The appellants seek to say that this work is preliminary and has been directed to decisions as to
what types of bets the respondents shall pursue in the business; that such decisions are merely
ideas and as such not the subject of copyright; and that the work of actually writing down those
ideas in the coupon is too easy and negligible to justify any claim to originality. ... There may
be cases where such a dichotomy might be justified between some preliminary work and the
actual transcription of a compilation, if the work was done with no ultimate intention of a
compilation. But on the facts of the present case such an argument cannot succeed. The whole
of the respondents’ efforts from the beginning were devoted to arranging a coupon that would
attract punters and be the basis of the respondents’ business. Types of bets were not considered
in vacuobut only in relation to the part which they would play in the coupon. In my opinion ...
the respondents ... established copyright in the coupon.- There may be originality in creating a derivative work from
another work
The question of how far a work that borrows from another work – e.g., a
translation, a three-dimensional copy of a two-dimensional work, or a two-
dimensional copy of a three-dimensional work – is “original” is an important
question. A number of different works of this character are now considered.EXAMPLE 1: A three-dimensional work made from a two-
dimensional work.Martin v. Polyplas Manufacturers Ltd [1969] N.Z.L.R. 1046 (New Zealand:
Supreme Court)[The plaintiff created some plastic coins from photographs of the coins, with the
consent of the designer of the coins, who owned the copyright in the
photograph. The plaintiff first made a three-dimensional engraving and then
created a die, from which the plastic coins were impressed. The defendant
made plastic coins copied from the plaintiff’s plastic coins. When the plaintiff
sued for infringement of copyright in the engraving from which his coins were
made, the defendant said that the engraving was not “original”.]CHIEF JUSTICE WILD:[C]opyright protection has been given to the published verbatimreport of a speech, a photograph
of a picture, a sketch of a piece of machinery, and a translation of a foreign work: 8 Halsbury’s
Laws of England, 3rd ed. 373. Though each of these is made from existing subject-matter the
medium of expression has been changed. Where the author has made use of existing subject-
matter in this way the question is whether, in changing the medium, he has himself done
sufficient independent labour to justify copyright protection ...From a visual inspection of the engravings on perspex, and from the plaintiff ’s detailed
description in evidence of his work, I have formed the view that the engravings were a work of
great delicacy and intense application. More valuable than my own opinion as to the artistic skill
and exactness required is that of the watchmaker and engraver called in evidence who described
the work as “remarkable” and, more particularly, that of [the coin designer] who said that the
engravings were “very fine pieces of work” and “very skilful work” of a “high standard”. I hold,
then, that the independent labour and skill employed by the plaintiff in working from the
photographs of [the designer’s] designs was such as to entitle him to copyright protection in(^34) respect of his engravings as an original artistic work.