Watermarks

[wolfnowl]

Hi Folks:

Came across both of these today.  

The first is from Terry White's blog: Russell Brown Releases his Watermark Panel for Photoshop CS5
The second is from Scott Kelby's blog: I Can Remove Your Watermark with No Problem…

Before CS5 came out, one of the concerns with 'content aware fill' was "what about watermarks?"

My images are almost all Creative Commons but I'm not in the biz...

Mike.

P.S.  Next week the local photo meetup group is having a session with a lawyer on copyright law for images in Canada.  If I write down anything interesting I'll pass it along.

[stamper]

I take it your not happy about the possibility that watermarks can be removed from your images? I am not a Kelby fan but he makes some good points about watermarks being on images and how easy it is to remove them.

[Rob C]

I suspect, but don't know, that watermarking is really only going to be effective in hindering the casual but not professional user of pinched images. I would imagine that somebody who doesn't even have the mechanism for cropping available in his computer will not be going to knock off a pic that shows a clear watermark - can't be that stupid...?

As I'm currently in the struggle of putting together a website, I feel the conflicting temptations between going for large enough images to show off, not putting on any scribbles of ownership on the images themselves, or staying with small sizes and thus probably spoiling the thing for myself. There is the school of thought that says anything on the web will probably get ripped off, but I hate the thought of being a willing rape. Worse, as almost all the interesting stuff was done on commission, I have worries about old clients or models getting their knickers in a twist if material appears in illegal reproductions. Sod and his Laws, of course.

Perhaps that's why, apart from lack of tech savvy, I still have nothing posted up beyond a white page!

Rob C

[fredjeang]

My position on that is clear: no watermarks.

Just look at this site owner's. No watermark, no copyrights in the image. Nothing but the pic. Just the right combination between good size and not usable size.
Generally 700-800 as max.

When I check from time to time Magnum website, I do not miss the size. Pics are talking by themselves even at a small size.

I've been watching many top works displayed at 500 pixels. No problem.

Many pro photographers members of this wesite have their pics with no watermarks even big sized. And they are pro studios.
Just check, you'll see.

Example of a LU-LA's member: http://www.adammork.dk/.
I've been impressed by his work, his website is well implemented IMO.
No watermark neither copyrights on the images.

[feppe]

Anyone using watermarks as a way to prevent copyright infringment is deluding himself. It takes little skill to remove watermarks even without content-aware fill. It's better to post images which are too small to reproduce (and piss off visitors like myself who hate postage-stamp -sized photos), not post anything online at all, or live with it.

[wolfnowl]

I take it your not happy about the possibility that watermarks can be removed from your images? I am not a Kelby fan but he makes some good points about watermarks being on images and how easy it is to remove them.

Actually, I've never used watermarks... my images online are offered under Creative Commons license anyway, so watermarks are rather a waste of time for me.  I was just passing along information for those who might be interested.

Mike.

[Rob C]

Actually, I've never used watermarks... my images online are offered under Creative Commons license anyway, so watermarks are rather a waste of time for me.  I was just passing along information for those who might be interested.

Mike.

Mike, what does Creative Commons license mean? I have never come across the term before.

Rob C

[feppe]

Mike, what does Creative Commons license mean? I have never come across the term before.

Creative Commons licenses can be applied on any copyrighted work. There are six licenses which are between full all-rights-reserved copyright and public domain to varying degrees. It is a very attractive way for artists to encourage exchange of all kinds of creative works, while keeping control of the copyright. Also used by professionals, such as author Cory Doctorow or singer-songwriter Trent Reznor.

I use Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 license, which essentially gives everyone the right to use my photos for non-commercial purposes as long as they credit me. There are several other licenses one can use, their license selection tool is a very handy way to determine which of them is most suitable for your purposes.

The reason I use watermarks with my CCd photos is to direct people to my site if they see my photos elsewhere.

[Steve Weldon]

It's better to post images which are too small to reproduce

Unfortunately the bulk of stolen images aren't being made into prints, they're being used on websites at the same small resolutions we post them on our sites at..

There is no single answer, but each deterrent we add will stop that many more thieves.. and the rest we have to write off.. at least at this time.  There is a very cool tool that crawls the web searching for images and recording what's necessary to recognize them.. so you can show the tool an image and it will tell you if its being used elsewhere and where.  It's still in its infancy but I expect it to be huge.

Then there's talk of a digital registry.. probably  using the tool above for enforcement purposes.

[feppe]

Unfortunately the bulk of stolen images aren't being made into prints, they're being used on websites at the same small resolutions we post them on our sites at..

There is no single answer, but each deterrent we add will stop that many more thieves.. and the rest we have to write off.. at least at this time.  There is a very cool tool that crawls the web searching for images and recording what's necessary to recognize them.. so you can show the tool an image and it will tell you if its being used elsewhere and where.  It's still in its infancy but I expect it to be huge.

Then there's talk of a digital registry.. probably  using the tool above for enforcement purposes.

It's copyright infringment, not thievery.

I bet the vast majority of people using web-sized images without regard to copyright wouldn't pay for them even if they were available for cents, so there's no lost monies involved. They'd just use another image.

Tineye is a cool tool and when google acquires it it will be huge. And the day google turns on face recognition on their image search (they already have that in Picasa), but that's another topic..