Watermarking :: What I use

Sveta asked me a week or two ago what I use to watermark my photos.  I thought I'd give a quick overview/tutorial on how I do it, and am finally getting around to it now.  Thanks so much for your patience:-)


So, why do I watermark my photos?  Mainly because I do not want someone to take one of the photos on my site and use it as their own.  Although the chances of this might be slim, why risk it?   I've noticed that my watermark tends to give a "professional" look to my photo.  In a nutshell, watermarking my pictures gives me a sense of security...not to mention how nice it happens to look. :-)


As you might know, all of the photos I edit are done on Picnik.com {there's the answer to your question, Guin!} where I have a premium account.  Picnik has a wide variety of fonts {most of which aren't even premium, so don't worry} and many options when using them.  As I don't have a photography business or anything yet {obviously...} Picnik is perfectly sufficient for my watermarking needs:-)

 Here is a quick over view on how to watermark your photos on Picnik....

{1}  Upload your photo to Picnik.com.  I think that you have to make an account first if you do not already have one -  but it's free.  Proceed to do any editing to it that you'd like.

{2}  Under the "Create" tab, go to the smaller tab, "Text".  Type whatever text you want into the "Type Here" box.  You can then select the font that you'd like to use.  Basically I write

Hannah Magdalene | Photography

in the box and select the font FF Meta Serif SC.  Please note that this is a premium font, which requires that you pay for a premium account to use it.  However, like I said, Picnik has a wide variety of other fonts that are NOT premium as well.  I really like FF Meta Serif SC because of it's simple, clean, and professional look.

Hit "Add" and your watermark should appear in the center of your photo in white. 

{3} Now you can further personalize your watermark however you'd like.  When you click on the text a little box should pop up in the vicinity showing you a variety of options.  You can move the text to a corner or other spot where it's not in the way of your photo's subject, make it smaller or bigger, change the color if necessary, tilt, fade, bold, or italicise it...It's up to you. 

I generally move the text to a spot near but not covering my subject and then proceed to fade it, edit the size, change it from white to black if necessary, and sometimes tilt it for a creative effect.  Just a peek at some ways I've found to put my watermark in photos.....

{4} Do any other editing that you'd like {It won't effect your mark} and save the photo to your computer.  You're done!

Adding an Image to your Watermark:

Adding a little image/flourish to your text can really make your mark more personalized and professional looking.  Under the tab "Stickers" {It's next to "text"} You'll find a host of little, well, "stickers" that you can add to your photo and incorporate into your watermark.  I was experimenting the other day with ways to to this, as you can see below.  All of the images I got were free from the "Floral" section.  All the text except for the very bottom one was free as well.

{In case you're wondering, this picture is from my trip to Italy - a small Italian town that I captured from the plane.}

The down side to adding an image to your watermark with Picnik: It takes quite a bit of time, seeing as you have to re-add your mark from scratch every time you use it.  You have to not only select your text and image, but also incorporate them together and do everything else: sizing, fading, moving, etc.  I've learned that time is of the essence while editing photos, especially several at a time, and this just adds and extra two or three minutes to everything else.  If you're not worried about the extra time, however, go for it! =)

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Do you have any further questions about watermarking that I might be able to answer?  Or do you have any watermarking tips for ME?  Do drop me a comment and let me know!

I hope that this answered your question, Sveta.  And I'm also hoping that it may have given some of you a few watermarking ideas to use:-)

Love and Blessings,

~Hannah

Keeping Photos Safe while Downloading :-)

Yesterday, the dreaded happened.  I had about fourteen pictures on my camera's Memory Card that I was downloading.  I was in a hurry, trying to do it quickly.  I moved my photos to my "June" file, and deleted them off my memory card.  Then I went to my June file to get them, and realize that they're not there.  They weren't in my Recycling Bin either.  Nope, they were completely deleted of my computer.

How thankful I am that it was only about fourteen, fairly unimportant photos that I had lost!  I can't imagine what it would be like if some certain photos I have were completely deleted.  This incident has got me thinking, though, and I'm determined to be more careful in the future...I encourage you to do the same, too.

So here are just a few helpful reminders on how to safely download and delete your photos off of your camera's memory card.  I'm sure we're all pretty familiar with this, but if your pictures mean as much to you as mine do to me, you certainly want to be aware of these:-)

1. Don't rush. I download photos from my camera A LOT (a few times a week, probably) so I sometimes *think* I can do it with my eyes closed.  I have to keep reminding myself to double check everything I do before and after I do it. 
2. Check to see that your photos are safe before you delete them off of your memory card.  That right there would have saved me the other day.  When you're moving a lot of photos then it will probably take your computer a little while and a progress chart thingy will show up and let you know when your photos have been successfully moved.  But if not, there's really no way to know for sure if your photos are safe without looking, at least on my computer.  So do check. :-)
3. Know where you're photos are going when you delete them.  Are they being moved the your Recycling Bin or deleted permanently off your computer?  Up until today, I didn't realize that when I deleted pictures from some files they didn't go to my Recycling Bin before being permanently deleted.  Yeeps! 

I'm really not sure why I'm writing this - I guess the loss of my photos had a rather traumatizing effect on
me:-)  And I doubt the fact that it's 11PM right now is helping, either....

More coming very, very soon, okay?  See my sidebar for details on upcoming posts!

Happy Clicking,
~Hannah