As an animator, it's important to me to be able to pull from collectively known culture (sometimes "pop," sometimes old) in order to tell a visual story. Culture is a language that we can use to communicate and connect with others and the wider that particular culture is (meaning that of music, stories, and now film) the more people you, as an artist, can reach. But then there's Copyright, which stands in the way of using certain types of culture because it's protected. That can feel unnecessary until it's YOUR work that you don't want appropriated for another use than what you intended. Having something fall out of your hands like that feels like stealing, but is it? I've taken the last couple months reading and compiling information in order to distill it down for you, the animator, whether you're concerned about your use of copyrighted material in parody, fan art or question why it even exists in the first place. Why is the copyright term so long anyway? All (relatively speaking) will be revealed!