On Thursday, a California court determined that The Walt Disney Company had improperly utilized motion-capture technology belonging to another business.
The media behemoth utilized MOVA Contour software, a visual effects company Rearden asset, without the required authorization to generate the Beast’s visage in its 2017 live-action adaptation of Beauty and the Beast.
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The firm’s counsel confirmed to Reuters that the jury found Rearden guilty of copyright infringement and awarded $250,638 in damages. The panel also suggested that Disney reimburse Rearden with $345,098 of the movie’s proceeds.
Rearden initially filed a lawsuit against Disney in 2017, claiming that one of the business’s workers had taken the motion-capture technology and transferred it to Digital Doman 3.0, another visual effects company, as reported by Reuters. Rearden maintained that Disney’s use of Digital Domain and the technology it employed to create Beauty and the Beast violated its copyright.
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Rearden stated in the report that Disney “should have known that Digital Domain did not have the right to use the technology,” as the media behemoth had previously collaborated with it on the use of Contour.
Disney contended that during the development of Beauty and the Beast, Rearden did not own Contour’s copyright.
With Emma Watson and Stevens in the lead roles, the live-action Beauty and the Beast adaptation became one of the highest-grossing movies of 2017, earning over $1.2 billion worldwide.
Disney did not respond to requests for comment right away.
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