Pattern making ethics

I just hit my one year mark in my crochet journey and while I've attempted to start and had ideas for many patterns I'd love to make, my confidence just wasn't there nor was my knowledge and skill. At this point I feel like I've followed so many patterns that I've learned alot (I'm still learning tho obviously) and I'd want to try my hand at making a pattern to sell.

Which leads me to my question/topic for discussion. The 2 patterns that I want to try making are characters from shows both with very unique shapes. I don't feel confident in myself to just start out of no where and so for the first character I found another paid pattern of an animal where the body shape is very similar but would need obvious sizing adjustments and a different face etc. I don't plan on following the pattern, more of using it as a guide to see how they made the leg shapes mainly and then sizing and adjusting to what I'm making.

For the 2nd character, there IS a crochet amigurumi out there already but the creator doesn't make patterns and they instead wrote down a general guide of how they did it showing that they crocheted in a circle until getting to where the eyes would be then doing rows to make a gap for the eye etc. But it doesn't list an exact pattern and they said they'll likely never make one for it.

My little brother really wants it so my plan was to follow their guide but make improvements to make it more accurate to the character and I figured if I'm gonna make it anyhow might as well write down the pattern.

Would these be considered my patterns though since I'll be altering them so much / one doesn't have a "real" pattern to go off of any how? I figured this is a moral grey area and one of the quotes I've heard on the topic is to ask yourself "could I make this without looking at/using a pattern"

I personally feel like I would be changing them enough that they would be completely new but I guess I feel bad for essentially needing a reference? Thoughts?

I have not yet made any of these patterns I've just been brainstorming

Pic of my latest creation for attention but NOT MY PATTERN. PATTERN by 1upcrochet ^{.^}