Piers Shepperd Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 Hi there, As you know, I've recently launched Stagelink I met Lightnix last night and he commented that he'd prefer not to see the watermark / copyright put on all photos uploaded to the site. The photo area of the site is for you guys and gals, so I'd really appreciate your feedback. It was supposed to offer an area where we could share our production photos, and hopefully display a little of what goes into making a Production. I kept looking at Blueroom posts which contained photos etc, and it occured to me that having them altogether was a good thing. I have a few questions; 1) Is the photo area pointless because so many other sites already offer a good service i.e. photobucket etc?2) Would removing the stagelink watermark & copyright from each photo make people more likely to post?My concern was to try and find a way of protecting images on the site, that got downloaded and then possibly used on other sites without permission. 3) Any ideas for categories to create for people to post photos to? Any thoughts and comments (positive and negative) would be welcomed as I try and sound out what you're looking for. Cheers, Piers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
computer Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 I would suggest watermarking it with something like "Photo hosted by Stagelink.com, user: Piers" to make it easier for someone to report a post being 'stolen'... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Piers Shepperd Posted January 31, 2005 Author Share Posted January 31, 2005 I'm tying to keep all of this stuff automated, so it can happen without me having to be handcuffed to a PC, but it would be easy enough just to have a simple text watermark;"Stagelink.com photo gallery" or something similar. Adding the user name to each photo is trickier because it requires some programming to generate the watermark on the fly. Maybe I'm being paranoid and I don't need to do this at all? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peternewman Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 I would suggest watermarking it with something like "Photo hosted by Stagelink.com, user: Piers" to make it easier for someone to report a post being 'stolen'...<{POST_SNAPBACK}>I'm tying to keep all of this stuff automated, so it can happen without me having to be handcuffed to a PC, but it would be easy enough just to have a simple text watermark;"Stagelink.com photo gallery" or something similar. Adding the user name to each photo is trickier because it requires some programming to generate the watermark on the fly. Maybe I'm being paranoid and I don't need to do this at all?<{POST_SNAPBACK}>The coding to create a dynamic watermark with the username in shouldn't be too hard to do in something like ImageMagick, it could then be done automatically on the fly when the image is uploaded. If users felt it was necessary/a good idea I wouldn't mind having a look at some point when I get some free time. PN Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Piers Shepperd Posted January 31, 2005 Author Share Posted January 31, 2005 I use a combination of Imagemagick and the GD libraries to create the thumbnails and overlay the watermark. My concern with creating the watermarks on the fly is the hit to the server. Yet again due to a firm belief in trying to keep it simple - do I really need to do this at all? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Baldwin Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 I use a combination of Imagemagick and the GD libraries to create the thumbnails and overlay the watermark. My concern with creating the watermarks on the fly is the hit to the server. Yet again due to a firm belief in trying to keep it simple - do I really need to do this at all?<{POST_SNAPBACK}> Surely you only need to do the dynamic watermarking once, on upload? The server hit for this really shouldn't be significant (assuming images are looked at far more than they're uploaded). Do you need to do it... quite possibly not. Those who upload images and are concerned about unauthorised duplication can add the watermark themselves. It might be worth configuring your server to refuse requests to serve images where you don't host the referring page (a la Tripod) - saves you bandwidth, and acts as a simple deterrent against image appropriation. Tom Afterthought - do enough people have the ability to watermark their own images? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IanG Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 It might be worth configuring your server to refuse requests to serve images where you don't host the referring page (a la Tripod) - saves you bandwidth, and acts as a simple deterrent against image appropriation.<{POST_SNAPBACK}> That is one of the things that annoys me about such services - you can't use them to host pictures for a bulletin board, and Google won't index them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
computer Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 I use a combination of Imagemagick and the GD libraries to create the thumbnails and overlay the watermark. My concern with creating the watermarks on the fly is the hit to the server. Yet again due to a firm belief in trying to keep it simple - do I really need to do this at all?<{POST_SNAPBACK}> http://www.dynasig.net is a successful way to show how GD doesn't seem to hit too much on my server. there are several requests per second and all of these are made on the fly, doesn't seem to demanding! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeR Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 IT would appear that by watermarking them with the stagelink name you are claiming copyright. Obviously youre not but thats my initial reaction. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Piers Shepperd Posted February 1, 2005 Author Share Posted February 1, 2005 OK,Thank you guys for the input. 1) Stagelink.com will nolonger add our logo or copyright to any photo uploaded to the Gallery - done.2) I'll monitor the situation and review again in a few weeks time, to see if we have any complaints.3) The onus is on the poster to be happy that they own the copyright to the material they post. It is very easy for users to add their own copyright / watermark to images.4) The Gallery offers the user password protected albums which allows the option for a user to stop search engines and other people viewing their images.5) There is a text field displayed below each image where copyright information can be added. I'd really appreciate it if a few of you could upload a few picy's and get back to me with errors / problems etc.You always have the option to delete / edit photos at any time so don't worry about losing control. Cheers, Piers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jivemaster Posted February 2, 2005 Share Posted February 2, 2005 As a moblie disco I find pirated pictures a great problem. I found my picture in several agencies' listings, even though they dont give me work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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