Different Watermark and / or Location per Album?

[taucher_0815]

Hi!

What about adding 2 more options to the Album-Configs?
Thinking of assigning different Watermarks and / or locations to specific Albums.

Currently you can set a Watermark only for the complete Gallery.

Why I am asking:
Most of the pictures should have a Watermark centered and visible to the image is useless for all people. When they purchase it (mostly for editorial reasons) the will receive the original image from me.

I am also taking images for several Cheerleader-Teams. They can use the intermediate images as they are as long as the WM ist still in place and visible. The pictures should then have a different Watermark at the bottom right or something. I'd like to keep the centered and large WM to be the default but when creating a new Album i'd like for this new Alb the above mentioned Setting...

What do you think?

[Αndré]

Valid feature request (and good idea imo).

[phill104]

Maybe it could be extended so users can have their own watermark too. However, in my mind it is better to watermark before upload.

[taucher_0815]

in my mind it is better to watermark before upload.

When you have several 100s of images you want to upload, then it is a bit tricky... I need to upload Images, that can be downloaded by a special usergroup without a watermark on it. If I would follow your way then i need to upload images twice.

[Joe Carver]

I need to upload Images, that can be downloaded by a special usergroup without a watermark on it.

A great concept, but open to many issues......

You will always need to have two copies on the server - one with WM, one without WM. Then you would be asking the server to do extra work on upload. IMHO a server is to serve and not process....(my opinion only)

How would those images be protected/hidden? Would they get a hashed/coded filename - or go into a special directory?

Could the same result be achieved with the non-WM images hidden in private albums?

+++++

However I do think being able to select which albums get Watermarking as a album option is a good idea too! Although I guess a workaround could be to turn it on/off in Config before uploading....

[taucher_0815]

You will always need to have two copies on the server - one with WM, one without WM.

Thats the actual behavior. When I am uploading Images, they get copied, resized and watermarked and the original is still kept untouched.

How would those images be protected/hidden?

I am still searching for a way to really protect the images.

Could the same result be achieved with the non-WM images hidden in private albums?

The images should be visible to non-customers also, but WMed

Example: Whe I shoot a cheerleading-competition, the Teams are allowed to use the images WMed for personal use. When there is a newspaper, they can logon, DL the image non-WMed and print then.

The same applies when some of the Cheerleaders want the Image(s) for extended personal use.

[tomsite]

I thought about that too, however you could create the thumbnails views etc. watermarked and move the original files into a different Album that is then visible to "special" user groups i.e. Media with no watermarks. Surely it is an additional step as you need to create the views watermarked and leave the originals intact, and you need to create duplicate albums with different access rights, one watermarked one without watermarks.

Certainly a watermark feature per album/user would be nice, and it would make life so much easier. But then one needs also to randomize the file names of thumbnail views and link those random file names to the original, non-watermarked files. Is it worth the effort and wouldn't it add to the load on the server? If you don't get rid of the direct link between original file name and thumbnail views it is possible to get the name of the watermarked picture and sort of reverse engineer the file name of the non-watermarked picture, which defeats the purpose of the watermark. And no, disabling right clicks is no solution, disabling "Save as" neither and neither is a solution against people with network sniffers filtering out the path and file names or just plainly viewing the source code of the generated HTML.

I guess the best and safest solution is seperated albums, even though it means more work on your end, IMHO a small price to pay.

Tom