How to Watermark an Image

A watermark is a great way to discourage people from copying the pictures you have on your blog or website. It still allows the picture to be seen, but most people will probably not want it with the watermark on it. If they want it badly enough to go the trouble of removing the watermark…then there really isn’t much that any of us are going to be able to do to protect it!

I initially spazed when I read a fellow bloggers post about their child's picture being stolen and put on t-shirts across the world. I've now simmered down and have decided to continue to put just the single Chasing Hailey across the top or bottom corner of each image. I still see a lot of ya'll not puting anything on your picrures and it makes me cringe a little. I don't know if it's a personal choice or if it's not knowing how to do it... If it's the latter...hope fully this helps.

I used Photoshop CS5 for this tutorial, but you can also use Photoshop Elements with the same steps.

 

Instructions

Making the watermark

1)        Open a new blank document with a transparent background. I used a 5 x5 “. (it all depends on how large you want your watermark)

2)       Select the type tool from the menu and type in what you want as your watermark text.

3)       The norm is to put it on a diagonal.  To do that, you will need to transform the type by rotating it. Do this by selecting edit, transform, and then rotate from the drop-down menu. Grab a corner of the text box and rotate it to the angle you like. Once you get it where you want it…click the check mark at the top of the screen.  

 

4)       Trim around the text. Since it’s already on a transparent background this is easy.  Select trim form the image menu, select transparent pixels and click ok.

 

 

 

5)       Now we need to set this up as a pattern in our library. We do this by, selecting define pattern from the edit menu, type in what we want to call it and press enter (or click ok).

Our watermark has now been created.

 

 

 

 

Using the watermark

1)        Open a picture you want to use in Photoshop.

2)       Create a new layer.

3)      With that layer selected, choose edit, fill. You will now have a dialogue box up. In that box select pattern (in the pattern box pick your saved watermark) and overlay. You will need to decide how strong you want your watermark to show up.  I personally chose 10%.

 

If anyone has any questions or needs help….please feel free to ask!