[Tris]

Does anyone know of any free invisible digital watermarking software? Or possibly some other permanent way of tagging photos without changing the image?

As far as my internet research has shown only 2 products seem to exist - Digimarc and Icemark. Digimarc used to be free but is now $49 a year whereas Icemark is a one off payment of $49. I know these aren't exactly bank breakers, just wanted to see if anyone knows of a free solution before I get out the credit card...

PS - I already have EXIF data on my photos but this is easy to remove..

[Paul B]

its obviously not 'free' if you know what I mean but Lightroom gives that facility and is plain brilliant.

[Tris]

Are you sure it's free/invisble? I have access to a 'free' version of Photoshop CS4 which uses the Digimarc plugin (not free)...

[Bubba]

Is there any point doing it anyway? If you modify the image slightly the watermark is removed isn't it?

I had a play with Digimarc (though this was a few years ago now). All you had to do to remove the watermark was slightly resize the image.

[Johnny Brown]

What are you doing with them that requires an invisible watermark? My approach is to only give high res files to trusted customers.

[Tris]

Is there any point doing it anyway? If you modify the image slightly the watermark is removed isn't it?

I had a play with Digimarc (though this was a few years ago now). All you had to do to remove the watermark was slightly resize the image.

This is very true... I guess a crop of one of your photos is still your photo????

[Tris]

What are you doing with them that requires an invisible watermark? My approach is to only give high res files to trusted customers.

The reason I'm doing it is because I have recently become a dad and have been getting hassle from family and friends about posting baby photos online, which I have done. They then asked if I can upload the full size versions so they can download and print off..

People have been saying wow they are great photos, you should send them off for catalogue shots etc...

I know there are lots of other ways of getting full size photos to people, emails/CD's etc etc. On other websites I have put visual watermarks on photos, but I can't in this instance.

I don't make any money from my photos so I don't see why someone else should be able to. I may be having delusions of grandeur and the photos could be shiter than shite, I just thought about protecting the photos somehow... I know very little about copyright breaching or photo theft cases etc but have seen it a few times in the climbing media where people have been using other peoples photos without their permission.

I suppose I could always setup a secure login on the webpage instead...

Any other thoughts people? This could all just be a big waste of my time

[Bubba]

You could put them on Flickr and set privacy to "Friends and Family" only?

There will me millions of great baby pics out there, unless yours are downright exceptional I doubt anyone is going to steal them for commercial use. If you want to see if they will sell, something like Smugmug Pro might be a good option. 

I guess it can't hurt to digimarc them, etc but I wouldn't spend any money on it, or at least try it out first. When I bypassed it all I did was a slight resize of the image, not even a crop and that removed the watermark.

[Johnny Brown]

I suppose I could always setup a secure login on the webpage instead...

Surely the way forward? Or use a print on demand service where they get prints not files?

[dave]

just dump them on a private photobucket account or some shit like that, then email them all the login details.

[Tris]

You could put them on Flickr and set privacy to "Friends and Family" only?

I don't have a flickr pro account, so people can only download them at a certain size, not orig. Plus when I put photos on a website where people have to sign up to see photos (a lot of the older family members are complete 'tards) they get confused and complain that it's too complicated. I had a load of free web storage and it was dirt cheap to register a new domain, so this seemed a better option than paying for a flickr pro account.

There will me millions of great baby pics out there, unless yours are downright exceptional I doubt anyone is going to steal them for commercial use. If you want to see if they will sell, something like Smugmug Pro might be a good option. 

This is very true, hence the grandeur comment previously  I doubt they are better than your average baby snaps, you know what happens with the 'my baby is the cutest ever syndrome' 

Will have a look at Smugmug though, not heard of it before...

[Tris]

I suppose I could always setup a secure login on the webpage instead...

Surely the way forward?

I think so too..  just need to figure out how to do it 

[Jim]

why not just carry on like normal putting up lowish res files on flickr or whatever you use and if someone wants a high res image, just email it to them.
or use a print on demand service like johnny said

[Bubba]

I suppose I could always setup a secure login on the webpage instead...

Surely the way forward?

I think so too..  just need to figure out how to do it 

Not sure about on Windows servers but on Apache it's extremely easy to password protect a directory - google htaccess