How to Watermark Your Images and PDF Files for Brand Awareness and Copyright Protection
Having a couple of hours of free time on the holidays, (instead of having at least some rest) I decided to take time looking for the ways to brand my images and PDfs I spread online.
Basically I was looking for some basic tools that would place a cute watermark on any images I want and I can tell you, finding a really useful and usable tool was not easy.
Anyway, I figured that some of my readers might be interested in that too – so I am sharing my tips here: some free useful watermarking utilities to identify and brand your images and PDF files:
Watermarking PDF files
Most PDF editors and converters are paid, I was really happy to discover one which is free, feature-rich and bug-free: PDFill
Just download and install the tool (the tool requires Ghostscript but don’t worry, the tool will install it automatically if you allow to) and run it. You will be able to access its multiple features – among them: text or image watermarks:
The process of adding an image watermark is quick and easy:
1. Point the tool to the .pdf document you want to watermark;
2. Point the tool to the image that will serve as a watermark;
3. Customize the watermark settings:
4. Save the watermarked copy and you are done!
Watermarking Images (Free)
Free Desktop Watermark Creators
Fast Water Mark
(Free download here)
The tool allows to create a text watermark and adjust its font, color, opacity and position. It only processes one image at a time:
Photo Watermark
(Free download here)
This one does have the bulk image processing feature but is a bit more limited in look and feel customization:
Java Watermark
(Free download here)
Don’t be fooled by the simplistic interface: the output is not bad at all. This one creates image watermarks and can also process only one image at a time:
And here’s a short overview of the three tools listed above for you to quickly compare:
| Watermark type | Bulk | |
| Fast watermark | Text | No |
| Photo watermark | Text | Yes |
| Java watermark | Image | No |
Free Online Watermark Creators
An online tool is only good unless you need it daily. When it comes to online watermarking tools, you won’t b able to find anything fancy but there’s no excuse for not checking one: they are all free and require no registration.
Let’s see how it works by trying one of them: PicMarkr
Select up to 5 images (either from your computer or from Facebook, Flickr or Picasa) and choose the watermark properties (text or image);
Click “Next step” and either download the watermarked image back to your computer or save the watermarked copy to your web album:
As far as you can see, easy, fast and fun.
Here’s the overview of best free online watermark tools:
| # of images to process | Watermark type | Limitations | Additional features | |
| PicMarkr | 5 | Image and text | Total file size 25Mb or less | Resize images, Download / upload from / to Flickr, Facebook, Picasa |
| WatermarkTool | 4 | Text | Max file size is 200KB | Set text and box transparency level, |
| Web Watermarks | 10 | Text | N/A | - |
| Watermark.ws | N/A | Image and text | < 500 KB per photo | Resize and compress images |
| Watermark images | 20 | Text | Total Size Limitation: 10MB | - |
Post image src: blogs.chron.com
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17 Responses to “How to Watermark Your Images and PDF Files for Brand Awareness and Copyright Protection”
This came at the perfect time,, in process of writing a ebook.
Thanks for the great post.
By John Paul Aguiar on Dec 29, 2009
Wow, this is fantastic!
By Robert Tolmach on Dec 30, 2009
Hey Ann, I read your blog post from Facebook & was eager to post comment on your blog. But, I have not proper website address to use during blog comment. I have created one blog on word press. I read your post & felt same as previous posts. I am looking forward for some more valuable posts & Facebook, Twitter updates. I am also thinking to submit your post on my Facebook group. But, I am searching for some good tool which one help me for same. Have you any idea?
By Anand Mistry on Dec 30, 2009
Thank you so much. As an artist trying to make a living from my art, I need to keep people from downloading a useful copy for free.
By Nancy Nuce on Dec 30, 2009
Very, very interesting! I would have never thought to do this. I just seen another post on brand thieving, and I’m so glad I came across these posts since I’m getting into the whole search marketing local area I will really be able to use this information for later use in my project(s).
By Danny on Dec 31, 2009
Thankyou so much.I have been looking for this.
By John on Jan 8, 2010
Thank you! I have been trying to figure out how to do this for ages!
By Cindy Schultz on Feb 23, 2010
Hi Ann,
We’ve just launched a new type of image watermark service which we think would make a great addition to this list.
The url is http://www.digital-camera.com/free-watermark
The service is fully online, no registration or uploads required which means it can be used within website scripts, on Facebook images and within a WordPress image URL upload.
Thanks
Matt
By Matt on Jun 25, 2010
Thank You for so usefull info, I was searching for info about watermarks all over the web.
Can You maybe answer my question ? it really can`t be retouched by for example photoshop ? I`m a Polish designer and it is important for me,
Thank You one more time.
By Jardrew on May 5, 2011