With the Supreme Court ruling, some new steps are in place to gauge whether an object is copyrightable. They are as follows:
“We hold that a feature incorporated into the design of a useful article is eligible for copyright protection only if the feature:
(1) can be perceived as a two- or three-dimensional work of art separate from the useful article and
(2) would qualify as a protectable pictorial, graphic, or sculptural work—either on its own or fixed in some other tangible medium of expression—if it were imagined separately from the useful article into which it is incorporated.”
As Shapeways says on its blog of studiogijs’ birdnest-eggcup found here: https://www.shapeways.com/shops/studiogijs
“The bird and the branches could all exist as an independent artistic work, even though removing them would leave you with no way to hold your egg. And that’s ok. The test does not care that there might be very little left of the functional parts of the object after you remove those artistic elements. It only cares that the artistic elements can be perceived. Each of those artistic elements are protected by copyright.”
