got a lot more affordable for 2D artists

Tomorrow, artists will be able to register up to 20 PUBLISHED 2D works in one application!

Email screenshot from Copyright.gov announcing that 2D artwork can be registered in a group of up to 20 different works on a single registration, starting February 17, 2026

Attention all artists!
After February 17 2026, we can now register up to 20 different 2D works - designs, drawings, paintings and other 2D pieces - in one single application with the US Copyright Office!
Currently, we've only been able to register a group of up to 10 pieces of 2D art only if they haven't been published anywhere. This is why I haven't been showing my new wing designs until I've finished and registered a whole group of them. That's still the best protection but it's nice to have another option.
The only other type that can be registered after publication as a group are photos, more than 700 at a time IIRC as long as they were all published the same year.
Or the images have to be a part of a collection such as an art book or pack of clip art that includes all of them for the first time if I remember correctly.

This is a big deal y'all.
Artists who produce a lot of different works in a year often would neglect to register anything due to expense or only pick a few popular pieces, as it doesn't always make sense to hold back on showing or selling a piece until you have a bunch of them. Especially in the age of social media where people expect us to share WIPs, where we need to quickly keep creating new things to keep income flowing & work even harder to be seen over all the AI content out there saturating the market.

While it's true that you own the copyright of a work as soon as you make it (as long as it meets the requirements of a protectable work), if someone infringes on your copyright by distributing or selling your work without consent you HAVE TO have a valid copyright registration certificate in order to fight it legally.
Whether you're filing a legal claim with the Copyright Claims Board, which only requires that you've at least submitted your application for registration and it's only roughly $100 to file with no attorney required, or in federal court which requires you to not only have applied but to also have it approved with the certificate in hand, registration is a requirement if you want to get any money out of the infringing party.

You don't need to be wealthy to enforce your copyright.
Now you may be thinking you can't afford a federal lawsuit, which is where you'd get the most damages awarded, but some attorneys take cases on contingency IF you've properly registered and have a strong case against a defendant they think will be able to pay. That means, you don't pay them but if you win or get a settlement, they take a percentage of that money.
Sometimes attorneys will offer a settlement negotiation first to the offending party, but that only works if you have a strong case and have registered your work because they may ignore you without a valid threat of being sued.

The cost of registration could be expensive however, starting at $45 for a single work by a single author / artist. You can see how the cost could be a barrier for a low income artist especially one creating many works within a year, and why I think this is something to celebrate.
I don't know yet how much it will cost for the group registration of published 2D works, but the cost for an un-published group is $85 so I expect an amount close to that.
It's well worth it, if at the end of the year you have at least 20 pieces you want to protect but haven't registered yet.

I believe we should be able to now register old works this way that we couldn't afford to register before, although keep in mind that since courts consider registrations done within 5 years of publication to be 'prima facie' and the registration won't be questioned, it's important to do it as soon as you're able.
That doesn't mean you can't register or can't litigate works registered after that point, but you may need to provide more evidence of ownership in that case.

Now I should state that I'm not an attorney, and this does not constitute official legal advice.
However, I've had quite a bit of experience dealing with copycats, settlements, CCB claims and even a couple federal court cases and there are things I wish I knew years ago, so I'd like to share what I can to help other artists.

If you've been as unlucky as me to have your work infringed en masse by a LOT of different overseas sellers, you'll want to subscribe to my Patreon for my posts about that. Some of that info may be paywalled for good reasons I can’t go into detail about yet, but please feel free to reach out if you are experiencing that yourself as I may be able to give you some helpful info and legal referrals.

I'll end with this:
If it weren't for registering my work and being able to get what I'm owed from infringing parties, I might have had to shut down Fancy Fairy last year or at least get a part time 'real job' like so many other artists have recently been forced to. Increased art theft had already made things really hard, and Trump's BS only made everything that much harder making this one of my worst winters for sales that I can remember.

Any artist being infringed should get their payback, and this rule change will make that easier! Share this info with your artist friends, and let's keep artists in business.

~
Alt text for screenshot:

Group Registration for Two-Dimensional Artwork Final Rule

NewsNet 1078 
December 19, 2025

The U.S. Copyright Office has created a new group registration option known as Group Registration for Two-Dimensional Artwork, or GR2D, to allow artists to register a group of published two-dimensional artworks by submitting a deposit comprising one complete digital copy of each work within the group. The final rule expands the registration options currently available to artists and permits the registration of multiple works with a single application and one filing fee.

The final rule also announces a new online registration application for this group option. The proposed rule would have allowed applicants to register up to ten works published within a thirty-day period. Based on commenters’ input and to facilitate broader participation in the registration system, the final rule permits applicants to register up to twenty works, where all works within the group were first published within the same calendar year.

The final rule takes effect on February 17, 2026, to coincide with the expected completion of related system development and educational resources. The Office will issue an additional public announcement when this option is available to applicants. For more information, please visit the Copyright Office website. 

 United States Copyright Office
copyright.gov
(202) 707-3000
or 1 (877) 476-0778 (toll free)

Kylie Jenner & Mother Plucker Feathers: Infringement of My Victoria's Secret Wing Designs

*Update 3/20/2020
The legal dispute between Kylie Jenner and I has been resolved. For clarification, we have never done business together and there are no plans to do so in the future.

*Update 12/26/2019
This dispute has been resolved between Mother Plucker Feathers and I.

It’s Infringement Mother Plucker! They copied my wings for Kylie Jenner's Fairy Halloween Costume!

Left: Eniko Mihalik in my original Kira wings for Victoria’s Secret, which they ordered from me directly and paid full price for (photo by Paul Bayfield / Timesniper Photography)
Right: Kylie Jenner wearing a knock of that same copyright registered design (photo by SPW)

Mother Plucker Feathers Co Inc. is taking credit for providing the fairy wings above (above right) to Kylie Jenner for a Halloween birthday party this last week, just after contacting me a couple weeks ago asking for my materials resources. This is an original design I drew from scratch, NOT a design from nature.

They even came to me last year, with the request to subcontract the same giant Morpho wings that I made for the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show 2015’s Exotic Butterflies segment but in pink, sending my original product photo in the email. They were also for Kylie (I didn't know until after Halloween) but after extensive emails back & forth, apparently with requests from Jill Jacobs, Kylie’s stylist, changing the direction a few times, the whole thing fell through and Mother Plucker made a different set for her themselves without my involvement out of fabric.
I was told this celeb wanted my wings and loves my work last year when they contacted me, so they all seemed to be familiar with my designs.
I also sent them a lot of links to other designs in my web shop for examples of colors and such.
The question of access is no question at all.

Mother Plucker again came to me again a few weeks ago, asking for 3 sets of iridescent wings 'at a good price' with a tight deadline I couldn't meet.
They emailed later asking where to get the materials I use, so I directed them to my online tutorial, which ironically explicitly explains in the first 2 minutes how important it is to respect copyright (see video below) and not to use others’ existing designs. I was even promised that they would not copy my designs in their email.
That tutorial showed the creation of a very different design, wings from a real butterfly species by the way. So no, there is no implied permission granted to use any of my designs simply because I taught a technique.

Imagine my surprise when my fans and friends sent me links to Kylie Jenner’s photos in a copy of my Kira design - which I have the actual US Copyright certificate of registration for - when I had not been asked nor paid for the use of my design.
In fact, that design was worn by 2 different Victoria’s Secret Angels in their 2014 Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show’s ‘Fairytale’ segment. I had 3 other pieces in that show and a handful of them in 2015 as well.
You can see all the pieces I created for them here: https://www.fancyfairy.com/gallery-2-celebrity-fancy-fairies

People were commenting on Mother Plucker’s and Kylie's posts calling them out for copying it before I even found out about Kylie wearing the knock off wings, because they are one of my oldest and known works and many of my fans recognized the design.
Both mine and the knock off have the same basic vein design as my own.

Every vein has been included in the copy, even the little squiggly downward curve at the tip of the antennae.
Photo on left © Paul Bayfield * Photo on right is missing the copyright info.
Images used here for the purposes of fair use, commentary and public interest.

The outer shape is a little more loosely copied, but still follow the same silhouette as mine with minor differences in the length and skinniness of the tip along the top.

The vein design is what I registered with the copyright office.

Jill Jacobs (Kylie’s stylist I mentioned earlier) seems to be credited as the stylist again, Mother Plucker the 'designers' in charge of fabrication.

It’s not yet certain which part of this team is the most liable, but that will be determined more clearly as my IP attorney reviews this case.

In addition to these wings being seen all over the world on two Angels as well as viewed on my site through the years, that design is currently the first item you'll see when you click on the Shop page of my website! See for yourself below and here: https://www.fancyfairy.com/shop
It’s hard to believe this was an accident. Someone in that team had to know they were copying an existing design, no matter who they thought it belonged to.

Although that is a digital overlay item, my terms are crystal clear in the download that it is only meant to be used in photo editing / digital art, never to be redistributed as stand alone wings whether physical or digital, and not for commercial use. Just in case anyone tries that baseless argument.

I first published this design in 2007, as you can see in this screenshot from my old, gaudy website (below left) thanks to the Wayback Machine Internet Archive. It’s also been around in Second Life™ for just as long (below, right), tho thankfully I think my aesthetic has improved since then!

I’ve frequently spoken out about copyright infringement and how much it hurts artists, when it happens to me and when it happens to others.
So much in fact, my friends have nicknamed me “the copyright fairy”.
I’ve been infringed upon by a very large photo editing app company, a child millionaire, craft supply companies, 3D asset marketplaces and more.
Infringements hurt artists, even more so when it involved someone like Kylie Jenner, one of the most visible and wealthy celebrities in the world. Millions of people will see her in my design, but not the quality I usually set my standards to, mistakenly thinking it originated from a different artist.
Please, support independent artists whenever you can. So much of what is churned out by huge companies gets built on the backs of lesser known artists who can’t fight back.
You usually get higher quality pieces, helping us continue to create our art, and you’re helping us pay the bills in a world where the gap between the rich and the low income is bigger than ever and the cost of living grows ever higher.

A lot of people have been asking how to help, one way is to subscribe to my Patreon if you wish to help out monetarily. I only charge when I release content for my Patrons there and it starts at only $1. https://www.patreon.com/faeryangela
You can also purchase my affordable digital wing overlays, clip art and cut files to use in your photos and digital artwork - NOT to make wings out of except for the Piera Clearwing Satyr file because that is a real butterfly design, I hope we’ve all learned that lesson by now to actually read the Terms of Use: https://fancy-fairy-wings-things.myshopify.com/collections/all/digital

To sum it up, I’m shocked at this violation of both my IP and my trust.
Infringement sure is a Mother Plucker isn’t it?

*Edited 11/10 to clarify that my Kira Wings design is my original design, not from nature, and to correct some minor grammar for easier reading.



Tales of Infringement and Fake Excuses

How Low Can You Go?

Pretty low, apparently. Gypsy Sport, an edgy designer label owned by Rio Uribe that prides itself on diversity and inclusiveness, tried with all their might to pin their infringement of my Guinevere fairy wings onto an innocent person - an innocent person who happens to be a struggling art student who is basically homeless in Puerto Rico due to the damage from hurricane Maria. 
I found out about the infringement when a follower tagged me in the comments of the image GypsySport posted (above left). I was not credited, nor asked for permission to use this photo.

I asked them via comments to remove the photo, and they commented back that they had found the photo on Tumblr on a Barbie and would credit me if I am the original artist. I replied that I wanted it removed and don't allow my copyright protected images to be used that way, that I sell different digital wing stock for that purpose, and didn't want others to think they could do this too. They eventually messaged me on Instagram, after I asked them to email me and specifically not to message me via IG because nothing can be downloaded from there, with a low resolution screen shot of Tumblr search results, one of which was the photo above in the middle that has my wings poorly edited in. They cropped out any identifying urls, the date, anything else that would prove what they claimed. They refused to email me the original or the screen shot. They told me they received the DMCA notice I emailed them with proof that I owned the copyright, US Copyright registration number and all, but they still would not remove the photo and I was still not being credited. They were also deleting my comments as well as comments from friends asking to remove the image. Thankfully my phone's screen resolution is high enough that I was able to faintly make out the Tumblr account name when I blew it up in Photoshop. I thought it was fake, because it's called ass--farts, haha! It turned out to be a real account with some beautiful illustrations actually, but that badly edited Barbie photo could not be found anywhere in her gallery. I also discovered that the artist, Ivonne, is a student who is struggling to survive in hurricane ravaged Puerto Rico and has been trying to raise funds to help with rebuilding her home. I got in contact with her about this issue and she told me she never posted that image, but she did post her original drawing of the Swan Lake Barbie and it had the SAME CAPTION. Rio of Gypsy Sport (the ethnic slur used in their name is a whole other problem too) appears to have FAKED a screen shot to make it look like Ivonne infringed on my IP first. 
Here is the link to her original post - also shown above on the right: http://ass--farts.tumblr.com/post/161679447989/swan-princess-o 
For some reason I can only see the full caption and hash tags when I open it in the app on my phone, and it's the very same photo. The exact image can be found when you search for #swan lake on Tumblr. He must have done a search for one of the hash tags, took a screen shot and simply replaced Ivonne's illustration in the screen shot with his own image he put together to fabricate a false story that would take the blame off of him.
To say it's infuriating would be an understatement!

What's more, they also implicated yet another person in this narrative! I had emailed the screen shot details to the main company address (before I heard from Ivonne) just in case it was some irresponsible employee I was talking to on IG since whoever it was wouldn't give me a name. Emily Morales emailed me back and told me "We have been granted permission from M. Repicky of Mattel® to use these images, previously found on tumblr." and indicated it was in fact Rio I'd been talking to on IG.
I wasn't given his full name or contact info, but he was easy to find although hard to contact as he doesn't publish his email anywhere. When they refused to give me the info I asked for, I called Mattel naturally, because if they were telling the truth I needed to get that taken care of right away. I couldn't have an image out there that Mattel was telling people they were free to use when they didn't have the right to my wing image! They wouldn't give me a link to the image so maybe Mattel would. They did finally credit me - after blocking me on IG - for the last hour or so that it was up, and then removed it. That didn't solve the problem of where the original came from if they had been honest with me.
Once I let Emily know that I've left a message with Mattel with all the details, I got an immediate response telling me to leave Mattel out of it, and "They did NOT grant permission to use that specific image, we have a great relationship with Barbie and assumed this was a Barbie photo."
So sounds like I was lied to in order to deflect liability. They were willing to soil Mattel's rep AND the reputation of a struggling art student who is homeless at the moment.
Well done Gypsy Sport. Super inclusive of you, how upstanding of people's civil rights to place blame on someone in Puerto Rico recovering from hurricane damage.

Hey Gypsy Sport, we ALL deserve an apology. Not a faux apology filled with more lies, but a sincere apology and compensation. Ivonne has a link on her Deviant Art site with info about her situation and how to support her, so why don't you show us that you actually walk your talk by donating some cash so she can fix her house? Here's her link: https://ko-fi.com/A2201D5B

Infringement is against the law, and infringement of work that has been registered with the US Copyright Office like mine has carries statutory damages up to $150,000 for each work, regardless of whether or not any profit was made directly. What's more, my Copyright Management Info was removed from my photo. That's the copyright statement I have written along the bottom panel of the wings in that photo (below), which anyone with half a brain should know means it's not free for anyone to use when it says 'All Rights Reserved'. The removal of Copyright Management Information, or CMI, is a violation of the DMCA Section 1202, and carries an additional penalty on top of the ordinary statutory damages for infringing on registered work of between $2,500 and $25,000.

SideGuinevereGrnGold_973.png

Below are more screen shots from my phone of the back & forth between me and Gypsy Sport, if you need any more evidence that their whole story smells like a heap of BS. I didn't realize the images weren't opening up when clicked, I fixed that as of May 14 at 11:04. You may need to turn off popup blockers for this page, as they will open in a new window.

Oh right, but what about her emails? Screen shots of that convo below.

Oh but there's just a little more. They aren't the first ones to have done this, to put blame on an innocent third party (fourth and fifth too) for their infringement.
Ellie Paisly, who now goes by @ellie.paisly on Instagram and used to go by hazypaisley, was the first to do this to me. She used a few of my wing photos in a bunch of her selfies she posted on Instagram and was telling everyone that she drew them. How anyone could believe that she really drew them is beyond me, but for quite a while she was taking full credit for my work. She also had done a promotional photo or two for clothing companies using my content, and meanwhile she's racking up social media followers and exposure for her art business while doing so.
When I found out due to a follower tagging me in her post, I politely asked if she would remove it, and even let her know that I do sell legit digital wings for this purpose. But she blocked me, and I saw that she was taking credit for the wings on other posts and was leaving some up, so she got dragged. She came over to my post to whine about it, and then, she told me that she got the images as public domain from her art school's image bank. 

Just in case she was telling the truth - I should have known that liars continue to lie but just to be sure - I emailed her school, Moore College of Art & Design. They then put me in touch with the only two image banks they use, Artstor and Art Museum Image Gallery, and I contacted them about the issue. Eventually they both responded to inform me that they never had my content in their banks, that they only use content from verified sources for educational purposes only. Even if she did get my content from them, she did not have the right to post them on her Instagram account anyway.
She lied about it, putting her school and the 2 image banks in the legal line of fire just because she didn't want to own up to her mistake. That is not okay. It's completely unprofessional, especially for someone trying to sell themselves as a pro artist. She also has an outer facade of being a loving fairy spirit that sympathizes with the underdog just like Gypsy Sport, but she completely disrespected another woman artist, her school and two other companies without seeming to care in the slightest. She's never paid me the invoices I sent her for the penalty rate for unauthorized use and yet I've seen public evidence of her commissioning things costing thousands of dollars. Many of the portraits she paints also look like they were traced from well known photos online, whether she had permission from those photographers I don't know, but I wouldn't bet any money that she has.
Below is a mound of screen shots of the whole mess, and my original Instagram post about it is still up. It still shows up in the top results of Instagram search for the #elliepaisley hashtag. Click on the photos for links to my original wing images or to see an explanation about what's going on in it. Most are self explanatory, and she obviously had always been telling people that she drew the wings, or 'art'd' them. Maybe she didn't learn anything in art school about what drawing is? Or maybe it's lies? Yeah, it was lies.

That's all for now folks. Remember, just because you didn't sell your infringements it's still against the law and you can still get sued for it if whoever owns the copyright can afford to do so, which reminds me to tell you all to ask your government reps to support the CASE act that would allow artists to fight infringement in small claims court.
Feel free to share this. I think it's really important that social media influencers and large designer labels are honest with the public, and when they aren't I think we all need to know so we can make the decision whether or not to support them and their businesses.
Obviously, my vote would be not to. Support honest artists that don't steal other people's work to further their careers. We really don't need anymore corrupt people in any kind of power.


#gypsysport #stopiptheft #arttheft #copyrightinfringement #arttheives #elliepaisley #hazypaisley #elliemiller #copyright #artistrights #fairywings