A Clever Way To Create A Less Intrusive Watermark
It's a balancing act to make a watermark useful without ruining the image — and photographer Klaus Herrmann has described his own way of going about it
If you’ve decided to indelibly put your name on your photographs to prevent theft, it’s a tricky act to get that watermark right. It has to be big and prominant enough that it won’t be easily cropped off, yet at the same time subtle enough not to ruin the image. Recently, Getty Images erred on the side of information rather than finesse, but what if you’re looking for something a bit more subtle.
HDR photographer Klaus Herrmann recently shared his method of creating a watermark/signature that he embeds in images. His method involves creating a text template, scaling it for perspective in a section of the image, and then blending it into the photograph. The result is an image where the copyright is easy to see, hard to remove, but doesn’t overly detract from the composition as a whole.
On the downside, it’s far more time intensive than applying a standard watermark, and in this case, stylized to the point where it doesn’t tell you who the photographer is unless you already know the signature. While a URL or your full name might be clunky, at least it’s not misinterpreted.
[via Reddit]