Attention ALL artists!
You sure have seen this post. It has spread like wildfire over the past few days so I doubt there is any artist out there who hasnât seen it. But even if you didnât, you should read on because Iâm about to tell you a handy little thing that can help you to protect your art from such assholes as the anon who submitted this bullcrap, as well as art thieves in general.
The magic word is Metadata.
Metadata is like an invisible signature that is embeded into a file. It can contain all kinds of information, like Title, date, keywords for online seach engines, and copyright information. And the best thing is, since this information is âhiddenâ in the code of your picture, itâs hard to remove it.
There is a nice basic tutorial on how to add Metadata, or âadditional file informationâ to your images in photoshop. Itâs really, really easy so check it out!
âAdding Your Contact And Copyright Info To Your Photos With Photoshopâ on PhotoshopEssentials.com
Iâm not sure if you can do the same with any other art program. If you know how to do this in other programs / can confirm that it works the same way there, please tell me so I can add the information to this post.
Adding the Metadata will not stop foul carrots from taking and reposting your art. It also wonât make them stop editing out your signature. It WILL however, help you prove that you are the original artist whenever you have to. Always remember my friends. You, the artist, are protected by law. No one has the right to take your intellectual property and hard work and repost, use or edit it without your permission. Ever.
EDIT: Thanks to the many people who added their comment to this! Iâd like to add a few things that may be helpful:
âin GIMP you can add copyright information using File > Properties. Should bring up a window where you can enter title, author, description, copyright, etc.â (Thanks to Pyrotogepi!)
Appearantly, the metadata works for all the adobe products in CC and can also be added via Adobe Bridge, which is free!
Please note that of course, metadata is not a 100% foolproof way to protect your art. There are ways to remove it. But adding it wonât hurt you and means more work for those who are desperate to erase any traces of the original artist. So yeah, donât rely on metadata alone. Use a signature and watermark too.
And on another note, please, for the love of spagetti jesus, donât send hate to the Drama Rising blog. The post I linked was not made by the person who runs the blog. As I said, it was submitted to the blog by an anon.
