Mistakes in comics happen, as it's only natural that even top publishers such as Marvel Comics and DC Comics miss an error that makes its way into publications. It's human to err. But, in last month's Doctor Doom, artist Salvador Larroca seemingly accidentally forgot to remove a watermark to DeviantArt, which made it into the comic's printing.
Swiping in comics is a generally frowned upon and surprisingly common practice that sees artists use other artists' work as a reference to their own drawings without giving them credit. Examples of this can range from something as simple as borrowing an idea from another artist's work to outright copying it and presenting it as their own. It's more egregious than a simple homage, as the work is literally swiped, redressed, and presented as their own. Some artists rely so much on swiping and photo references, that they've been accused of outright plagiarism, such as Greg Land's work on the Alien Omnibus Vol. 1 looking a lot like artist Tristan Jones's work.
BleedingCool.com pointed out one of the more bizarre recent examples of an alleged swipe, as the pages of Marvel's Doctor Doom series features a map of the galaxy with a pretty clear DeviantArt watermark on it. In a scene with Doom speaking in front of a computer screen with a map on it, DeviantArt's logo is pretty apparent. The original work comes from DeviantArt artist Offeye, who created their own version of the Star Wars Galaxy. Here's the swipe with the DeviantArt logo for reference.
Here's Offeye's map of the Star Wars galaxy next to the swipe. It's exactly the same, minus some color inversion.
It's unclear if Larroca obtained permission to use the image in the background of the scene, or if he put it there himself without approval. Regardless, it's pretty surprising to see a watermark slip past the cracks. If you look even closer, Larroca didn't even change the names on the maps, so perhaps Doom was looking for the Outer Rim? Larroca has been accused of using heavy photo references in his work in the past.
It's safe to assume future printing of Doctor Doom #10 won't include the DeviantArt logo hiding in the background of this map. It will probably be completely changed - especially if Larroca didn't have permission to use the image. Still, the fact it was published at all is an error Marvel definitely wishes they could have caught ahead of time. It seems DeviantArt accidentally just became canon in the Marvel Universe.
Source: BleedingCool.com