Re: embedding copyright

[Virginia]

Good Day!
I am wanting to embed a copyright on a bunch of JPEG portrait files I shot. I was wondering is there a way to embed it without having to re-save the file. I would rather not have the lossy effect if it can be avoided (even though I'm sure I wouldn't notice the difference by looking at it.)
One way around it I thought of was converting all to PSD, embed copyright, save and then reconvert to JPEG, but that seems like a lot of work for what seems should be a relatively simple change.
I am using PSE 3. I am trying to embed my copyright before I give the 2 clients CD's for proofs, just to be on the safe side. I plan on giving them personal printing permission once I have edited their chosen shots. I also plan to watermark the proofs.
Any ideas to make the process more efficient will be greatly appreciated. I've got almost 200 files to do.
Thanks in advance!
Virginia

[Ward Grant]

Hi Virginia,

If you are just going to add a copyright notice, you shouldn't see any real difference if you resave as JPEGs. This would be easier than converting to PSD and back to JPEG. For future projects, you could imbed the copyright on a seperate layer before you make your JPEG copies.

Since you have 200 to process, you can use the Process Multiple Items under the File Command. It would probably be best to have all 200 in a seperate folder to be easy to select the source. It will give you the option to create a new folder as your destination folder.

I would select about 10 of the images, experiment with different fonts and styles before you did the full 200. You can also see if you notice any image degredation.If you invoke Help, it has a good summary of all the options under this feature.

Post back if you have any questions or concerns.

Ward:cool:

[Tom M]

I would think that if you are editing images, that you would be archiving the resulting files as PSDs anyway.

[Virginia]

Thanks for responding,

Ward said:"For future projects, you could imbed the copyright on a seperate layer before you make your JPEG copies."
I'm a little confused by this. I was asking about embedding the copyright notification into the file itself. It ends up appearing with the EXIF information in the metadata. I do water mark all the "proof" photo files I give with a copyright symbol and my initials, then they pick which pictures to edit for printing.
Tom said "I would think that if you are editing images, that you would be archiving the resulting files as PSDs anyway." I guess I wasn't clear about what I was trying to do. I am basically giving them a proof CD and would like to embed my copyright into the file itself. I will be editing the chosen shots in a PSD format and then I do put my copyright and initials on the image and if it weren't already there, I could put embed the copyright into the photo file.
The process multiple files doesn't offer changing the file info as an option, which is where access to the copyright of the file is.
I am new to selling my images. So far, I have given the proof CD with pretty much all of the decent shots (for this client 152) and I was thinking it might be wise to have the added copyright in the file itself, but maybe that isn't necssary. I then give them printable files in the sizes they request of their chosen shots on a CD that they can take to make the prints. I'm charging for my services as a photographer and editing with the CD rather than per print.
There may not be an efficient way to do this. I would appreciate comments from those more experienced on whether embedding copyright in the file itself is helpful. I was just thinking it would be harder to remove if someday I had to prove it was my photo.
Thanks for your input!
Virginia

[Tom M]

An action could be recorded for this with Photoshop.
You could possibly run it with Elements.

[Virginia]

Hello Tom,
Thanks for the suggestion, but I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean. Are you saying there might be something written to run the embedding copyright in the file action in photoshop? If there is do you have a suggestion of how I would find it and how I would install it or use it with PSE 3?
Thank you for your time:D,
Virginia

[Tom M]

Virginia,
I could record an action to place your name for each image here:
http://img445.imageshack.us/img445/5148/picture12xt.th.jpg (http://img445.imageshack.us/my.php?image=picture12xt.jpg)
You could install it using these steps:
http://digitalmedia.oreilly.com/2005/02/23/PSelement3.html
But I think you would have to run it one image at a time in Elements.

For example, you could have several open images.
You would run the action on the first image, it would close, click the action for the next image and so on.

In other words I don't think that PSE will let you choose a folder and run an action on everthing in it with one click.

[Ward Grant]

Virginia
Sorry for any confusion. I probably got hung up in semantics: copyright to me is the copyright symbol with your name or initials and perhaps a date. I thought you wanted some way to have this showing in your image. I now understand what you want to do, but this is out of my knowledge range.

[Virginia]

Thanks for the explanation Tom.
The picture of the screen looks like what is accesible in PSE 3 and I am able to insert my name and a url, so it may be the same. And you have to do it one file at a time. I guess that's the only way to do it.
Now my question is do you think it is worth the time doing it?
Thanks again for your help,
Virginia

[Tom M]

You know, now that I look at that info window,
It appears to be more of a reference feature rather than a legal safeguard.

When I place a © on images on my website, I do it just so I can say it is my established practice, in case I have to prove it sometime.
Because as we know anything can be removed with Photoshop.