Many who market or sell photographs online or who just want to prevent online photo theft of the images they've posted for family and friends, often use watermarks as their first line of defense. While it's not the only defensive measure photographers can and should take to protect their images online, watermark use is sensible, practical and useful.Although its true that someone with expert Photoshop skills can eliminate a watermark in an hour or so, even if thoughtfully constructed, watermarks still stop most thieves because it's rarely worth spending an hour or more to steal an image, especially if the final product has any telltale visual artifacts shouting, “Theft!”
This past July, at the Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition Conference, Google demonstrated an algorithm capable of automating the removal of watermarks from photos. Google showed that the removal of watermarks from a series of photographs that now takes hours or days, could be done in minutes.
In years past, when travelers returned home, they took their slide or negative film to the camera shop, the drug store, or the quick processing shop to have the film developed and made into slides or prints. A few hours or days later they picked up their photos to share with friends and family.
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