Copyright?

[Cyberfish]

I have found people that are using my pics and saying they made them.Is there any way to copyright them?

I notice some pics have a little circle with a c, I am guessing that has something to do with it?

[Steve Foss]

Mike, it's a very common occurrence these days.

You can put the copyright symbol and your name on the pic, but you have to do it across a big part of the face of the pic to really discourage digital image theft, and that tends to ruin the impact of the image. If you make it small enough so it's subtle and in a corner of an image, then it's easy to either crop it out or clone it out in Photoshop.

You are protected under copyright the moment you capture those images, whether you register them or not. You can register them with the U.S. Copyright Office, which costs some money. They are protected in either case. The difference is that, if you register the copyright, you can collect court costs and larger damages if you win a copyright violation suit.

Realistically, you need to send a well composed e-mail using correct grammar and spelling (so it's as educated and official looking as possible), notifying the Web site these thefts are showing up on that they are indeed thefts, that you hold the copyright to the images, and that if they are not immediately removed or credited to you, you will be suing them for allowing the posting of pirated images. If they are posted on a public sharing Web site, you'll want to identify the post number, describe the images and include the user name of the criminal who has stolen them. If the images are showing up on someone's personal Web site, the e-mail needs to go to that person.

If you are POSITIVE they are your images and they are posted on a public sharing site in threads like what you see here on HSO, you might consider posting yourself and calling out the thief. But only if you are sure they are your images.

Often, that takes care of the problem.

[ShawnZ]

Cyberfish, what HSOforum or place are you seeing your images being used?

I occasionally wonder about the possibility of that happening with images that I post, so that's why I'm curious.

Any feedback would be nice.

[eyeguy 54]

Thieves everywhere!

[Cyberfish]

Thanks for the info Steve, it is helpful.

ShawnZ, it was over a year ago and I lost the site, should have saved it, it was a guide business I recall, not a forums board like this one.

[dkhntr]

Hello :-) This is dkhntr's wife, Jenni. I've been reading/looking at pics over his shoulder for a while now. GREAT pics on this particular part of the forum. This thread caught my eye though.

I'm a "starting out photographer" and one of the things I wanted to make sure I got done was get a watermark for my photos as well. Mostly for my flower shots but also for portraits so the customer can't just use them.

I don't know if you've got a photo edit program like Corel's Paintshop Pro or Adobe's Photoshop but those are helpful in creating a watermark.

Like Steve Foss said you are protected under copyright the moment you capture those images but a watermark can't hurt. I used to just put a txt layer over my pictures w/ the © 2010 J Cameron Photography (alt + 0169) to get that symbol but then realized it was too easy (like Steve said)for ppl to just edit it out. I then went on the hunt to find a way to create an actual watermark. I found a pretty helpful site w/ step by step directions on how to do it. Once you create the watermark you just save it and copy/paste it as a new layer for the photos you want to mark.

here's the HSOforum. now this one is for Paintshop Pro (which i use) but i'm sure there are other sites out there that will explain how to create one.

http://hubpages.com/hub/Paint-Shop-Pro-X2-Making-Your-Own-Watermark

I played around w/ it a bit and what i liked the best is that you can make it as opaque or transparent as you'd like per picture.

Nothing worse than seeing one of YOUR pictures someplace you didn't post it being used without your permission.

Good luck!!! :-)

~Jenni - Dkhntr's wife