A Brief Note About Watermarking

April 26, 2009

I’ve noticed that the majority of users on flickr do not watermark their images.

They may add contact information into the exif data when they edit their images in photoshop but I’ve noticed that this usually does not carry over with an actual watermark on the image itself.  As you’ve seen in my blog and on my flickr stream I typically add the grumpymonk.com URL at the bottom right corner of every photo.   Some professional photographers add a much larger watermark across the bottom and in some cases across the middle of the image itself.  This is especially true of anyone who works with women wearing a limited amount of clothing.

I’ve been posting my work online nearly as long as I’ve been taking photos.  Its been a great way to learn, get feedback, show off, meet other photographers, and watch other people repost your pictures for a variety of reasons without your permission.

Over the past seven or so years I’ve engaged in a variety of practices to prohibit people from copying, reposting, or linking to my photos.   I’ve also engaged in heated debate online regarding proper conduct when reposting or reusing images.  After years of this I’ve stopped using a variety of technological solutions and simply choose to include my copyright information in the exif data in every jpeg I post and stamp the grumpymonk.com URL on the bottom right corner of every image.

My grandfather had a saying, “locks are there to keep an honest man honest”.  A thief, he said, isn’t intimidated by your lock.  If the thief wants something from you, they can most likely take it.  This is true of posting your photos online.  Once that image is displayed on the screen there are any number of ways that someone can make a copy.   I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re better off making it straightforward to let people copy your image.   That way they won’t rip it and most likely crop your watermark off.   I say most likely as there are people out there who will for whatever reason crop your watermark off and either pretend that they took the photo or more commonly in my experience, pretend they are the person in the photo.

If you look at a site like tumblr.com which is a very lightweight blogging tool which most people use to repost thing they find interesting the vast majority of users just want to take your photo and comment on it.   Usually they just think its neat and want to share it with their friends.    Chances are they will also fail to mention where they found it.  Tumblr.com also makes it extremely easy to copy and repost content.  The person reposting your photo may be a 5th or 6th generation copycat and simply has no idea where the image originally came from.  This isn’t the fault of tumblr.com or any other blogging software, its simply how people tend to use the tools they’ve been provided with.

This is why putting your URL on the photo itself is so important.  As irked as you might be that someone has taken your photo out of context and redistributed it at least everyone will be able to know where it came from simply by looking at the image.  If you’re worried about the watermark getting in the way of your photo and distracting attention from your subject create an action in photoshop that creates a border and adds your URL to the border.  It makes it a little easier for people to crop off your information but most of the time they’re going to be too lazy to do so.  Use their slack to your advantage.

I’ve gotten a number of paying jobs off my flickr stream and through google.  Newspapers and magazines do comb through search engines to find material if they don’t want to pay a photographer to cover something.  So if they find your photo on someone else’s website at least they can find you.

Once you post something online you’ve provided the online world with the capability of producing an unlimited number of perfect copies of your work.  I think its important to accept that there will be a loss of control over your content in sharing it online.  Once you accept this and stop trying to cover every eventualilty to prohibit users from downloading your photos you can focus on ways to guide the user to make copies in a way that preserves your ownership of the image.  Instead of making it difficult, make it easy.  Let them take the image you want them to take in the format that you’ve decided upon.

Just remember to put your name on your work.  Its yours.  Might as well let people know.

Posted in Technique