People Coping Instead Of Buying

Short answer, I don't.

Slightly longer answer. It happens but you can't sell if you aren't online and people that copy will copy with or without a watermark. I simply don't worry about those that copy and concentrate on selling to those that will buy.

Hi Natalie,

On this site if they copy a thumbnail it is not very big. Rather small for printing. The larger digital file is on another server, and will not be copied. It is in reserve for the printers.

You will not lose a file for a 48" or 60" print.....etc....

Broadcasting the thumbnail images is good for business.

Separately, when most of us go on FB to sell, we have low resolution digital files made up to share. I do that with each of my images in Photoshop.

Dave Bridburg
https://Bridburg.com

I wouldn't worry about it. If they are copying it, they weren't going to be a buyer to begin with.

Unfortunately there are many dishonest people in the world and no matter what you do, if your work is halfway decent, it will get copied. But it is either hide it in a closet or put it online. I constantly deal with that. I run reverse image searches often. The scraper sites are a losing battle, pretty much nothing you can do about them. Now if you find someone selling your work you can ask them to stop, send a DMCA, contact an attorney, etc... Like stated above, the images that they can grab are low resolution and the most that they can do is sell it on a coffee mug.

Once on twitter somebody tweeted me back on one of my cat paintings.

"wow this is cool, I will print a little copy for myself"

I thought %&7"(/#@ ohh well at least you should keep it in yourself what you will do. Then I tweeted back the link to the image and wrote it would be nicer if she buys a little print and support my art with that. Of course didnt happen. But that person would never had bought one anyway..

So it is kind of the part of it.

I sell at arts and crafts shows, local art shows, and out of state art shows. Never the same paintings as the ones I post online.

I don't get too excited if and when someone copies my work for personal use. I realize (right or wrong) that's just the way it is. As a result, I only upload reduced size files. Somebody using my work for profit, well that's another story.

With a good printer and a bit of skill with a graphics program you can make a pretty nice 8x10 print from our preview images here. What's that saying? "Locks are to keep honest people honest, they don't stop dishonest people", or something like that. Like others have said, if they are dishonest they were never going to buy anyway, it's not worth worrying about. The bigger problem is shady company's taking our images and offering them for sale on products on Amazon and such, but trying to stop that is like playing whack-a-mole. I just don't worry about it but I don't get many sales anyway, not exactly a big loss. In fact if somebody else managed to make money from my art I'd be tempted to congratulate them. lol

If you are a creative type - where are you going to display your work ?

It could be in a small town, or a large city - but in theory people could duplicate your work anyhow when they purchase an original .
They could buy a card - or snap a cell shot at a show - easy enough.

Not a good feeling to know that your work is copied - but typically it is small time potatoes - and you didn't actually lose a sale from it.

If you do find your work on the Internet - by a Google reverse image search - you send a DMCA notice for take down.

I wouldn't bother chasing ghosts around the Internet - only if it is on another sales site.

Don't let the fear of a petty thief stealing an on-line image stop you from posting and promoting your work!

You lose much more when they successfully paralyze you.

Hello

Unfortunately no site can protect work from thieves who are adamant on having an image that is on their page.

As soon as you go to a site, the image is on your computer. No right click or watermark stops that. All images go straight into a temp folder and can be grabbed from there by people who want it. That is how browsers are designed to make the browsing and speed more efficient.

I only have to make a screenshot and I have any image I want, from any site.

We do however, counter this with these options

1. We have no right click on some pages
2. We offer a watermark (unfortunately this does deter some buyers)
3. Enlarging any thumbnails degrades the quality of the image terribly so it is useless for a print. Remember if they want the image for a phone wallpaper etc there is NOTHING we can do to stop that, even phones have screenshot takers
4. Your full resolution image is hidden away so people only see the low resolution copy
5. On the full resolution preview on the main image pages, it only shows a small section and a border is actually removed. That way, even if people took the time to open all the full resolution image and copied each segment to stitch together, they would not get the complete image.

The low resolution thumbnails and preview images are as safe as we can make them, your full images are not on the site

You need to look on the site which is stealing the work and find a contact link. Then you need to file a DMCA notice (Digital Millennium Copyright Act)

Unfortunately these need to be sent in by the artist themselves to the site stealing them or to the server host of that site.

You can also find that here http://www.whois.com/

Abbie
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Abbie Shores | Artists Community and Technical Support Manager | Shopify Support

I thought this was an economic post about people coping.

Copying didn't originate with the internet. It just made it a little easier.

I like what Janine said about chasing ghosts. Don't go walking around haunted houses or weird internet sites.

I consider a 900 pixel download from here a freebie as long as they don't try and sell it or use it commercially. There is nothing and I mean nothing you can do to stop someone from downloading any picture from any site on the internet.
I have licensed my photos 40,000 times and most of that is on the internet where it can show up in a Google search and be copied. So far i have had very few problems and the ones I had were dealt with.

there is no way to know how many download it. if they do, its tiny, and they can't make a large print from that. you can't worry about it.


----Mike Savad
http://www.MikeSavad.com

It is like leaving your wallet on the seat of your car. MOST people will not steel your wallet...... some will. You can't worry too much about it. There are many honest people out there who are willing to pay for things. Anytime you post anything on the Internet people CAN steel. Even steeling your identify. We can't worry about our art when it's on the Internet. I have seen my work stolen too, but I am making pretty good sales. So, I am happy.

My avatar is world famous, it has been tattooed numerous times, used for peoples paintings, used in a street mural artist competition some of these uses with permission most without. I’ve made zerrrrrooo sales off of it....

basically you have a choice:

you could either take a chance and upload here, get sales and not worry about what could happen.

or

you can place your images on your drive, never show anyone at all, and not make a dime on it.

those are your only two choices. people that steal were never going to buy in the first place. people that buy usually have no plans on downloading a small image.


----Mike Savad
http://www.MikeSavad.com

I sell in 15 different galleries and venue up and down the Central Coast of California. I attend a half dozen open houses and featured artist showings in any given month.

I cannot remember being to one where I did not witness someone taking a photo of something hanging on the wall.

I get it that it is not right and I do not condone it, but it is part of doing business in the day and age where everyone is carrying a camera around with them and has little or no understanding of the ethics regarding art and or copyright laws.

As difficult pill to swallow as it is, you just have to accept it as part of doing business.

I take a lot of pictures for some of these venues, with the artist's permission, of course, to be used in advertising. I can get a great shot that will give me a file large enough to print in larger sizes without a problem.

In reality, your images are not protected anywhere.

You're over worried about the 1% of people who might steal your work and not thinking about the other 99% who won't. Concentrate on selling and don't worry too much about the rest.

"how do you keep people from coming (STET) your work without watermark "

Turn on the watermark.

dito

I wish I had the money to pay someone to steal 20 or so of my photographs and/or artwork. Then I could raise a huge stink over it - and more people would look - and maybe buy a few. As it is - no one even looks . . .

they could look here https://royd-erickson.pixels.com/ or here https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/1-roy-erickson.html

Hey on the bright side, those people with my raven tattooed on them is like free advertising for as long as they are alive?

I have 2 flying crow photos that are the same image except one is a png file for tshirts. They are among my most viewed photos. I am pretty sure they are linked somewhere for people to swipe as tattoos. Eventually it will sell.

That is why I am happy so much for single card sales, because its mean there are honest people out there, its mean also is what they could afford and they didnt want to get the image on the sneaky way, and maybe they wanted also for me to know that they appreciate my work as an artist

I have one image https://fineartamerica.com/featured/teutonic-knight-hans-zimmer.html that is used as an avatar image somewhere. Not worth going after it - i prefer being humbled instead. :o)

Electronic media and "can't be copied" are two poles in life. On the one hand, it's the risk we take, on the other, they won't get a very good copy. In all likelihood, if there were a way to prevent things like screen shots, we'd just stop people who were not likely to buy anything anyway.

Natalie,

You probably want to group register your images with the US Copyrights Office. Using their online features for photos.

The cost is very low for a group registration.

If you have not done so yet.

This would protect you, if someone used an image in a commercial manner and beyond that. Lawyers would take your case much more readily.

Dave Bridburg
https://Bridburg.com

Jack

I've removed your post. Please do not share sites or apps that enable people to have their work refused printing.

People, please do not enlarge your images. If you do we cannot be responsible for QC refusing to print them

Thank you.

If people copy your work, no big deal.

If people copy your work and try to sell it; sue them!

I agree with David regarding registering with the US Copyright Office. This is an important step for anyone making money from their images. And sadly too few people do it.

Images will get copied off the FAA site and used for other purposes, and the more successful you are on here probably the more it will happen. A small percentage of those copies will be commercial or for profit. In the USA, you cannot "sue them" if you haven't registered your work with the copyright office. This is a prerequisite to filing in the federal court system, where copyrights must be litigated.

Now, people will say you own the copyright from the moment you fix the work on your canvas or click the shutter. And that's true. But without that registration you don't have a lot of financially sensible options to defend your ownership if someone takes your work. That's where the registration comes in. A registration allows you to claim statutory damages of between $750 and $150,000 without need to prove "actual damages". Actual damages are hard to prove. Especially if you have a site where you're selling cards for a few dollars a piece or licenses for a few dollars each. The other key thing a registration does is allow the courts to award you your legal fees and costs. Suing in federal courts is expensive. Consider this: I had a case last year that went through the federal courts in Florida. There was never a trial, nobody even saw a courtroom, there were no depositions, witnesses, etc. But I still had over $6000 in legal fees and costs. And the court awarded me that in their final judgment. Otherwise, without the courts awarding you your costs, you need to find someone using your photos where you can PROVE damages even greater than that amount. Probably impossible unless it was a Fortune 500 company that used your work. Many law firms take copyright cases on contingency if you have your registration since they know they'll get their fees back if there is ever a trial. Try finding a lawyer to take a case regarding an unregistered image on contingency. You won't. Further, a registration is a powerful negotiating point in your favor to settle matters before a lawsuit even becomes necessary. Few people want to risk a lawsuit when they might end up paying your legal bills in addition to their own.

Note that you need to have registered your work BEFORE the infringement started. Not necessarily any infringement at all started, but before the specific infringement you are seeking legal resolution for. So you don't want to wait around too long. I register my images at least yearly, often more often, and often hold back images from sites where I know they're likely to be ripped off until AFTER I have my paperwork from the copyright office. The copyright office has streamlined the process in the past year and you can register groups of up to 750 images at a time for $55 (I think).

Onto watermarks, I believe they are important. In the US, the DMCA provides for damages of between $2500 and $25000 if you can prove at watermark was removed by someone. In the case I mentioned above, it was possible to prove without a doubt that the person had cropped the watermark off, since they used the image in multiple places, at least one still had the watermark present. The court awarded damages of $2500 on top of the statutory damage for the infringement itself. Watermarks also deter some amount of theft, and if your image is copied and the watermark remains, at least it can serve as some attribution to you or free advertising for you.

The latter is why I REALLY wish FAA would provide an option for a customized watermark where the artist's name can be inserted. Too often I see my images from FAA in the wild with the FAA watermark on them, but NO credit or links to me whatsoever.

And on finding where your images ended up, Google reverse search is great, but there are several better platforms that automate the searching and legal aspects together. I've used one with good success. If you're really concerned I'd look into those.

Hope that helps, and I really hope someone reading from FAA can take my suggestion about customizable watermarks back to the site developers. Not a lawyer, nothing in here should be taken as legal advice. But I do have years of experience with copyright matters in multiple countries.