majinfaisal Posted July 27, 2006 Share Posted July 27, 2006 Hey, im planning on getting my site up live in a few days time, but wanted to be extra cautious with the legal side of things. I am planning on selling company logos that i have designed myself so they are ofcourse unique, after the site goes live i really would not want to see my hard work ripped by someone, so the measure that i have in place (so others cant rip my logos from the site) is to watermark the display images on the site and e-mail files to clients rather than provide them for download, tedious i know....would like some help with this. I have no clue how to 'add' copyright on my images, so basically others cannot resell my items on the web without my permission. So can anyone help me with the steps i need to take in order secure my images. thanks. BTW on my footer i have placed, ?Copyright 2006 Companyname Powered by http://www.oscommerce.com Ive read that this should be ok. -------- http://www.riecks.com/forphotogs/copyrightaction.html This website goes on about adding copyright through photoshop, anyone recommend this way or other methods? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
majinfaisal Posted July 27, 2006 Author Share Posted July 27, 2006 Im in the UK also, im not sure if that makes any difference in terms of image copyrighting.....?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
majinfaisal Posted July 28, 2006 Author Share Posted July 28, 2006 So far what ive done is added the copyright labels through photoshop from the posted link above....and the watermarks of course, is this enough to secure me?? Would like opinions from others thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 copyrighting through photoshop is a waste of time. it's only visible if you open a photo up in PS... so someone could take a screenshot and avoid taking your copyright with it the simplest way is to put a semi-transparent watermark over the most detailed part of the image (so it's harder to airbrush out) but even that isn't foolproof. if i wanted to steal a photo badly enough, i could easily airbrush any copyright from a photo :) (i don't do that, but still. it's not hard to do) - you're just deterring MOST people by using a watermark in the end... the only way to prevent theft 100%, is to not place it on the internet in the first place, but of course that defeats the purpose of it all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
majinfaisal Posted July 28, 2006 Author Share Posted July 28, 2006 I suppose your right there, if someone reallllllllllllyyyyy wanted the image they could get it.... Btw the photoshop copyright comes up on the advanced properties of the image file also, but your right about the screen shot thing. Thanks for the reply anyways, ill stick to a decent watermark i guess! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drkstone Posted August 22, 2006 Share Posted August 22, 2006 While you can not prevent all image theft, you can take some additional steps to make it more difficult, and more easy for you to trace. I find one of the best ways for tracing stolen images, is to name them with unique names. Some image theives may be lazy, and simply save the image, without changing it's name. For example name one of your images: 83nj73jjd663j473eu.gif - then you can use for example google image search, and search for some of your unique image names. You may be surprised, and catch one of the lazy thieves. I use watermarks as well. You could also use a low resolution on the images, so that even if they do steal it, the quality is not very good. Placing a hidden attribute with your copyright info is a good idea, because if you catch someone with the above method, and they deny it, you can prove it with the hidden file attribute. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gil_e_n Posted August 22, 2006 Share Posted August 22, 2006 I'll start off by saying that I'm really, really not impressed with any of the current ways of protecting images from image thieves. Mainly because they're either completely ineffective, or they interfere with legit site users. But I'll try to run down the major methods anyway. Method 1: Disable right click through javascript Pros: Stops the amateurs Cons: Irritates legit site users who do use their right click button for things besides stealing images. Easily bypassed by disabling javascript. Some thieves may not even notice if they run with javascript disabled. Like me. Method 2: Cover image in a watermark. Make sure to cover up the detailed bits. Pros: Difficult and time-consuming to remove. Cons: Your legit customers may be irritated at the watermark as well. Personally, I want as clear and as unobscured an image of what I'm contemplating buying as possible. Since you're selling logos, though, it might be more understandable. Can be defeated by thieves good with photoshop. The better the watermark is at deterring thieves, the more it's going to irritate your legit customers. Method 3: Set your image as the background. Cover it with a resized transparent pixel. Pros: Unobtrusive to your legit customers. Can be downloaded by thieves without them even noticing that they've saved a transparent pixel, wasting their time. Cons: Still pretty easily bypassed by anyone who knows what they're doing. There are ways to save the page background, and if that fails, there's always good old print screen. Still, imo, probably the best balance between security and unobtrusiveness. Always BACK UP your files and your database before making any changes. Before asking questions, check out the Knowledge Base. Check out the contributions to see if your problem's solved there. Search the forums. Useful threads: Store Speed Optimization How to make a horrible shop Basics for design change How to search the forums Useful contributions: Easypopulate Fast, Easy Checkout Header Tag Controller Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trollsoft Posted November 11, 2006 Share Posted November 11, 2006 Legal advice: You don't need to have a copyright symbol or notice anywhere on the image or site to still have a valid copyright (this is true all over the civilized world). Technical advice: None. Legal enforcement advice: Copyright sucks. The reason things are copyrighted is because they're easy to copy, and the only real way to stop copying is to sue (or the semi effective technical methods). If you're in the US though, and you want enhanced damages, you need the symbol on the site (which you have), and you need to register the image with the US Copyright office (but that costs $45 so you probably want to be fairly sure someone worth sueing is going to steal it. You have three months from publication to register or don't bother). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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