Re: Image Stealing

Evelyn:

Yes--it is easy to add an invisible watermark to your images. As well as
others, PhotoShop and Picture Publisher both do this, (although at some two
hundred dollars difference in cost).

However--the big question is still going to be: "What are you going to do
about it after they "steal" your watermarked picture?"

Oh sure--you will no doubt get replies condemning the practice and all sorts
of suggestions about protecting your images. Most of them simply won't work
and even surer, we all agree, these people are dirty rotten so and so's ...

But ...

The only practical recourse--other than a polite "pretty please, don't do
this" e-mail--is to haul their thieving fanny into court. Unless you are
VERY proud of your photo work, I can guarantee that the fuss and bother
connected with all this will be a hundred times more costly than the
pictures are worth. And--unless you are both in the same city, the
jurisdictional disputes alone can take years to resolve while two sets of
attorneys pay for their new swimming pools.

Take it from a guy that has been taking pictures professionally, off and on,
every since my days as a combat photographer in Korea in the
"50's" --Sometimes it's just a lot easier on the blood pressure to take
pride in the fact that someone considered your work worth stealing.

Besides--now you can feel justified in using their web site as a convenient
source for those images you don't have and they do.
 (A--clearing of throat--hem)

Best wishes
Ted Temer
Temercraft Designs Redding, CA
temer(at)c-zone.net
www.temercraft.com/
www.newsredding.com/


> I created and maintain a web site for my sister's small business on line.
> We feature lots of product pictures and It takes some work to scan, crop
and
> arrange images into catalogs.  Some of them are our own digital photos.
> I've come across at least one competitor that snatched all my pictures for
> one line to use on their client's site.  They didn't even bother to change
> the file names.  Is there any way to prevent this sort of thing by placing
a
> watermark or something on your images without interfering with the
content?
> I put the store name in tiny font on some, but this was time-consuming and
> someone could still crop this out.  Thanks.
>
> Evelyn
> webmaster(at)gohallmark.com
> www.gohallmark.com
>
>

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