Quote Originally Posted by Alhanelem View Post

A friend of mine made me a sculpture of a character from a Final Fantasy game. Technically, this is a copyright violation, because SE owns all the rights to those characters. However, it's up to SE to decide they're bothered by it and to tell me to destroy it / not make any more likenesses to their characters. A copyright holder can decide that they are not in fact bothered by someone's use of their work and allow it to pass if they so desire.
I wanted to point out that I believe this is untrue, unless I am mistaken and my art teacher is in a whole hurt of trouble, a person may use copyrighted/trademarked property as an educational tool or for personal use as long as no profit or gains are to be made. Fanfiction, cosplay and similar art forms all fall under this category.