Wolf Photography - IP

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Good Practice

Always backup all of your images, work files (eg invoices etc), email data folders and website files. I recommend a triple backup with an ongoing back unit change every 3 years. Your backup unit may be covered for 3 years warranty but that excludes the data! Don't get caught out.

Start changing all of the file names now to filename PLUS a copyright notice in the title (eg european wolf 003 Copyright Villayat Sunkmanitu.jpg). We're not as limited on the number of characters as by earlier operating systems, so use the characters you need.

Put as many hurdles in the way of copyright abusers as possible: disable 'right click', disable image save, watermark the images, don't post anything larger than 500 pixels, put a company logo on to hide some image detail on the larger image. Ensure you place copyright notices in appropriate places on wesites etc.

Ensure that the 'metadata' on your images is filled in before submitting slides of your work to your website.

Always issue a licence whenever an image is leased for website or publications usage.

Always issue an invoice to your customers re print sales and ensure that it reiterates the copyright policy.

Try to only use one printer for all your business and get them to sign a contract re respecting your Intellectual Property.

Don't enter competitions that abuse your Intellectual Property, always read the small print!

Do not upload images to social networking sites (eg Facebook) without checking their 'Terms and conditions'. Your images could be used as adverts or sub-leased to third party companies and you won't know about it. Facebook actually strip out all the 'Metadata' from your images so that the owner can't be identified. This makes your images 'Orphan works' and there are changes afoot to enable businesses to be able to use Images that are orphan works for free - so make sure you 'watermark' any images that you upload to the internet and never upload the original - upload a smaller version of the image (no bigger than 600 pixels) and put a copyright notice on the front of the image somewhere.

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