Welcome to our first Thinkin’ Thursday. This is the day when we cut to the chase, put our feet up, sip on our favorite hot beverage and nosh on the topic du jour.
Everybody always has questions about low res files, putting files on Facebook, watermarks and clients who cut them off, etc, etc, etc.
We waste a LOT of time worrying about these matters. A lot.
You know what? Give it a rest. Just stop letting it be an issue.
Slap your watermark on your files, stick them on Facebook and go on with your life. So what if a client cuts your watermark off? You can rant and rave to your fellow photogs, send a carefully worded email to your client and the result will be the same; you will have bitched to your peers and come across as a bitch to your clients. You aren’t going to sue them and they wouldn’t have the money to settle with you if you did – so just get a grip. If you put your files on Facebook – they WILL be cropped, they WILL be printed out on home computers, and ….wait for it…they WILL BE SHARED.
Cha. Ching. That’s what you wanted all along, wasn’t it?
You can probably assume that no reputable lab or kiosk will print out files with your watermark on them, but clients…? Give it a rest. It’s gonna be like knocking your head against a brick wall sometimes. Put a notice on the bottom of your invoices that your work is protected under copyright law and then let it be.
Quit wasting your breath and your precious time Facebook-stalking your clients looking for copied and cropped prints. The time you waste doing this is worth money – money that you will NEVER recoup. And all you will do is make a reputation for yourself as a whiny, money-grubbing person. I’m all about standing on principle, but sometimes it is a total losing battle. I think this is one of those times.
We just can’t always have it our way. If we put our files on the internet, we can’t control what happens to them. We can right-click protect, but they can still be screen-captured. So it boils down to this – you have two choices. Put your files out there – or don’t. Make your decision, do it, and shut up about it.
Exactly!!!!!
I’ve just recently come to the realization that it’s really a waste to worry about facebook cropping. I love that you just confirmed my decision to give up on that headache 🙂 score one for this team!