How to add a watermark
 

I have been having problems with people using photos from my gallery with out my permission. How do I add a watermark to my photos through photopost.

well if they are using the actual real photo path you can permanently watermark images in admin watermark options filling out all that and turning it on. You set in edit categories in admin which usergroups get images watermarked.

If this is a simple thing as users hotlinking your images elsewhere you can do something like htaccess protection

PhotoPost PHP Photo Gallery Features

I am still having problems Chuck, I have added the path to my watermark image but it is not showing up on the photos. I have it set up that the watermark is to be shown on all usergroups.

well how things work depend on how you have it setup. Watermarking works in our application as well as other option all depending on your real issue your trying to contend with.

Permanent watermarking is not going to appear on photos just because you add a watermark path. You would actually need to watermark the images. After you enable watermarking and set category perrmissions for usergroups you can use the scan database option to watermarking non watermarked images in there.

On the fly watermarking would work on your gallery but the images are not really truly watermarked.

More information would definately be needed for me to truly ciomment on how to best handle your situation.

Hi Chuck,

I suppose, many user are a litte confused on the number of options at different places at the admin menu. Watermarks are handled at the Show Photo Options and at the Watermark Options - but also at the Image Protection Section and the Database Section. Only the correct combination of all this controls lead to the desired gallery functions. For PhotoPost Pro experts everything is pretty clear. But newbies maybe do not even know the difference of watermarks and on-the-fly watermarks (irrespective of the language problems of your worldwide customers). To save your time to support the newbies, it could be helpful if the newbies would find some short "howto" tutorials at your website with typical scenarios (like "howto add watermarks" or "howto activate/configure the lightbox feature").

... only as a proposal ;)
HaPe

There is two types of watermarking and I have dicussed this in detail many times on here so there should be topics.

You are correct options show up in different places but they are worded according to the watermarking type.

Permanent Watermarking

1. This can only be controlled through the Admin => Watermark Options. You set the full path to a watermark where asked including the filename. If you are using GD2 to watermark images the file has to be a png image. If you are using Imagemagick then your file can be a jpg or gif image. Once you turn on watermarking and set a watermark path you can set in Admin => Edit Categories for each category which usergroups get their images permanently watermarked.

On the Fly Watermarking

1. This requires you have GD2 installed on your server. You do not need to be using GD2 as your image processor to enable this type of watermarking just have it on the server. Therefore you can use Imagemagick to process your images but GD2 is the image processor that does on the fly watermarking.

2. You would fill out the path to watermark image where asked in any section does not matter as long as it is set. Now the options to use on the fly watermarking show up in both show photo options or image proection. You need to turn on the use of watermark.php to serve images and you need to turn on the option to overlay the watermark.

I want all photos that are uploaded to my gallery to have my watermark on it. I have uploaded my image my cpanel and the path is /public_html/photos/images/epglogo.png

I then logged in as the Admin on my gallery, went to edit settings/watermark options and have the following set

Watermark Options
Enable watermarking of photos with overlay image? Yes

If enabled, position of overlay watermark on images. South West

Full server path to watermark overlay image. /public_html/photos/images/epglogo.png

I then saved it

I then went to Edit Categories/main/ edit the clicked all the user groups i want the watermark to show on.

I added the watermark path where it says
Path to watermark for this category*:

I then clicked on *Check box to apply these settings and permissions to all children:

Then I clicked on save changes.

As far as I know i have done the correct things but I must be missing something.

I went to scan database and saw this

Check here to watermark unwatermarked files.
This action cannot be undone - backup your data directory and photos database!


I haven't clicked and saved it yet. Am i suppose to check the box and save it.

Well two things.

1. You do not have to fill out a category watermark if you have the global one set so clear all the category watermark paths.

2. Your watermark path is wrong that is definately not a full server path. full server path would never begin with public_html so your using a partial path and things will not work. Look in your global options in admin whats your data directory path? you can guess your true path from that.

3. in scan database yes you check the watermark images and save.

When I scan the database will the watermark be visible even if i have unchecked users who can see the watermark.

Can I change the watermark from being on the south west side to the south east side of photos after i scan the database.


If i wanted to change my watermark to something else will the old watermark from when i scan the database remain.

I am not sure what setting your referring to a users who can view the watermark. The setting is which usergroups get there images stamped with the watermark so if you elect to watermark a groups images permanently and scan database yes the actual physical images will be watermarked.

The scan database is a one time thing for watermarking it will not remark watermarked images. There is never a way to rewatermark an image. In permanent watermarking you are destroying the original image and replacing it with an image with the watermark so no way to remove an old watermark.