A problem graphics artists are faced with is having their graphics stolen by others. In some instances graphics are taken by contest holders who renig on contests only to use the graphics without paying for them. In other cases it is a third-party lurker who picks off a graphic to use as their own.

One way designers can help protect their logos is to place a watermark on the logo. Basically a watermark is a translucent layer that contains a copyright notice. This notice is placed over top of the graphic such that the graphic is not really usable. At the same time this watermark is light enough that it doesn't interfere with evaluating the logo. As the watermark is its own layer, it can easily be turned off once the graphic has been sold.

Using watermarks on images you post on the Internet to protect your works is a highly advisable practice.

Hey watermarks are really no protection. Anyone with any experience with Photoshop can do away with them. And most contest holders don't want to see them.

Watermarks are the best available protection and I think most contest holders, myself included, would not have the time or skills to remove a properly done watermark. Yes they are annoying but properly done the annoyance will be minimal. The simple fact of the matter is a watermark is much preferable to a low quality logo submission and they will help provide some measure of protection against lurkers who like to steal the work of others.

i'm sure most contest holders would understand the designer wanting to protect his/her work, although i must admit i've seen a few that are a bit overkill (could the site have a standard watermark that contestants could use?)

i was also wondering, for this site, what about having any potential contest holder pay the "site" the prize money before the competition is approved and then at least once a winner is announced he/she can be guaranteed he/she won't be stiffed? if a winner isn't chosen they could always have their money refunded...

i've only been entering contests as long as this site has been running and i have wondered what's to stop someone from just stealing others work by not paying etc...what can you do if you have been a victim of such theft?

i'm glad you brought this up KLB, i was considering doing a watermark and wanted to know what people thought about them

Most of the contest sites where I am a member have promoted the use of watermarks, but most contest holders can't picture a concept in different colors or sizes let alone try and imagine a concept without a watermark. Sounds good but it hasn't worked at SitePoint, DesignContest, or RentaCoder to name a few that I belong to.

thenameisjolo wrote:

i'm sure most contest holders would understand the designer wanting to protect his/her work, although i must admit i've seen a few that are a bit overkill (could the site have a standard watermark that contestants could use?)

This is something we could provide, but maybe a better idea would be a simple tutorial on how to add a translusent layer to a file that is turned on when saving demo files. It really doesn't take much opacity to make a watermark reasonably effective without interfering with the overall look of the image. I'd hope that most graphics designers would have enough skills to create this on their own.

thenameisjolo wrote:

i was also wondering, for this site, what about having any potential contest holder pay the "site" the prize money before the competition is approved and then at least once a winner is announced he/she can be guaranteed he/she won't be stiffed? if a winner isn't chosen they could always have their money refunded...

We've discussed this but aren't sure if it would be a wise idea to act as a middle man. This would bring on a great deal of administrative and legal headaches. We do plan on eventually charging contest holders a modest subscription fee for the privilage of holding contests.

One of our best defences may be the rating system we implemented. At least members can quickly drum out bad players by giving a negative rating to contest holders that renige on their contests. Although members also need to remember to give positive ratings to contest holders who hold a fair contest and pay promptly.

thenameisjolo wrote:

I've only been entering contests as long as this site has been running and i have wondered what's to stop someone from just stealing others work by not paying etc...what can you do if you have been a victim of such theft?

Well using a work without paying for it and getting the proper copyright release is illegal. The best defense to someone who steals a graphic is to keep a documented "paper trail" that proves you created the work (e.g. contest threads) and then send a DMCA take down notice to the upstream hosting company that is hosting the site that stole the graphics. If you provide good documentation, you'll usually find that the offending site will have been taken down in very short order until the site's owner fixes the infringement.

If it is brought to our attention that a member is stealing the works of another member we would take corrective action from the stand point of either getting the member to mend their ways or banning them.

thenameisjolo wrote:

i'm glad you brought this up KLB, i was considering doing a watermark and wanted to know what people thought about them

Watermarks can be distracting but a fair contest holder will be able to appreciate the reasons behind using them and shouldn't hold watermarks against contest participants.

I think most contest holders, myself included, would not have the time or skills to remove a properly done watermark.

True, also true for the newbees surfing around adn use whatever the see.

This may be the only reason to use a watermark. A wtermark is also useful for some detailed illustrations as you should work hard to remove it.

On the contrary, I agree with phacker.

And most contest holders don't want to see them.

What's worse is; some contest holders may be disturbed by the watermark unconciously, esp. the ones with no visual design experience. That's the most imp. reason I don't like using watermarks.

I always put watermark, and I recomend putting one, but if someone is about to steal your work, or idea you can not stop him. :mad:

I'm hoping that with some education and vigilance to weed out members who steal copyrighted works we can limit the amount of problems we have from people stealing each other work. Dealing with someone stealing someone else's idea is a much more difficult issue to address.

If anyone ever sees an instance where a member steals or uses someone else's work in relation to a contest without proper compensation or proper permission, I would hope that other members would use the "repot bad posts" link on each post to report the copyright violation. We may not be able to stop copyright violations on third party sites, but we can take actions on this site.

Im not keen on watermarking - I dont liek to see them - but I fully understand and suggest their use (though I dont too often myself). However when I do use them I find that ANYONE - no matter how experienced gives up taking mine off because I make it a huge pain in the butt.

[*]I create a new file, 150X150, transparent bg
[*] put my logo in it
[*] set opacity to 75% on the whole image
[*] selection tool, box, whole image
[*] edit, define pattern, name it "watermark"
[*] open the PSD I want to watermark
[*] in EVERY layer, add pattern, set to overlay, watermark pattern, gradient set to linear burn or overlay depending on colors
[*] File, save for web, PNG, Image only
[*] present to client, if sold, I take the pattern off and hand it over markless

If done right, its very subtle yet noticeable, andunless they almost pixel by pixel remove it - there will be signs of a watermark being there...

hope it helps someone who has problems, though I hope none of us do.

Hey there,

Sounds like a pretty solid watermarking technique, but can we please see some watermarked work of yours? I've looked into your posts and didn't find anything with a watermark on it.

Thanks,
Ronny.

See Also -

"ej ronin" wrote:

I'm not keen on watermarking - I dont like to see them

Which means that until someone gives me reason to do it - I'm not going to. So far people here seem honest. Sure some concept borrows ahve been done on a few contest, but...thats not really wrong. I'll watermark when someoneblatantly rips a design or concept off, but as I said - until then I see no reason to do that on my own work jsut yet.