Have a question for Ask The Geek? Send it to me.

Dear Ask the Geek,

I have a question for the photo geek. What book or resource do you recommend to learn tips on using a DSLR? Want to increase my knowledge before my trip to Lucca this April.

Thanks,
Kristen

Dear Kristen,

this time I’m trying something a little different and I hope you’ll find it useful – I’m answering you in a quick video! Check out my answer regarding improving photography with some helpful tips about using your manual, books and sites you can read for tips, and setting some goals for improving your photography. I’ve also included some helpful links below the video (direct link to the video in case you don’t see it)

Books & gear I mentioned:

• The Digital Photography Book by Scott Kelby [Kindle ebook version]
• The Digital Photography Book - Volume 2 by Scott Kelby [Kindle ebook version]
• The Digital Photography Book - Volume 3 by Scott Kelby [Kindle ebook version]
• All 3 volumes of Scott Kelby’s The Digital Photography Books - [Kindle pack]
• More camera/video gear and photography booksI use or recommend - and more books that talk about composition and the more artistic side of photography

I also wrote a post about tips to improve your photography with any camera (not just a DSLR).

Other sites & blogs you should check out: (have a favorite site? leave it in the comments)

• Digital Photography School (they have a very active forum, too)
• Photofocus
• Phototuts+
• Jasmine Star Photography (especially for portraits / wedding)
• Strobist
• Joe McNally
• Stuck in Customs
• Nicolesy
• Mitchell Kanashkevich (he has a lot of ebooks, too)

Hope that helps,

Sara Rosso, aka WIHT’s in-house geek

Disclosure: Some of the links in this post are to Amazon – I’m an Amazon affiliate and I will receive a small percentage if the product is purchased. 

Writers*, the Internet and its images are not your ClipArt gallery.

Especially in the case of Cooks Source, an assumption was made by the writer that the material they found online was somehow “available” and could be taken, re-used, re-written and published, and including the original author’s name was enough to justify its usage.

Some people make a living publishing content and photos online. Some just enjoy it as a hobby. Some do it as a second job, hoping for something more. All of these people have the right to full control over their intellectual property’s copyright, no matter what you perceive their aim to be.

In this article, though, I want to focus on photography. While more and more people realize using words someone else has written is plagiarism, it’s not as clear to them how they can use / re-publish others’ photos in their content.

A Photo Illustrates Your Story, or A Photo is The Story?

I think the first distinction to be made is between a picture illustrating or visually decorating content, and a picture as the story. In the first case, the picture helps you, the writer, to illustrate your story to the reader through visual clues. People like pictures, it breaks up text, and it gives them different focal points. In the second case, the picture is the reason for the story. It’s news, a point, a counterpoint, or the basis for a discussion.

Example: this picture of gelato.

In the first case (a picture illustrates a story): the writer could decide to use the picture in a story talking about gelato, about summer in Italy, about ice cream even. They use the photo like clip art – to punctuate a textual story with visual elements.

In the second case, an article could be written with reference to the author’s original blog post where the picture appeared. Additional details like the original author’s name & link, point of view, perhaps even a small excerpt is incorporated into the story (not only a credit at the end) as the writer uses the author and her photo as a point of reference and source, and as a key component to the story the writer is currently telling that is related to the original author’s content.

Neither of these editorial approaches is more correct than the other. Most of the photos on When I Have Time are used in the first case, as they help illustrate my story, but they are not the story. Often copyright owners find more gratification from the second case – if my photo is your story, most likely I am getting publicity, interest, and hopefully credibility and traffic from its inclusion.

In both cases, the writer needs permission from the copyright holder to use their photo.

Case #1 actually happened to me and this particular photo, and it was included in a post as an visual without my permission. I feel no need to name the site as we rectified the situation cordially and they were very professional. But it became even clearer to me that the assumptions some writers are working on need to be set straight.

Respect Image Copyright

If there’s a watermark on the photo, you can bet the photographer cares about how that photo is republished and used. Even if there’s no watermark, there is copyright on the photo! {Read up on a Guide to Copyright and Creative Commons if intellectual property rights are fuzzy to you} If a photo is available for Creative Commons usage, the author will declare it somewhere in an easy-to-find place like their site sidebar, on their About page, or directly under the photo.

If you can’t find Creative Commons license information at first glance, don’t assume that photo is available for the taking. Assume the exact opposite. It’s not available, for any usage, and you should write the copyright holder for permission. When in doubt? Send the photographer an email!

Proper Usage and Crediting a Photo

If you find a photo available for usage that is Creative Commons, its license dictates how the photo can be used, modified and attributed. If you’re not sure your usage is ok, ask the photographer! Ask!

Some tips for proper usage and crediting a photo:

• Did I mention ask permission? When in doubt, ask. This step cannot be overlooked.
• You credit the name, but don’t give a link. A link is not required by law, but it is the Internet. Why not share the love back?
• Make sure you insert the link and credit before the post has been published (so all RSS readers see the link).
• Never put your own logo or watermark on the photo unless you have explicit permission to modify the photo (again, ask!).
• If the photo you’re using is Creative Commons, drop the author a line after the fact to see where their photo has been given new life – who knows, you may gain another reader or even an advocate.

Build a Relationship with your ClipArt generator, the Photographer

If you’re a site owner, or a community site writer, why not think of other ways to approach photographers so that they will be more interested in your request to republish their all-rights-reserved photos?

• Approach the photographer and offer to do a profile on your site about the photographer in exchange for a certain number of photos (i.e., 5) for other blog posts.
• Offer to pay the photographer (innovative, I know).
• Offer something else in exchange (perhaps you can barter its usage).
• Ask if they have any photos with Creative Commons licenses or available on stock photography sites – perhaps you’ll find a substitute photo that can be purchased cheaply or can be used with Creative Commons.

Are you a writer looking for images? Start with Flickr’s search for Creative Commons images licensed for commercial use.

Do you have any tips for writers on correctly finding and using images on the Internet?

If you’re a photographer, what would you prefer writers offered you, other than money, for using your photos?

*I use the term “writers” in this case to mean both journalists and bloggers – I have seen cases where both have overlooked copyright.

Photo credit: me, Sara Rosso

Here’s a few of my tips for improving your photography, no matter what camera you have. Note that these are not suggestions about composition or improving your artistic license, but practical tips regarding light, focus, and using your camera’s basic functions.

Note: While I have been using DSLR cameras for several years (and you can check out my Flickr photostream for some of my more recent photography), I purposely chose photos that were taken with a 3.2 megapixel point-and-shoot camera to help illustrate some of these points.

1. Keep Steady, keep the picture sharp and in focus

Nothing ruins a picture like it being out of focus. Your little-camera-that-could is probably trying as hard as it can, but you’ve got to help it – stay as still as possible to reduce that shake.

Here’s a few quick tips:

• Use two hands. It may seem obvious, but I’ve seen many a photo being taken with just one hand on your camera. Your camera might be light and easy to use so you don’t need two hands to focus and push the button, but it will help stabilize it with two hands. Use both!
• Bring those elbows in. The display screen on most cameras means you can see what the camera is focusing on without putting your eye to the viewfinder, but chances are you are holding it away from your body and increasing the chances of camera shake. Bring your close elbows into your body.
• Brace yourself. Put your back up to a wall, lean on a corner, sit in a chair. Do as much as you can to make yourself into a stable tripod for your camera, and take crisper pictures.
• Brace your camera. If you can’t brace yourself, at least brace your camera. Rest it on a rock, on a counter top, on a low wall to stabilize your shot as best as possible.

2. Emphasize natural light first and foremost – avoid flash when possible

If there’s one thing that’s the bane of most photography, it’s that nasty flash reflecting on the food, in a window behind your subject, or otherwise whitening out your focus unnecessarily. Try to use natural light when possible – open nearby curtains to let in more light, move the subject closer to the light and turn off additional light sources so that you can focus on photographing just that natural light. You can override your flash setting and turn it off so you can experiment with light.

3. Pay attention to where the sun is, where reflections are, and where the glare is

Sometimes a photo is just not meant to be, and the sun has a lot to do with that. Note which direction the light is coming into your photo. If you have a subject you can move, like a person, make sure the light isn’t coming directly from behind their head as you won’t see their face at all (this can be fun for silhouette photography, though). Turn them so that the light source is in front of them or slightly to the side to avoid dark shadows on one side of their face. Make sure your subjects are either completely in the sun or shadow so you don’t have blotchy pictures.

4. Get creative with your light sources

If you don’t have enough natural light to make the shot, before you give up entirely, try increasing the light coming in by reflecting off a mirror, white poster board or other reflective surface onto your subject. Or sometimes, the light can make the entire picture.

5. Use the viewfinder & change your perspective

Most beginning photographers take pictures with their cameras straight out in front of them, and digital cameras with their LCD display screens have encouraged this. Try putting your eye to the viewfinder, and change your physical perspective as well – point the camera above your head, get down on one knee or on eye-level with your subject, or even look behind you to see if you’re missing an equally gorgeous shot.

6. Isolate your subject or change the background

If you’re trying to take a picture of a person, a plate of pasta, or your dog, if that subject’s in the middle of a chaotic tableau, they’ll disappear. To make sure your subject stands out, isolate it as much as possible – ask the person to stand near a wall instead of in the middle of the room; move extra cups, napkins and menus away from your plate of pasta; get closer to your dog so you fill more of the photo’s frame with him.

7. Use the “little flower” macro option

Almost all cameras have that “little flower” or macro as a setting for close-ups. Make sure you’re using the correct setting (little flower = closeups, mountain range = longer-range) at all times, and why not try both settings if you have time? It’s a digital camera after all and you can experiment.

8. Read the manual

Probably the best and most basic advice anyone in the tech world will give you is read your camera’s manual. Why not carry it around with you for a few weeks so you can read a few pages a day, or look up the answer to a question you have about using the camera? You’ll thank yourself later. And that’s why you spent all that money on the camera, right? So you could get good at using it.

Have any questions to ask regarding improving your photography? Any tips to add?

Read these articles for more information about improving your photography:

• BBC’s How to take good photographs
• Kodak’s Top 10 tips for Great Pictures
• Lifehacker’s How to Take Great Digital Portraits

Images from my food & travel site, MsAdventuresinItaly.com, and are copyright Sara Rosso.

Photoshop (from Adobe)

Even now the cost of Photoshop is enough to make your jaw drop (from $200 to $1400), and therefore it is quite an investment to use for those that are casually interested in improving their photos or images.

This year, when I switched to a Mac (thanks to the Vista-XP-Windows7 Bermuda Triangle fiasco) the thing I was most reluctant to leave behind was my working copy of Photoshop.

GIMP (The GNU Image Manipulation Program) is a free, open source program that is very powerful and in many ways better than Photoshop because it’s free and has a great community behind it. Because it lets you be a powerful graphics editor, too. I started playing with GIMP (or the GIMP as some say) more than a year ago, when I didn’t have Photoshop on my work computer and wanted to see how it worked.

Everyone says GIMP has a steep learning curve. They are right. Especially if you’ve never used Photoshop.

But I will show you how you can do 7 easy tricks you would do in Photoshop for absolutely free using GIMP. Of course, these are not really “tricks” in the sense that they are neither original nor groundbreaking, but after learning them and where these functions are located in GIMP, I guarantee you’ll be comfortable with GIMP and on your way to using a powerful and free open source software within a few minutes.

Here are the tricks we’ll cover:

1. Resize an image
2. Add a guide
3. Rotate the image to correct/straighten a horizon
4. Crop an image
5. Change a color image into black and white
6. Fix blemishes or remove unwanted things using Clone
7. Add a text layer watermark

Note: Menu and toolbar names will be in bold and an indication of a nested menu item will be preceded by “>” (i.e., File > Open)

First let’s take a look at our original image we’re going to work on in GIMP.

It’s not a terrible image, right? It’s got some potential. So let’s get to work.

1. Resize an image

The first I usually do when working on an image for my blog or for sharing online is to resize the photo. You won’t need an image that is 3000 pixels across if you’re posting on Flickr or something similar – usually 1000 pixels in width is a safe bet to do a quick resize. Note, this is not a crop – I am not removing anything from the image, for now.

After opening the image, navigate to Image > Scale Image to get the resize dialog box.

And here’s the dialog box. Note that the “chain link” is linked by default, meaning that GIMP will retain the proportions of the image (i.e., an image that is originally 200×100 will reduce to 100×50, etc.) If you need to resize to a specific size (i.e., 100×37) you’ll want to click on the chain to remove the proportion constraint. Also pixels is the default denomination – you can also choose inches or percent to reduce the image by 50%, etc.

Insert the new Height or Width, press your enter/return key and the other measurement will update automatically if the proportions are linked. Once you have entered the measurements you desire, click “Scale” to resize the image.

2. Add a Guide

Guides can be useful to mark the halfway point of an image, when aligning text or different layers or to help correct a horizon. In this example, we’re going to add a guide so we can do the last task.

Go to Image > Guides – then you can choose to add a guide in several ways: by percent (50% horizontally, 10% vertically, etc.), arbitrarily (by pixel) or from the selection – for this example we’ll use a simple guide by percent.

I’ll put the horizontal a little lower than the middle of the image, at 60% horizontal.

Here you can see the guide on the horizontal.

3. Rotate an image (in this case, to fix a horizontal)

Sometimes a picture needs to be rotated because the photographer wants to give it a different look, or feeling, or sometimes you’d just like to straighten up the picture a bit. To rotate the image 90 degrees clockwise/counter-clockwise/or 180 degrees, you can easily do that with Image > Transform and then by choosing the method you’re interested in.

But what if you need to rotate the image just a little? Just a few degrees, or 10, or 45? It wasn’t completely intuitive for me to find how to rotate an image just a little bit. In GIMP you can rotate a layer just a little bit, which is why I suggest doing any rotating to the original image before adding text layers or other modifications.

To rotate the image, access it at Layer > Transform > Arbitrary Rotation:

The dialog box give you the opportunity to enter the degrees the image needs to be rotated, use a slider to rotate it arbitrarily, or you can do it directly on the image by clicking and rotating. This particular photo only needed about 2 degrees of a nudge to straighten it up.

4. Crop an image

Now the image has been straightened, but there are some “gray areas” since now the image doesn’t fill up all the rectangular space. So we need to crop it!

To crop, I usually select the area I want to keep, and then crop. First, select the Rectangle Select Tool in the Toolbox in the upper left. I like to use an additional setting to help me keep the crop in proportion with the original image – in this case it’s a vertical photo so I’m going to select “Fixed Aspect Ratio” on the lower right of the Toolbox and insert 36:54 (width:height) for my image (or 2:3). [Note: this ratio will not work for images from every camera - check your own image ratio]

Then I select the image that no gray/empty area is included in the selection. After selecting, you modify the selection by hovering the mouse at any of the four sides of the image and GIMP will let you extend/decrease the size.

Then, select Image > Crop to Selection.

Now I have an image that is straight and correctly cropped.

5. Change a color image into a black and white image

Sometimes a black and white photo can add some austerity, increase the drama of a photo, or sometimes it’s just something you want instead of the color original. There’s no need to take photos in black and white originally because you can always use software after to turn them black and white.

In GIMP there are actually two different ways to change a color image into a black and white one – by changing the mode to grayscale, or by desaturating it.

To change the mode, go to Image > Mode > Grayscale.

To change the desaturation, go to Colors > Desaturate. I usually compare the different shades with “Lightness” “Luminosity” or “Average” to see which effect I like better.

6. Remove unwanted blemishes from a photo with the Clone Tool

Let’s not turn the photo black and white just yet. Perhaps you didn’t notice that little duck in my original photo (see it there in the middle right?) or that sun glint on the water surface on the bottom left, but we’re going to remove the little guy and that glare to show you the potential of the Clone tool. Let’s take a closer look:

First select the Clone icon (the little stamp) in the Toolbox, and then the Brush size (lower in the Toolbox) you’ll need to use – if it’s a small detail, you’ll need a finer/smaller brush, if it’s a larger area, increase the size of the brush.

Then, select an area using Alt+ click or Option + Click that will be your base/reference area for the cloning. You may have to move this several times to get the effect you want. Bye bye little duckie!

And now we have a cleaner picture:

7. Add a text layer watermark

You may not like watermarks on photos, but I think it’s a simple precaution that many bloggers and photographers do today. You can create a watermark that’s more stylish or beautiful, but to start with, you can just add a text layer to the image and reduce its opacity so that it appears translucent.

Click on the Text Tool (A icon) in the Toolbox, then click and drag on the image where you’d like to put the text box. In the text dialog box, insert the text you want to use as your watermark – for example, your name, your domain, or your blog name.

Then, click on the layer in the Layer Toolbox and reduce the opacity from 100% to an opacity that is comfortable for your watermark. Voila!

And now my picture is ready to be saved and put online! What else would you like to know how to do with GIMP?

Here are some other GIMP tutorial sites, and information on free alternatives to Photoshop:

• 11 Outstanding (Free) Alternatives to Photoshop
• GIMP.org Tutorials
• Gimpology Tutorials
• Open Source photography pool on Flickr
• Open source software for photographers using Linux

image by yohann.aberkane

Thanks to one of the many Meet the Media Guru events organized in Milan, Cory Doctorow was in Milan and I was lucky to get an interview one-on-one with him. Here’s part 3 of my interview with Cory Doctorow, where he talks about the future of art in the Information Age.

SARA: Can we go back to copyright a little bit…you talk about “the elimination of copyright is something that diversifies cultural participation” and “decentralizes who gets to make art.” I wanted to talk to you about what you think the future of an artist is, because maybe a couple of years ago, you were a programmer OR a writer OR a photographer and I think that if we’re not going to be able to “get rich” because that’s something that the copyright should be protecting who can buy, and how many copies they can buy, a further evolution of this might be: you might make less from that book, you might write more books because the technology is helping you do things faster, but you might need to diversify your own talent.

How do you see the future of an artist being impacted by the information age?

CORY DOCTOROW: Well, I think that, and I want to start at the beginning of the question: I think that copyright diversifies decision-making about who gets to make art. Before copyright, we had patronage, so a pope or a duke said that you could paint a ceiling, you could paint a ceiling. We got some great ceilings that way, but it was not a great way for apportioning capital to make art. The creation of an exclusive industrial right that you could then waive investment on to restrict copying allowed people to make any art that they wanted to, provided it was profitable.

So that was the second stage, and that vastly diversified decision making about who got to decide who made art, and that was good. We are entering the realm now in which relaxing that right, not eliminating it but relaxing it, dramatically reduces the amount of capital you need to produce, because for example you can remix and do lots of other things. And when you dramatically reduce the amount of capital you need, you further diversify, because now it’s not just that art which is profitable, but it’s that art which is profitable at smaller investment levels, or that art which doesn’t require profit in order to exist, right? It can be made for free.

So this is really a good policy, I can’t wait to have more diversity from a more relaxed or more liberal copyright regime. But I don’t think that copyright ever made a majority of artists rich.

So, the majority of artists were not earning anything like a living before copyright, before the Internet rather. They won’t be earning a living during the Internet, they won’t be earning a living after the Internet because creating art is a non-economic, fundamentally non-economic principle. People make art even when no one wants to buy it because they want to express themselves.

Now the Internet has made it possible for a generation of artists to earn a living, there are a lot of artists who are earning on the Internet and that’s great news for them. Visual artists who can connect more readily with potential buyers for their work. My friend Rick in Michigan, he lives outside of Detroit and he’s a well-known painter of science fiction book covers and it’s your basic commissioned painter work. It’s your basic day-job for painters. But he loves photography and he sits in his backyard and he takes the most exquisite macro focus photography of bugs and high-speed photography of birds. And the Internet has made it possible for him to connect with an audience, a gigantic audience of people who want to buy art prints of these photos.

So here you have someone who was making a modest living painting book covers for New York publishing, is now making a real living as an artist taking photos that really tickle his artistic fancy from his backyard in Michigan. So this is the kind of thing the Internet enables. But even when it does enable an artist to make a living, the two reasons we make art is to get paid, but also to be heard. The Internet has made it possible for more people to be heard by more people than ever before.

So, every artist is going to find their own way to earn a living or not, and the majority of artists won’t find a way to earn a living, that’s just the way it works, whether or not there’s an Internet. But if there’s an Internet, more artists will be able to find an audience and that’s a piece of the puzzle. It’s not the only piece but it’s a very important piece of the puzzle.

SARA: Can you give us a little preview of what you’re going to be speaking about tonight? (Meet the Media Guru, Milan)

CORY DOCTOROW: I think you just heard it. I’ll be talking more about exactly this.

SARA: Yes, because I saw that you’re talking about writing in the “Age of Distraction”…

CORY DOCTOROW: I won’t be talking about that so much but that’s certainly something that cuts right into my daily experience, because I work on a novel all the time, I’m writing a thousand words every day on it, I wrote a thousand words this morning and getting those thousand words done when you travel a lot and have a little baby and all the rest of it, is tricky.

SARA: I’m not sure if you’re aware that in Italy they are proposing a law for a registry of bloggers, because in Italy we still have a registry of journalists – to be a part of this you have to be certified and carry a license. What do you think the implications of having a registry of bloggers could be, that we’re held accountable legally just like a journalist could be in Italy?

CORY DOCTOROW: I don’t think it would work very well, because defining who a blogger is would be very hard. It would silence or make ridiculous the phenomenon, for example of a 12 year old who wants to open a blog to talk about their Pokemon cards with their friends. Do those people need licenses? And how do you establish where the cutoff is?

This sounds to me like it’s something that a Parliament could spend 10 years debating, and by the time they come up with a working definition, it would have been completely invalid and technology would have moved on.

If there’s a legitimate problem that the Parliament’s trying to solve, this won’t solve it. I guess that’s the shortest answer I can give you: this won’t solve it.

SARA: That’s all the questions I have today, thank you for your time.

CORY DOCTOROW: It was lovely to meet you.

Thank you so much, Cory! I’ll be posting a round-up with the downloadable file and audio tomorrow.

Image by regolare

Dear Ask the Geek,

I have a quick question about the copyright info you have on the photos on your blog. I have just started my blog, and I love posting my photos. Should I be concerned about doing that? I was hoping to ask your advice and a bit of your wisdom on the matter since you have more experience blogging. If one adds the copyright sign like you do, does that protect the images? Also, on a technical note, how do you add that to your photos? I use a Apple with iPhoto, but I also use a PC.

Any advice would be so helpful!
Budding Photographer – Blogger

Dear Budding Photographer – Blogger,

On my food and travel blog Ms. Adventures in Italy you might have noticed that I have “sararosso.com” on all my photos, but that’s not to say that it’s the right thing for everyone. Let’s look at each of the issues of your question in more detail.

• The Difference between a Watermark and Copyright
• All Rights Reserved and Creative Commons
• How to Create a Watermark

The Difference between a Watermark and Copyright

First of all, let me clarify that the semi-transparent text you see on my photos is not a copyright. It’s a visible digital watermark that is an opaque text layer that I insert in my photos. Invisible digital watermarking takes the process much further and actually embeds identification information digitally into the file which cannot be seen. This is not very widely used and would be the sort of thing a professional photographer may do. It usually requires special software.

A watermark does not necessarily protect the photo’s copyright. To learn more about copyright, Read the { When I Have Time A Guide to Copyright and Creative Commons } In it, I touch on the fact that copyright is inherent with original works of art like photos. In short, you automatically “own” the copyright to your photos. It’s up to you to decide how you’d like your work to be shared/modified/re-worked by anyone that finds it.

A watermark, more than an actual legal mark is what I consider to be a social deterrent that serves two purposes:

1. deter the user from stealing the photo which is unusable for many (profitable) ends
2. help render it recognizable by the author or others in the case that it is re-used somewhere else

While it won’t stop your photos from being taken, modified or re-published, it may deter someone interested in taking the photo since they don’t have a pristine photo available for their means.

All-Rights Reserved and Creative Commons

I decided to keep my photos All Rights Reserved except for a small selection of photos on Flickr that I have released under the Creative Commons license: Attribution-Non-Commercial which means I expect to be attributed as the original author but that people can re-publish/modify/build on for non-commercial means.

Depending on your objectives, you might also decide to change your license terms on your photos. I suggest you read the When I Have Time A Guide to Copyright and Creative Commons and decide what’s best for you.

How to Create a Watermark

There are several ways to create a watermark, and several programs you can use to do it. Most are specifically photo editing software, and some are even free!

Some include plugins or actions to create a watermark, but there is a simple method to do it that will work in almost any program:

1. Open your photo file (Geek tip: always work on a copy of the file so the original remains untouched)
2. Create a new layer or text layer
3. Type in the text you’d like to appear (your name, your blog’s name or your URL)
4. Adjust the opacity or transparency of that text layer so that it is visible to the degree you prefer.

Some prefer to create a “frame” to the photo with their URL or to not use transparent text at all but rather the full text color, but it’s completely your preference.

Photo-Editing Software to Make Watermarks with:

Here are some suggestions of software to get you started. Making a watermark is something you’ll have to learn the first time you use a software program, just like any software, but once you know the steps it’s quite quick and easy, and you can set up a batch to do it on a group of photos in many software programs for your next blog post.

• Adobe Photoshop or Lightroom – I’ve been using Photoshop for more than 10 years, so I’m most comfortable using it. Adobe Photoshop Elements is a lighter version of the software for the budding photographer (like you!)
• GIMP – a free, open-source alternative to Photoshop that is rich in features.
• Picnik – online photo editing with a lot of options. Choice of Free or Pro versions.
• PicMarkr – a free, online way to add watermarks. Pro installable version available, too.
• Watermark.ws – an online and free tool to add watermarks.
• CNET 15 Online Photo Editors Compared – some free, some with paid pro versions, including some of the software I mentioned above.

Good luck, and start experimenting!

Sara Rosso (aka WHT’s In-House Geek)

• What is Copyright?
• What is Creative Commons?
• Types of Creative Commons Licenses
• How to Use Others’ Creative Commons Content
• A Video Introduction to Creative Commons
• Copyright and Creative Commons Resources

What is Copyright?

Copyright is a way to protect the “original works of authorship” of published and unpublished work, usually expressed in a tangible way. On a high level these types of works are protected:

• literary works
• musical works, including any accompanying words
• dramatic works, including any accompanying music
• pantomimes and choreographic works
• pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works
• motion pictures and other audiovisual works
• sound recordings
• architectural works

Several of these categories are directly applicable to content made available online. When you create something truly original: a song, a photo, a story, a blog post or a video, you automatically have an all-rights reserved copyright for that work.

Note that copyright is different from a patent, which is attributed to an original method of doing something, a process or a physical invention; or a trademark, which is almost exclusively a visual combination of a logo, slogan, and/or image.

There is no “international copyright” though most countries respect and protect copyrights through international agreements such as treaties and conventions. Copyright is a delicate issue and if you are serious about protecting your rights you might want to speak to an intellectual property lawyer in your country.

But what if you’d like to make your work available for people to enjoy, share, re-use, adapt or modify?

Let’s look at something that is being used all over the world, and in fact is being translated and adapted to local countries’ legal requirements: Creative Commons.

What is Creative Commons?

Creative Commons, while a relatively new term since its birth in 2001 is by definition is a non-profit organization, but the name is more widely associated with the concept of Creative Commons as a way to extend copyright to promote legal sharing and modification of original works. Here’s the goal of the organization:

increase  the  amount  of  creativity  (cultural,  educational,  and scientifc  content)  available  in  “the  commons”  —  the  body  of work that is available to the public for free and legal sharing, use repurposing, and remixing.

Creative Commons is a way for you to take your intellectual property – original content like photos, writing, designs, videos and more, and assign rights to it to be shared with the community and the world. It is not an alternative to copyright: it works in parallel with copyright.

Creative Commons licensing can protect the original copyright and level of permissions the author chooses. It can also perpetuate these rights (or not, depending on the author’s choice) and encourages and facilitates re-use and sharing. Most importantly, it helps the author retain rights if they so choose, and it helps the user to know exactly what the author wants done with his content and how they can utilize it. As CC calls it, “Some Rights reserved.”

If instead you prefer to give up all rights to your work, it becomes “No Rights Reserved” and part of Public Domain in which no law restricts the way the works are used. Public domain is more commonly attributed to works whose copyright licenses have expired, usually dozens of years after the author’s death. Each country has its own laws and validity lengths for patents, trademarks and copyrights.

Here are the Creative Commons licenses. The licenses are iterations of “living licenses” that are updated frequently and the version of the license attributed to that work will be depicted with a number like 2.5. Attributing the most current form of the license available is always recommended.

Each license has three components:

• a “Commons Deed” which briefly explains the rights and rules of the license
• the “Legal Code” which should suffice as legal backing in the case you need to go to court and is available in several languages
• and the accompanying license image “button” that you can display on your site or where you’re publishing your content.

The most basic Creative Commons license chosen by authors is that of “Attribution” – being credited for the work if it’s re-used. Other attributes are then added and mixed depending on the author’s desire.

Here are those elements directly from the Creative Commons license page:

Attribution. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your copyrighted work — and derivative works based upon it — but only if they give credit the way you request.

Noncommercial. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your work — and derivative works based upon it — but for noncommercial purposes only.

No Derivative Works. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform only verbatim copies of your work, not derivative works based upon it.

Share Alike. You allow others to distribute derivative works only under a license identical to the license that governs your work.

For example, an author combining the desire to make work available for non-commercial means but would like others to continue sharing their creations as well might offer choose the following license:

• Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike (by-nc-sa)

Be sure to read and understand the full list of Creative Commons licenses made by combining the elements above.

Ready to choose a Creative Commons License?

• Not sure which license is best for you? Use the Creative Commons License builder to help you figure that out.
• Once you’ve decided which license you’re interested in, get that license’s image button and copy the HTML code
• and insert the code on your website or where you’re publishing the work.

How to Use Others’ Creative Commons Content

Not publishing any work to be shared through Creative Commons, but you’d like to utilize, share or build upon others’ work? Here are a few tips:

• Look for Creative Commons Licenses: Most authors that are using Creative Commons will know you know – here are a few key places to look: in the sidebar, at the bottom of the page, in the About page, or even on the Contact page. If you don’t see the information you’re looking for, don’t hesitate to write the author about the type of license they have on their work. They will appreciate your respect and effort.
• Understand the License Details: You found the license, but make sure you understand each component of the license by clicking-through and reading the details of the license so you know the work’s opportunities and limitations before you start using it.
• Re-use, Modify and/or Distribute Accordingly: The author has gone to the trouble to select and display the ways their work can be shared and modified, now respect it! Make sure to re-distribute the work with the same license that was given to the original if “Share Alike” is specified.
• Let the Author Know: Let the author know with more than just a link back or listing their name – tell them you enjoyed their work and appreciated the fact that they made the available to the community.
• Make Your Own Work Available: Now that you’ve shared or modified someone else’s work, why not contribute to the cycle by distributing some of your own work via Creative Commons?

A Video Introduction to Creative Commons

Still want to know more about Creative Commons? This video is a great introduction to it:

http://blip.tv/play/gpxSkdkzg9ky

Copyright and Creative Commons Resources

• Wikipedia’s entry on Copyrights
• US Copyright Office : What Does Copyright Protect?
• EU Single Market Copyright
• Creative Commons Licenses on CreativeCommons.org
• Search Creative Commons content on CreativeCommons.org
• Google enables Creative Commons image search
• Flickr Creative Commons images
• Mashable’s 25+ Sources for Creative Commons Content
• Search Google using Advanced Search and filter by Usage Rights
• Follow @CreativeCommons on Twitter
• Track your online Creative Commons content with FairShare – via RWW

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.