A roundup of opinions and processes on adding watermarks to images online, from nine WordPress photographers.
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Photographers sharing their perspectives on watermarks:
Jeff Sinon, Jeff Sinon Photography
Mary McAvoy, The Ripest Pics
Karla Aguilar, Traveller Soul
Richard Smith Jr., Reckless Pixel
Marcus Kazmierczak, Mkaz.com
Jen Hooks, My Three Birds
Pam Kocke, Pyjammy’s {Identical} Triplets
Donncha Ó Caoimh, In Photos
Stephen McLeod Blythe, All My Friends Are JPEGs
Many photographers display watermarks — commonly known in the form of a visible marker such as text, a logo, or a signature — on photographs for various reasons, while others strongly prefer not to add them. Here, we’ve asked a handful of WordPress photographers their takes. You’ll read a mix of opinions from bloggers who take pictures for different reasons, their various experiences and methods, and links to other sources of information.
Like other roundups on The Daily Post that compile the best practices of bloggers, our goal is not to tell you what’s “right” or “wrong,” but to present a range of perspectives so you can decide what you are most comfortable with — and choose the best route for you and your photographs.
Do you use watermarks on your blog images? If yes, why is this important? If no, why is it not necessary for you?
Jeff Sinon is a nature and landscape photographer. He’s an active Daily Post participant and has written posts for us on composition and image orientation.
Jeff: Yes, always. I use watermarks as both a security measure against image theft, as well as for branding.
Considering the “if it’s on the internet it must be free” mentality that seems so prevalent, I do everything I can to make sure my photos aren’t used without my permission and that I’m being compensated for their use. I make my watermark fairly large so that an attempt to crop it out will usually have a detrimental effect on the photo. I use my watermark, along with only sharing low-resolution files, as a deterrent to unauthorized use.
Image by Jeff Sinon
My watermark is also my logo, my brand.
–Jeff Sinon
My watermark is also my logo, my brand. It’s very distinctive and recognizable, letting people know that they are looking at a photo by Jeff Sinon. While some people argue that a watermark detracts from the photo, I’ve had almost universally positive feedback on my watermark, with only a handful of people complaining about its size.
Richard Smith Jr. is a photographic artist from New Jersey.
Richard: Do I use watermarks? My answer is yes and no: it depends on the nature of the photo. I am a photographer and more so a Photoshop artist, and I create images that may be printed and sold, or I might have a client who has hired me to create an image. Either way, I will watermark it when posting to my blog. I feel the mark should not be distracting: a simple custom watermark in the lower corner is sufficient.
Image by Richard Smith Jr.
Explore Further: For example, Digimarc offers a Photoshop plugin.
My current mark is also one of my business logos, which helps with branding and lets people know who I am (as opposed to just putting the © symbol on the image). If an image has a high chance of being “clipped,” I may also add a digital watermark that cannot be seen, which you can generate using a paid service plugin in Photoshop.
Check It Out: Here are examples of mobile apps that help you to create watermarks.
I won’t watermark images of generic content, such as phone photos of ducks in the park or an impromptu photo of a rainbow. If the image has a person I know — like a family member or friend — I will likely watermark it. There are also free apps for mobile devices that create watermarks easily.
Mary McAvoy is a photographer at The Ripest Pics.
Mary: I’ve posted my photos on the internet for nearly 10 years. Because of the volume of images I upload, I have three tiers of security to protect them from infringement of the copyright I have on each photo and to minimize the amount of preparation time for upload.
Here’s what I do:
1) Reduce image sizes. I duplicate images that I upload and reduce the sizes so they won’t print well if blown up larger than 4×6. This minimizes a person’s interest in taking my photos for commercial use off the internet.
2) Label photos. I label my photos not only for SEO purposes, but to protect them. For an image that I care for, personally and professionally, I add “by-mam” to the label (“mam” are my initials). This label becomes a characteristic of the photo; where the photo goes, the label goes. I hope this discourages people from lifting my work.
3) Watermark my best photos. To give another layer of protection to a handful of my images, I use PhotoBulk, which allows you to batch mark photos. It’s a drag and drop app with options such as watermark placement, font/size, opacity, and copyright wording.
Related Reading: A post on workflows and editing processes, including tips on protecting your work, from our original Photo 101 series.
In addition to these steps, I display a statement on my sites to inform visitors that all content is copyrighted to me. I also include instructions on how to contact me to request permission to use an image. Despite this process, I’ve found my photos used by others online. In one case, my image had been slightly altered and the person put his own copyright on it!
Pam Kocke, based in New Orleans, often publishes images of her triplets on her blog.
Pam: I feel like “mom bloggers” are particularly encouraged to watermark their photos, but I never have felt the need to do so. This may sound surprising because photos of my three children have been stolen from my blog several times and used on other sites.
I’d have to watermark over their faces to make it worthwhile!
— Pam Kocke
There are a few reasons for my anti-watermarking stance. First, I’d have to watermark over their faces to make it worthwhile! To me, that negates the point of posting images in the first place. Second, it’s a lot of work, and it’s a step I don’t want to do between taking photos and publishing them on my blog.
Finally, I don’t actually see the harm in not including watermarks. From what I can tell, the people who take my photos do so because they think it’s cute to have triplets. I don’t fear for my children’s safety because a bored teenager wants to pretend like they belong to her.
I can understand why photographers want to watermark their photos, but since I ultimately don’t stand to make money off of my photos, it’s not worth my time and effort.
Marcus Kazmierczak is based in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Marcus: Watermarks on photos are annoying, especially when photographers drop them in the middle of the image, often with little regard for the content. It’s distracting and does little in the way of copyright protection.
Recommended Resources: Read “The Value of Watermarks” at The Copyright Zone, or listen to the Street Photo 30 episode at This Week in Photo, which discusses legal issues.
The watermark is not required for copyright protection. In the United States, what is really required is to register your images with the copyright office. However, including a watermark which then gets removed may result in higher damages for a stolen image.
EXIF stores information about a digital image, from shutter speed to date/time and much more.
I simply include a copyright notice in the EXIF data and include that with the images exported, which provides some legal protection.
Image by Jen Hooks
Jen Hooks is the photographer at My Three Birds, and owns a small photography business in Ohio.
Jen: As shown above, I add a little watermark on the images I use on my blog. But I don’t use watermarks to prevent theft; I add them as a means of extra promotion.
If anyone comes across this photo — whether shared on Facebook or elsewhere — the URL for my site is there, for all of those nosy, curious, and interested viewers. It’s an easy way to get more traffic.
Quick Tip from Jen: Want to know if your image has been appropriated by someone else? Use Google’s Reverse Image Search.
Watermarks are easily edited out these days, unless you do an enormous obnoxious one across the entire photo. When you do this, it ruins the image — and the whole point of sharing photos online is for the beauty and enjoyment. So, my motto has always been: if you don’t want an image potentially taken by someone else, just don’t put it on the internet.
Donncha Ó Caoimh, based in Ireland, can be found at In Photos.
Donncha: I don’t use watermarks anymore, although for a series of Folsom Street shots from San Francisco, I’ve added my email address to a bottom corner. Since 2014, I’ve distributed all my photos under a CC BY-SA license and have come around to the idea that if someone uses my photo without asking me, it’s not that they’re trying to steal from me — it’s because they like the photo enough to share it. It’s a compliment.
Read more about sharing your work via a Creative Commons license.
A watermark is partly an ego thing — and wanting to get recognition for your work — but I’ve seen so much amazing work out there that I am humbled if someone shares my work, regardless of whether they give me credit or not. If I can, I’ll leave a friendly comment thanking them for sharing it.
I prefer to make a watermark unobtrusive, in one of the bottom corners. Just my name and URL, or email. It can be cropped out of course, but 99 percent of viewers appreciate the photo and won’t steal it. Those same people will be annoyed if the watermark is plastered across the middle of the image.
Image by Donncha Ó Caoimh
…the realistic loss of income from images being stolen was almost nothing.”
— Stephen McLeod Blythe
Stephen: I believe the internet has changed the way in which we use media as cultural references to interact, and that dogged enforcement of copyright against non-commercial uses does more harm than good. Even when I depended on photography as my main source of income, the realistic loss of income from images being stolen was almost nothing. All my pictures are released under a Creative Commons, attribution, non-commercial, share alike license.
Karla: I used to add watermarks to my photos, thinking that this would protect them. However, someone stole one of my images and uploaded it to Instagram and made it hers, without tagging or mentioning me. Another person took my photos and created an album on Facebook with no attribution.
Karla Aguilar is a travel blogger based in Canada.
I learned a lesson after these two events: anything published online can be used by people with no ethics or common sense! The golden rule is to give credit where credit is due. If permission is needed, just reach out to the photographer.
For our readers who are considering their options, can you offer tips on creating your own watermarks?
On digital marks
Read more about EXIF metadata and viewing and using it.
Stephen: If you want to mark your images in some way, do it digitally in an invisible manner. This is something that professional press photographers do as a matter of routine. Ensure that the EXIF metadata contains information about you, your website, the date of creation, and keywords. This prevents your image from being “orphaned” and allows anybody who stumbles upon it to easily identify you as the creator.
If you use something like Photoshop or Lightroom to edit your pictures, they have built in features to edit the metadata which you can find with a quick Google search. Personally, I use a stand-alone tool called Edna for the Mac, which updates the info in batches.
On visual watermarks
Are you a Lightroom user? Jeff published a watermark tutorial at New England Photography Guild, using Lightroom 4.
Jeff: Make it distinctive and easy to read. Or do as I’ve done: if you have a signature that you really like, use that as part of your watermark.
Make several versions. I have three versions of my watermark — black, white, and gold, which is the one I use most frequently. With several color options, you can choose the right version for each photo (to stand out against certain backgrounds and colors).
Image by Jeff Sinon
Also, make it big. It doesn’t have to be a huge watermark plastered across the middle of your photo — just make it obvious without taking too much away from the photo. Whatever you do, don’t make it too small and place it tight along the bottom of the photo. Make it big enough for people to read and recognize it, and if someone really does want to steal the photo, they’re going to have to work their butt off to get rid of it.
More Tutorials: Photofocus has published a few tutorials as well, from a how-to on adding watermarks in Lightroom 5 to a resource on creating signature watermarks in Photoshop.
Richard: I have lighter marks and darker marks to contrast against lighter or darker images. I also have marks of two different opacities. Although opacity can be changed when adding the mark, I find it easy and quick to have it already set for quick retrieval. Keep watermark colors on the duller side and not too vibrant. (For a long time, I used a translucent mark at a mild opacity.)
Finally, save your watermark in a PNG file format. Without getting too technical, this format is great for the web and works with the most popular watermark creation software programs and mobile apps.
We love PicMonkey, too. We recommend it for things like custom headers and image widgets.
Karla: I use PicMonkey to create watermarks. It is super easy and allows me to personalize them (in different font styles, colors, and sizes).
Photographers have different reasons for adding (or not adding) watermarks to their images. In many of the cases above, photographers have figured out, over time, what approach works for them — and while they represent two camps — for and against watermarks — it’s nice to hear they agree on something: don’t plaster a watermark across an entire image! All that said, we encourage you to explore the tools mentioned and resources recommended to decide what’s best for you.
Related reading and resources
Watermarks Can Be Music to Your Ears, Carolyn E. Wright
On Watermarks and Signatures, Thomas Hawk
The Pros and Cons of Watermarks, Don Peters
The Value of Watermarks, The Copyright Zone
Street Focus 30: Street Legal with The Copyright Zone Guys, This Week in Photo
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Great article and nice to see so many comments and questions.
I think more than understanding the what & why of a watermark, people need to understand the legalities of their intellectual property. The lack of understanding intellectual property runs very deep. Watermarks mean very little in a court of law unless your images are registered.
Also I find that most people are thinking in terms of their images being stolen and used somewhere on the web. While yes this does happen, there is a whole other side to the stealing of images and that is the printing industry. Images are stolen every day for print. Finding your one of your images being used in print can be a very disheartening thing. How much money is being made off of your image? Is the content malicious or hurtful in nature? There are many questions, but most often you’ll never have to ask them because you’ll never know your image was stolen and in this event a digital watermark means very little.
There is also the recent changes in the penalties for removing watermarks, the fines are starting in the thousands and top out at over 100K.
While watermarks do offer a line of defense posting images at lower DPI is very helpful, as is digital watermarking too.
Protect your intellectual property it is your right, in fact (exclusive Right ) is the only “right” mentioned in the Constitution, Article 1, Section 8 states “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;.” All other “rights” or freedoms are part of the “Bill of Rights,”
Sorry to get so technical.
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I really like the different perspectives you bring in! This an an awesome article
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I AM NOT MUCH OF A PHOTOGRAPHER, BUT I DO MY VERY BEST ON TAKING PICTURES, FOR I SIMPLY LOVE IT. AND HERE I DEEPLY APPRECIATE THE SO MUCH PASSION AND EFFORT PUT INTO THE PICTURES TAKEN HERE. GOOD LUCK EVERYONE
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Our article “The Value of Watermarks” referenced above which appears in thecopyrightzone.com sets forth the types/amounts of money damages federal law permits for the altering of watermarks and copyright management software or meta date EVEN IF there is no copyright infringement case.
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Love the book Ed, it really is a great read and I tell so many photographers about.
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Great! I need to learn how protect my images. Until now I never do it. Thanks.
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Thx for this post. Very interesting and useful opinions to consider from serious photographers and other bloggers
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I’m not sure why I can cope with a signature on a painting (well, some signatures) but I’m not comfortable with watermarking of photographs. I don’t even like “watermarking” of TV screens. It’s the distraction, evident by those who describe it as a brand. Brands are meant to stand out, to be seen.
I get around the logos on the TV screen by putting black cardboard on the bottom and top left corners, which means I still miss out on some of the shows that come with the bottom third of the left hand side emblazoned with something that doesn’t move when the camera moves!
I think it is the difference between the ability to immerse yourself in the experience of the image and just skating across the top where the watermark trips me up. No matter how delicate or subtly incorporated, it’s still added to the surface.
Perhaps that’s why some paintings are ok. The signature is another set of brush strokes that become part of the texture of the image? It doesn’t trip me up.
Just some thoughts completely unrelated to copyright. I ramble on.
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I do. It is my signature. I have found that some of my pictures that weren’t watermarked, were used without my permission (or the watermark was not visible), so at least now people can see where the picture came from:) And if they remove the watermark…well, at least I can still prove, I am an owner of an original file:)
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