Watermarking Photos - Why I watermark | local photographer Plymouth, MI

Last month, as some of you may know, I started working with a girl from Etsy. Photographing my daughters with her hats so she can show photos on Etsy, ect. I had submitted a photo months ago for her to use, ect. I was doing a fair amount of hats and using my daughters as models and watermarking them, ect. I even was going to try to get some friends to help model (and for those who wonder what happened to that modeling gig here is why!)

Anyways, last week I got a e-mail from Shauna from that her whole IDEA of hats, images, detail descriptions and photos from other photos were stolen and put on this Chinese site where they are selling her hats in bulk for $6 each!!! OMG- I went to the site and saw a photo of my little Bree with their watermark all over! They even watermarked other photogs watermarked photos! It was insane! I won't post the link as I don't want to be connected at all with that site...

She was notified by Etsy and now she has to video tape herself making the hats. I have to admit I think it was good that ETSY follows up on this stuff and deletes users who are not following policy, however it has been alot of work for Shauna.

It was super scary :( Lesson learned!

Etsy sellers: WATERMARK like crazy all over the image!

Photogs: don't be afraid to watermark right thru your images. I know it takes way from the photo a bit, but it provides a little bit of security in this insane world! The other site actually cropped out my watermark to show the hat!

My origianl photo that was stolen and watermark cropped out

So if you wonder why I watermark my photos, even my personal Facebook photos you now know it is to give a little more protection to my clients, me and my family!

This was minor for me as I have heard crazy horror stories about stolen images, fake Facebook pages and even people having fake babies using other peoples photos! Just watermark your photos!

Baby M turns1! | Children & Family Photographer | Plymouth, MI

One year sessions are so fun, but at the same time they are a little sad for me. I see these little babies grow and we have sessions so often and then after 1 year the sessions are spaced out longer. I have a few of my newborns that are all turning one within the next month and its so hard to believe that the time has gone by so fast!

I was sooo happy we got to do baby M's session outdoors!

So the Wednesday weather was CrAzY! It rained, stopped and rained some more. Dark clouds were all over the sky. We rescheduled the shoot for Monday and then all of a sudden blue skies came out with just a few looming dark ones. Ahhh Michigan weather :) SO we decided to try it and guess what?! No rain! It was really nice, not too humid and the grass wasn't even wet! Yea!