In today’s article I am going to explain how to put a watermark on your photos, or what is the same, add a signature to your image.
What is this signature for?
Well, it serves so that anyone can know the authorship of the image and, in theory, so that it is not “stolen”, because it is almost as easy to remove the mark as to put it. Although the main and most justified reason is advertising.
eye! That you don’t have to obsess either and place a signature in the middle of any photograph that covers the entire center of interest and doesn’t allow you to contemplate anything. Many times we become so obsessive that the only thing we achieve is to spoil the photo. Keep all these things in mind when inserting your signature.
It is just an advice. Today I’m going to tell you how to do it step by step, I’m going to make it very simple, just as they had to explain it to me, that some people find these things more difficult than others 😉 So you won’t be able to say you don’t know do it.
I am going to explain (with images) the steps to add your watermark in Photoshop, although you can do it online with any editor. The advantage of doing it in this program is that it’s worth doing it once and automating it to save work the rest of the time, and besides, it will always stay the same.
Otherwise you will have to do it every time and it is easy that it does not always look the same, either because you do not remember or because you put a font that is only specific to that editor, for example. The good thing about this is that if you do it this way, you can also “customize” the signature so that it harmonizes with the rest of the image and does not stand out so much (see image below). As you can see, everything has its advantages and disadvantages.
Watermark with online editor
How to watermark your photos, step by step
Now yes, we are going to see step by step how to insert the watermark with Photoshop, check that it works and record the action to do it with the rest of the images automatically.
1. Create file
To do this go to File > New. Once the dialog box is open, name it and put 800×600 pixels and the background content Transparent and press “OKAY”.
Watermark with online editor
2. Insert text
Select the option of Text in the menu on the left and write the name.
select text
To change the color, select the text with the mouse and go to the change color option. Choose the color you want for your watermark and press “OKAY”
Change color
Choose the font you want. You can also add a second line (this is optional) to put your business name, website… or whatever interests you. Add the text on the second line with a enterchange the size of the font to differentiate the name from the rest and use if you need the combination “ALT+↓” to separate the second line from the first.
Second line
3. Validate
Once you have it to your liking, validate by clicking on the icon that you have indicated in the image with a red circle. You already have the signature done. The next step will be to make some adjustments so that the fingerprint or signature looks good when inserted.
Validate
If for whatever reason you have not set the transparent background when creating the document, deactivate the eye in the box “Background” so that it is transparent.
4. Cut
go to menu > Image > Crop and a dialog box will open where you have to click the option “Based on… Transparent pixels» and activate all the boxes of the option “Pull apart” (View image). when you give to “OKAY” the image will be adjusted to the part that contains information.
Cut
5. Save
In the menu choose File > Save as and a dialog like the following will open. Name the file and save. It is important that you always have the file saved in the same place in order to automate this action. Later you will see why.
Save
6. Place
Open the image you want to insert your watermark into and go to the menu: File > Place. Look for the created file in the folder in which you have saved it and click on “Place”
10_Place Insert the watermark
Your signature will be in the middle of the image, like in this example:
inserted signature
Now you can reposition the signature where you want with the mouse dragging…
Reposition with mouse
… or automatically. To do this, use the combination «Ctrl+A» to select the entire image and the buttons that I box in the following image will be activated. With them you can with a click place your signature above, below or in the corners. Choose the place where you want the mark to be and press “Ctrl+D” to deactivate the selection.
Automatically place with buttons
With “Ctrl+T” you will activate the free transformation and dragging with the mouse from a corner you will be able to make the signature bigger or smaller, as you prefer. Once this is done, validate at the top right on the icon that I highlight in the following image.
Validate
How to automate the watermarking process
You already have your watermark (or watermark as they say) created, now what we are going to do is record this step so that you can do it automatically with all the images you want.
1. Delete layer
To do this, delete the “Signature” layer (or whatever you have named it) by dragging it to the trash can or by right-clicking on it: delete.
2. Create new action
go to menu > Window > Actions
Actions
Create a new action on the shaded icon in the following image:
Create new action
A dialog like the following will open. Name it and hit “Engrave”.
name and record
With this gesture you activate the recording so that Photoshop remembers the steps you take from now on.
3. Place brand of water
Put your watermark back by clicking on the menu > File > Place > choose the signature document and click on “Place”. It will always go to look for the file at the same place of the recording, that is why it is important that it is saved in the same location.
Valid and as it will have appeared again in the center, to put it back where you want go to menu > Selection > All and align the edge with the buttons in the second figure.
Select All Align Edges
To deselect go back to menu > Selection > Deselect or with the combination “Ctrl+D”
Once this is done, modify the size to your liking with “Ctrl+T” and dragging a corner with the mouse. Validate the changes and “Control” and the arrows you can move the mark to separate it from the borders. When it is right where you want, stop the recording on the button that I indicate in the following figure.
stop recording
To check that it is correctly executed, remove the signature layer and hit play to run it. Now you can open another image, select the Signature action (or whatever you called it) and hit play to execute it.
Apply to another image
And the watermark will be inserted into the new image:
New image with watermark
You already know how to put your watermark (I have inserted a text, but this can also be applied with your logo or an image of your choice). Remember that it is not always good to abuse it, it can cause indigestion or as we talk about water… drowning 😉
I hope it has been useful to you, if it has been, in return I would ask you to share it so that other people can also use it. Thank you and see you soon!