How do you stop your art from being stolen?

As an up and coming artist I was wondering how do you keep people from taking and reselling your pieces? Does anyone hear use DigiMarc ( www.digimarc.com ) to digitally watermark their images? Is there another way to watermark easily? Any other suggestions? Thanks to all who respond here.

Hope this makes sense

Haven't heard of digimarc. The one I am familiar with is DRML, especially for protecting videos.

Something about getting works published:

1. Having your work stolen is unavoidable nowadays the same way as Speilberg (is spelling right?) & Bill Gates are hurdling to protect their multimillion dollar royalties and assets.

2. Ultra-dynamic, super legendary artists are more likely the candidates of the theft.

3. Watermark your work by signing it. Actually just merely publishing it is enough as protection in the web.

4. Once you publish, consider it for disposal and for mass massacre and salvage.

5. For me it's like this: "Gee, they are crazy about it." The next day, the download site is banned. So what if they get 1% of your brain's effort? That's actually nothing.

6. Don't work for it. Just "draw" it. Just create the art out of passion. Be happy about it.

7. They re-sell it? Your publisher is the one in charge in the legalities (if there's any).

8. If the thieves re-sell. Oh what a shame!

9. The rest is even more blah.

10. Good luck!

Thanks so much for the input.

Most of the watermarking type services are a bit out of my price range. DigiMarc at 79 dollars a year is about the cheapest and within my price range. Thing is there is de-watermarking software out there for those so inclined to steal.

I think I will keep my work vary fairly price that should help to discourage theft. At least I hope so.

DeviantArt offers a watermark protection thing if you upload your art there. Of course, it helps to sign it too. While copyrights are automatically enforced, putting a statement doesn't hurt either. Something like:

This picture Copyright 2007 Jon Doe

(replacing John Doe with your name, of course)

Mind you, while many people don't realize this, putting (c) has no legal recognition. If you want to put a real copyright symbol, hold 'Alt' and press 0169 on your numeric keypad.

Thanks Larcen. I joined DeviantArts awhile back and uploaded a few pieces. Was not aware of there watermark protection. Maybe I should check back on their site.

Thanks again.

kurchatovium said:

Thanks so much for the input.

Most of the watermarking type services are a bit out of my price range. DigiMarc at 79 dollars a year is about the cheapest and within my price range. Thing is there is de-watermarking software out there for those so inclined to steal.

I think I will keep my work vary fairly price that should help to discourage theft. At least I hope so.

Click to expand...

Oh I see. It appears you are having your own web and will take charge of many contents. My team mate and I sidelined with a video producer using DRML. Sometimes this tools have incoveniences (to other PC) but yeah they work well.

For some artists/publishers, self-watermarking can be enough. Some sites only offer this digital watermarks as option for their uploaders. Okay I think $79 a year is fair enough for a site owner, not to mention the other financial aspects in automation

Bohemianne said:

Oh I see. It appears you are having your own web and will take charge of many contents. My team mate and I sidelined with a video producer using DRML. Sometimes this tools have incoveniences (to other PC) but yeah they work well.

For some artists/publishers, self-watermarking can be enough. Some sites only offer this digital watermarks as option for their uploaders. Okay I think $79 a year is fair enough for a site owner, not to mention the other financial aspects in automation

Click to expand...

Well I will have web content and be selling collections of art to use as wallpaper and for screen savers and yes I think 79 dollars is not too bad. Especially since the DigiMarc watermark is imbeded rather seamlessly into the image without perturbing the image itself. One can potentially remove it but it is not so easy and I think me not being well known I would hardly be worth all the effort. Thanks again for your time.

Thanks rajee. Those are great links.

Your welcome Kurch.