Photography is an art. PP is part of the art process to get exactly what the artist (photographer) invisions. If someone can capture exactly what they want in the camera, with no PP, good for them. For me, I can see more detail than my camera can and my PP is trying to bring out what I saw that made me want to take a photograph in the first place. Cloning out unwanted objects in a picture is not a sin. If an artist was paint a scenic view do you think they would paint in power lines or maybe a piece of paper laying in the view they are trying to capture in their painting. No, they wouldn't. The artist/painter might paint in such a way as to add shadow or contrast/detail to their painting to improve their art work. Would you say this painting is not worthy of being called "art"? In my days of doing darkroom work, I spent many hours adjusting color balance, dodging and burning to get the exact detail I wanted. Thank goodness digital has made this easier, faster and cheaper.(and much more fun!!) Not every picture needs PP but if it does then take the time to do it and change that snapshot into a work of art that you enjoy and enjoy sharing.

I too have not heard of that but there's a world of gotchas I haven't heard of. I doubt I will stop using. A few years back I did have a issue with a website and company who pulled some of my cityscape pictures of Atlanta for their website. They had cropped my ©copyright out of the image. Here is what I was told:

To contact them and request the picture be taken down (which I did and they did)

That unless registered with the US Copyright office, I could sue and the picture is legally mine but I would not be entitled to monies for my legal fees. So, no one sues as your outcome willl be a cease and desist and a lot of cost

My pictures are only protected in the US unless registered.....and even those images have limited protection.

If registered with the US Copyright office (which comes with a modest fee and you can send more than one image with your request but each request requires a fee) you are entitled to damages, attorney fees and legally sit in a position where the defendant sits in an indefensible position.

Someone mentioned resize your website images.....for the web. You should regardless of the copyright issues. Monitors are running at 72dpi so your images should be sized to that dpi (it's like trying to put more water in a glass that is full to add more dpi) and I usually stay with 1000 pixels at the longest edge or less. I do this for web space only. Anyone who wants one of my pictures can snag it (even though I disable their mouse clicks).......and with the fractal programs can easily res-up most images to a very printable size at 8x10 with few if any artifacts. In fact, with CS5, their res-us capabilities improved tremendously. OnOne has a fractal program that also does wonders.

I am involved with PPA and will try to get clarification on the © question.

Thanks for the heads up!

Well, this is certainly more complex than I imagined. Unless someone else is really interested in the bottom line, I think I will continue to use the symbol, as many people do, unregistered.

The only trouble I've had, or at least that I was aware of, was someone on Facebook "borrowing" some of my images. I contacted them and they refused to take them down. I contacted FB and within 36 hours they were removed from the other person's page. FB was great. I connected with a real person and they took real action. Thanks for all the research!


















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