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[mojobadshah]

Hi, can anyone tell me where I can find authoritative documentation (e.g. US Copyright Office) on copyrighting characters and expressions?

[Smokin]

copyright office is the best place to find the info you are looking for. Characters in a tangible form is no different than a photo, drawing, or piece of written literature. For more info on that field you should look to talking to others in that field for common practices, the animation guild in Los Angeles might be a good place to start, other forums with professionals in the concept/character development industry would be another place, but looking for a specific "authoritative" literature on such a narrow niche like characters is like looking for a needle in a haystack.

[mojobadshah]

I actually called up the U.S. copyright office and spoke to an information specialist and I'm confused now because I was under the impression that fictional characters and expressions e.g. Harry Potter "boy wizard" and Superman "caped crusader" were copyright issues, but what he told me was that the actual physical representations e.g. drawings of them are what are copyrightable other wise this is a trademark issues.  Are these information specialists experts or do they just know what the average individual knows when it comes to these matters?  In other words does he know what he was talking about?

[Kaitlin]

Yes, he knows what he is talking about.

...what he told me was that the actual physical representations e.g. drawings of them are what are copyrightable

I think the source of your confusion is a misunderstanding of how the word "expression" is used in the maxim that copyright protects works that are "fixed in a tangible medium of expression."   
In the phrase "tangible medium of expression"  the words "of expression" merely describe the sort of tangible medium that is to be used, namely, one which people use to express themselves. 
What copyright protects is the work in the form in which it is fixed.  That is, copyright protects the "work" as embodied in a physical representation, which is no doubt what he meant when he said copyright protects the physical representation. 

This may help: http://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/fixed_in_a_tangible_medium_of_expression

[NJ Patent1]

Kaitlin:

“What copyright protects is the work in the form in which it is fixed.  That is, copyright protects the "work" as embodied in a physical representation, which is no doubt what he meant when he said copyright protects the physical representation.” 

I confess (C) is a minor part of my IP practice.  But I think you and the “information specialist” may have understated the case.  Doesn’t (C) protect an original work of authorship - fixed in a tangible medium of expression - from which it can be perceived.  “It” referring to the original work of authorship - not the tangible medium of expression from which it can be perceived.
 
Turn back the clock.  I work-for-hire for Walt Disney.  We want to come-up with a cute cartoon short.  I get an idea for and draw pictures on transparencies (celluloid medium?, assuming such accepted by Register) of a cute little mouse - call him Mickey.  (C) is applied for, submitting a transparency depicting my original art work on transparency(ies), and (C) is registered.
 
Disney’s cartoon short is a wild success.  Somebody else decides a cartoon strip in the Sunday paper in which the cute mouse is the main character is a great idea, reproducing (copying) Mickey on newsprint, not on a transparency or pressboard or canvas, whatever "medium" was submitted to the Register.  Differences in medium (newsprint vs. transparency etc.) notwithstanding, is there no potential (C) infringement (leave TM asside)?  Derivative work?  It think there is.  It is the “work” of original authorship itself, not necessarily the tangible medium of expression from which it can be perceived, that controls.
 
Having typed that, I have an admittedly fuzzy recollection of a case from early 2000’s in which a manufacturer of sport shoes (Nike? Puma? Addidas?) registered (C) for a rendering (drawing) of a sport shoe, and later tried to sue a manufacturer of sport shoes for (C) infringement who was selling shoes that looked just like those in the rendering.  They lost.  Court said, if I recall, (C) did not extend to physical look-alikes bcs they were not “copies” of the rendering (drawing).  But what about figures ("dolls") of action characters like Superman. Spiderman, etc., anything owned by DC or Marvel comics?  If I start selling Spiderman figures w/o permission, I know I will catch flack.  But under what theory? 

Returning to OP,  IMO your (C) registration for  that "character" fixed on paper should  provide protecton for the same character expressed in other media (e.g. ojn a computer screen).  As for "expression" ,  not sure what you mean.  Short "expressions" in sense of a slogan w/o content usu don't qualify, but the way an idea is expressed can be subject to (C).   

[Kaitlin]

Thanks for weighing in, NJ Patent1.

But I think you and the “information specialist” may have understated the case.  Doesn’t (C) protect an original work of authorship - fixed in a tangible medium of expression - from which it can be perceived.  “It” referring to the original work of authorship - not the tangible medium of expression from which it can be perceived.

Absolutely we understated.  But I didn't think I said anything that contradicts what you've said, in fact my intent was to emphasize that it is the work (meaning the original work of authorship) that is the subject of copyright. 

Returning to OP,  IMO your (C) registration for  that "character" fixed on paper should  provide protection for the same character expressed in other media (e.g. ojn a computer screen).

Again, you are correct--although I do not believe the OP has said he actually has a registration.  I expect his interest is academic. 

But what about figures ("dolls") of action characters like Superman. Spiderman, etc., anything owned by DC or Marvel comics?  If I start selling Spiderman figures w/o permission, I know I will catch flack.  But under what theory?

Like yourself, I'm more conversant with other areas of IP--and I've been out of the field for some time now, to boot.  So it seemed prudent to leave to others any discussion of derivative works in the field of cartoon characters.  My intent was much more narrowly focused, and spurred by the OP's use of the term "expression," which you also seem to have noted was unusual.

You write,

  As for "expression" ,  not sure what you mean.  Short "expressions" in sense of a slogan w/o content usu don't qualify, but the way an idea is expressed can be subject to (C).   

Not only here, but in many of the OP's prior posts, the word "expression" is used as if "expression" itself were a subject of copyright (as opposed to the way an idea is expressed).  My impression is that it is the phrase "tangible medium of expression" which has led the OP to latch onto the term and give it undue importance, apparently concluding somehow that "expression" in the abstract is a subject of copyright.  This possible misunderstanding was the point I hoped to address, and may have been what the information specialist was also trying to address.

My guess is that in trying to point out there is there is nothing magic about something being an "expression" that makes it copyrightable, the information specialist may have resorted to using the words "physical representation" as a broad-brush over-simplification to quickly get across the idea that a work must be fixed in a "tangible medium of expression" without using those actual words.  That is, I think "physical representation" was an attempted paraphrase of "tangible medium of expression."  My emphasis that it is the "work"  that is protected, and my use of "as embodied in", were my feeble attempts to keep the paraphrase simple while bringing it more in line the full "original work of authorship fixed in a tangible medium of expression".

[mojobadshah]

Lets say I was the first one to write a Harry Potter book (original authorship) and the main character in my book (fixed in tangible medium of expression) is Harry Potter, a boy wizard (no drawings, just strings of words).  Would Harry Potter be considered an expression (conveying "boy wizard) and character?  Would the character and expression "Harry Potter" be considered a character and expression that is copyrightable or not?  Would this be a trademark issue or not at all?

[BobRoberts]

My understanding is that Harry Potter becomes a protectable Character under Copyright when he has been sufficiently described so that people can understand his reactions to some situations, or possibly predict his actions.  Now, I believe that there could be protectable aspects in images as well, beyond the standard Boy Wizzard (i.e., a picture of a boy wih dark hair and glasses in a wizzard robe may not be infringement, but if you draw the exact facial likeness, (and possibly include the lightning-bolt), then you would infringe Copyright of the Character...
 
From a Trademark point of view, I believe that there has to be more than 1 book/volume for a book (title) to become source recognition.  So, at the second volume, book etc, the Book/title may become the subjct of Trademark Protection (in my understanding of it).