You sure have seenthis post. It has spread like wildfire over the past few days so I doubt there is any artist out there who hasn’t seen it. But even if you didn’t, you should read on because I’m 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 “hidden” in the code of your picture, it’s hard to remove it.
There is a nice basic tutorial on how to add Metadata, or “additional file information” to your images in photoshop. It’s really, really easy so check it out!
I’m 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 idiots from taking and reposting your art. It also won’t 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.
art thief: well how can you prove its yours??
me: /opens metadata
I spread the word as it is important to all artist who ever suffered from art thieving or so.
You guys, metadata is super important, you guys. In an everday and legal sense. People legitimately look at and rely on metadata to know the basic, but important bits of information about a digital product (paintings, photographs, exe files, etc.), ESPECIALLY the source.
Don’t underestimate it!
Welp I only saw this just now, hope I ain’t too late ʕ⚆ ᴥ ⚆;;;ʔ I hope it can be done on GIMP somehow.
For GIMP users, here’s a li’l tutorial ʕ❀ゝᴥ・ʔ
1. Launch GIMP, then open or create an image.
2. Click “Image” near the top of the GIMP window and select “Image Properties” from the drop-down menu to open the Image Properties window. You can also press “Alt-Enter.”
3. Click the “Comment” tab near the top of the Image Properties window to switch to it.
4. Click once in the text box to start adding a comment. I strongly recommend you type it
5. Type or paste the comment in the text box, then press “Close” to save it and close the Image Properties window.
6. Click “File” near the top of the GIMP window and select “Save As” from the menu to open the Save Image window. (Depending on which version of GIMP you use, you might have to select “Export As” to accomplish step 9)
7. Type a name for your file in the Name box, then select a folder where to save it in the Save In Folder box.
8. Click the small “+” sign in front of the Select File Type option to see all available file types.
9. Select “JPEG image” from the list and click “Save.” The Save As JPEG window pops up.
10. Use the Quality slider to adjust the quality of your image.
11. Click the “Save” button to save the image. The comment is now embedded in the image.
As for the copyright notice, try not to mess around too much. Here is what you really need to put in it:
Do you design a lot of characters living in not-modern eras and you’re tired of combing through google for the perfect outfit references? Well I got good news for you kiddo, this website has you covered! Originally @modmad made a post about it, but her link stopped working and I managed to fix it, so here’s a new post. Basically, this is a costume rental website for plays and stage shows and what not, they have outfits for several different decades from medieval to the 1980s. LOOK AT THIS SELECTION:
OPEN ANY CATEGORY AND OH LORDY–
There’s a lot of really specific stuff in here, I design a lot of 1930s characters for my ask blog and with more chapters on the way for the game it belongs to I’m gonna be designing more, and this website is going to be an invaluable reference. I hope this can be useful to my other fellow artists as well! :)
