The Parable of the Painter and the Short Film

One day while teaching, Josh was asked, ”Teacher, how does a plagiarist expect to get away with plagiarism in a digital age?”

Josh spoke thus:

A painter was watching a cartoon.

“I want to paint this cartoon,” the painter said to the painter’s self, “I want to take every frame of that cartoon, and I want to paint every frame of that cartoon.  Then I want to take each of my paintings of each of the frames of that cartoon, and I want to photograph them.  Then I want to show the film of photographs of the paintings of the film.”

“You realize that’s exactly what the filmmaker did, don’t you?” the painter asked the painter’s self, “You do understand how animation works?”

“Of course I realize that’s exactly what the filmmaker did,” the painter said to the painter’s self, “I’m the filmmaker.  I made this cartoon.”

“Well then you’ve already done it,” the painter said to the painter’s self, “You’ve made this film.  It’s done.”

“The cartoon is done,” the painter said to the painter’s self, “The film isn’t.”

“Then you could take the film, make a cartoon of each frame, photograph each frame, and make a cartoon movie,” the painter said to the painter’s self.

“I was thinking of sculpture,” the painter said to the painter’s self, “I could make a sculpture of the figure in each frame, take a picture of each sculpture, combine the pictures and make a stop-action film.”

“You could make it in 3D,” the painter said to the painter’s self.

“I could use those cameras from the Matrix and film each sculpture from three hundred and sixty degrees,” the painter said to the painter’s self.

“You could make three hundred and sixty films,” the painter said to the painter’s self.

“I could make three hundred and sixty times three hundred and sixty films,” the painter said to the painter’s self.

“It will be a huge project,” the painter said to the painter’s self.

“All from ten seconds of film,” the painter said to the painter’s self.

“All from a mouse on a steamboat,” the painter said to the painter’s self.

“Who’d ever put a mouse on a steamboat?” the painter said to the painter’s self, “You are a unique genius.”