ImageBridge Frequently Asked Questions

 

About Digimarc® ImageBridge™ Digital Watermarking

Account Management and Link Back Services

Embedding

ImageBridge Reporting Services

Product/Technical Information

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About ImageBridge Digital Watermarking

What is Digimarc® ImageBridge™?
ImageBridge is a digital watermarking solution that communicates image copyrights and automates the tracking of digital image use across the public Internet. This gives organizations the ability to see where their digital image assets are in use outside the boundaries of their internal network. ImageBridge reporting services provide the information to determine if images are being used in the right place at the right time, or if images are being used incorrectly.

Why would a company or organization want to use ImageBridge to track their images?
Once your digital images leave the boundary of your organization's network, they become susceptible to misuse. Through simple integration of ImageBridge into your existing workflow, you are able to place an invisible digital watermark on your images that allow you to both communicate copyright information and track usage of digitally watermarked images across the Internet.

How can I find out more about ImageBridge?
Read more here or contact us directly.

How much does ImageBridge cost?
ImageBridge pricing depends on the level of services and software options you need. Pricing starts at $3,995 for a single desktop solution. Please contact us to discuss your needs.

Do you give a discount for non-profit organizations?
ImageBridge is offered at a discounted rate for non-profit organizations. Please contact us to discuss your needs.

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Account Management and Link Back Services

What are ImageBridge Reporting services?
ImageBridge reporting services detail the results of ImageBridge tracking and monitoring. Reports are available through our website.

What is Directed URL searching?
Directed URL searching provides the ability for you to search specific websites (for example: channel partners or potential infringers). These target searches offer monthly tracking capabilities that provide valuable information about online image use for trade promotion management as well as corporate compliance programs.

How can I view my ImageBridge reports?
ImageBridge reports are available online any time of day and are updated continuously. See a sample ImageBridge report.

Is it possible to change the Link Back information that is displayed through my digitally watermarked image?
ImageBridge customers can change the destination or contact information linked to their ID without re-watermarking their images. This ensures that digitally watermarked images will always be current, giving customers the flexibility to change marketing programs, web destinations, or even their company’s name without having to re-process their images.

I downloaded the ImageBridge Reader Plug-In software from your site but it’s not working. Why?
The Reader software available from our site is a product that allows you to detect and read digitally watermarked images. It does not allow you to embed digital watermarks and an image ID into your digital watermarks. In order to subscribe to our ImageBridge solution and receive an ID, please contact us for more information.

I have lost my PIN/ID/Password. How do I get this back?
Please send an email to helpdesk@digimarc.com and Digimarc will send this information to you once we have located your account. Please include enough information about yourself to insure we can find your account.

What are ImageBridge Link Back services?
ImageBridge Link Back services enable one-click linking from a digital image to additional online information about the image or owner of the image. The image contains a unique transaction ID that serves as a persistent, reliable portal to relevant information, such as related imagery, video, analyst reports and other types of image information contained in a company’s digital asset management system. The link may contain image owner contact information and copyright ownership information.

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Embedding

Where does digital watermarking fit in the creative workflow process?
Applying a digital watermark should be one of the last steps applied to an image, just before compression. Digimarc recommends the following workflow for adding a digital watermark:

  • Make all necessary modifications to an image until it has the desired final appearance
  • Embed the digital watermark
  • Save the new image
  • Read the digital watermark using the signal strength meter to verify that the image contains a digital watermark of sufficient strength for your purposes (Note: If compression was used, close and reopen the image prior to verifying the watermark strength)
  • Publish the image

What is the ImageBridge Batch Embedding Application?
The ImageBridge Batch Embedding Application is a desktop application with a simple user interface (UI) that enables you to digitally watermark one or many images. It combines advanced batch processing and intelligent embedding to simplify and accelerate the production of ImageBridge-enhanced images. As an integrated workflow tool, it provides an intelligent and customizable process for producing trackable, manageable assets.

What is the ImageBridge software development kit (SDK)?
The ImageBridge software development kit is a fully documented set of APIs that can be integrated into other applications. This enables tight integration with existing workflows and helps automate the digital watermarking process. The SDK provides flexible and automated batch or on-the-fly watermark embedding and reading capabilities.

What is the ImageBridge Scripted Embedder?
The ImageBridge Scripted Embedder is a parameter-driven batch solution for parallel integration with other applications, such as an asset management system. It is highly flexible and allows embedding at various integration points. In addition, the Embedder accepts inputs via XML, allowing for a high degree of flexibility.

How do I digitally watermark images?
There are a number of ways to digitally watermark images. The first step is to obtain an ImageBridge subscription or license. This will provide you with an ID that you can add to your images through the digital watermark embedding process. The next step is to determine which tool best suits your embedding needs.

  • ImageBridge plug-in application – ImageBridge works with a number of image editing and asset management systems to offer digital watermarking solutions. The ImageBridge plug-in is integrated into leading image editing and asset management tools such as Adobe Photoshop; Adobe Photoshop Elements, ULead PhotoImpact, or JASC PaintShopPro. From an option in the application’s menu, you will be able to select "Embed" or "Detect" Watermark from within the image editing software.
  • The ImageBridge Batch Embedding Application
  • The ImageBridge Scripted Embedder

Do I embed a digital watermark into the original art or a copy?
Digimarc recommends that a digital watermark be embedded into a copy of an image only, and not the original. It is best to keep a pristine version for other uses.

On the Microsoft Vista operating system, why am I repeatedly required to re-enter your User PIN/ID or asked if I would like to check for a new update?
Your system's UAC (User Account Control) may be blocking the Digimarc user data from being written. If you would like to change Photoshop to always run as an elevated program, please right-click the Photoshop.exe under "Program Files", click Properties, and then select the Compatibility tab. Under Privilege Level, select "Run this program as an administrator", and then click OK. This will allow the plugin's preference file to be written into the Photoshop directory. This preference file holds your PIN/ID and the last date it checked for an update.

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ImageBridge Reporting Services

What are ImageBridge reporting services?
ImageBridge reporting services detail the results of ImageBridge tracking and monitoring. Reports are available through our website. The reports are the result of a search tool that looks for Digimarc IDs with images and creates a report that shows you where your watermarked images are being used on the web.

How does the ImageBridge reporting gain intelligence as it searches the Web?
New websites are constantly being added to the list of searched sites. Additional site data comes from domain name registrars, customer submissions and through discovery from the spidering of existing websites.The search tool makes an initial pass through new sites, and in 30 days, it will crawl the site again. On each subsequent visit, it is able to identify those websites whose content is frequently changing and those websites whose content changes less frequently. The tool then revisits the more dynamic sites more frequently and less dynamic websites less frequently. This enables it to focus its spidering on the larger, more dynamic websites while still providing wide coverage of the publicly accessible Internet.

How long will it take a posted test image to be found by the general Web search?
This is difficult to predict given the size of the Web and the nature of search engines. Sites that are referred or frequently linked from other sites have a higher chance of being searched. Smaller sites with less traffic may never be searched.

What is Directed URL searching?
Directed URL searching provides the ability to target searching to specific websites (for example: channel partners or potential infringers). These target searches offer monthly tracking capabilities that provide valuable information on online image use for trade promotion management as well as corporate compliance programs.

How can I subscribe to ImageBridge reporting services?
ImageBridge reporting services are available for an annual fee that works in conjunction with your ID.

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Product/Technical Information

What is an Imagebridge ID?

An ImageBridge ID is a unique identification code assigned to ImageBridge customers. The ID, which is embedded into an image through ImageBridge digital watermarking, is the "key" image identifier that Digimarc reporting services and linking services track.

What is an ImageBridge digital watermark?
An ImageBridge digital watermark is a code embedded into digital image content - a raster image or photograph. ImageBridge software embeds a unique ID into an image by making subtle changes to the image that can be detected by an ImageBridge digital watermark reader. Digital watermarks are imperceptible to the human eye.

Does ImageBridge work with all digital images?
Digital watermarks work on raster images that meet the recommended size requirements. Digital watermarks are much less perceptible in natural images, such as photographs, than they are in graphic images, such as logos. Digital watermarks create subtle changes in pixel luminance, which is difficult to see in an image with detail, but more obvious when there is no detail, such as text or logo on a solid background.

How are ImageBridge digital watermarks applied to an image?
ImageBridge watermarks are “perceptually adaptive.” They conform to the unique pattern of each image, placing more watermark in areas with rich detail and less in flat areas. This process ensures that digital watermarks remain strong without being easily detectable visually.

What kind of manipulation can an ImageBridge digital watermark survive?
ImageBridge digital watermarks can survive copying, renaming, file format changes, rotation and a range of compression and scaling.

How do you read an ImageBridge digital watermark?
The image editing and asset management applications are capable not only of digitally watermarking images, but also of detecting and reading them. When an image is opened or scanned into one of these applications, the ImageBridge plug-ins' auto-detection software quickly scans the image for the presence of a digital watermark. One can download the free ImageBridge reader, Digimarc's stand-alone application to detect and read a digital watermark. It is available free for Windows and Macintosh platforms.

Are ImageBridge digital watermarks independent of file format?
Yes. ImageBridge digital watermarks are carried by the image's pixels; they are independent of the file's format.

What size images can one digitally watermark with ImageBridge?
We recommend a minimum size of 256x256 pixels. There is no upper limit on the size of an image that can be digitally watermarked. If one doesn't intend to apply any compression or other image edits, the image can be as small as 100x100 pixels.

Does a digital watermark affect the size of a file or image?
ImageBridge digital watermarking can change the size of a compressed image slightly, but again the size of uncompressed images doesn't increase.

Are ImageBridge watermarks dependent of color space?
The ImageBridge digital watermarking process is color space independent, so one can embed a digital watermark into RGB, CMYK, gray scale and LAB images.

Why would a digital watermark degrade or become unreadable?
ImageBridge digital watermarks are carried in the image pixels. Transformations that alter the pixels or delete image data, such as extreme compression, could cause the watermark to become unreadable.

Can a digital watermark be removed?
Digimarc does not provide tools or software to remove its digital watermarks. Removing a Digimarc digital watermark without discernibly altering the image quality is a difficult process. We always suggest that the image creator/owner retain an original copy of the unwatermarked image.

Do ImageBridge digital watermarks survive scaling?
The ImageBridge reader software can read the digital watermark after scale changes of as much as .6x to 2x of the original image size. A digital watermark can also survive any amount of image rotation.

Does ImageBridge digital watermarking prevent printing of an image?
Digital watermarking does not prevent printing of an image.

Will an ImageBridge digital watermark be invisible on screen but visible when the image is printed?
No, at this time ImageBridge watermarks embedded with an image editing application do not function as a visible watermark when printed.

Will an ImageBridge prevent downloading of images?
Digital watermarking does not prevent the downloading of an image.

How does digital watermarking work with graphic image files like GIFs? Logos?
ImageBridge digital watermarks are independent of file format.

Can I save my digitally watermarked images as GIFs?
GIF is a highly compressed format for image files that uses indexed color to compress the color palette and reduces the file size. Because of its high rate of lossy compression, indexed color is not recommended for use with watermarked images. ImageBridge digital watermarks are carried in the image pixels by making subtle changes in the pixel luminance. Transformations that alter the pixels, such as conversion to indexed color, could cause the watermark to become unreadable. If you choose to use indexed color, the digital watermark must be embedded in the image prior to converting to indexed color. As recommended for all images, indexed color images should be tested for watermark readability prior to publishing. To test an indexed color image, convert the image to RGB in your image editing application, then use the Digimarc Read Watermark filter.

How does compression and/or scaling affect the readability of a watermark?
The ability to read a digital watermark after any compression is a function of watermark strength and image size. A higher strength watermark in a large image will withstand higher compression rates. A general rule of thumb is to use a maximum compression ratio of 18:1.

Lossy compression methods such as JPEG actually remove some image data which generally degrades image quality. This can have varying effects on survival of the digital watermark. Generally if one favors image quality over image size when selecting the degree of compression, one will get the most favorable results. In order to digitally watermark a JPEG image, it must be uncompressed and then re-compressed after embedding. In general, one will get the best results by starting with an uncompressed image.

The ability to read a watermark after an image has been scaled is a function of watermark strength and image size. A high strength watermark in a large image will withstand a wider range of scaling. As a general rule of thumb, ImageBridge reader software can read the digital watermark after scale changes of as much as .6x to 2x of the original image size. However, the recommended workflow sequence is to perform any scaling prior to embedding a digital watermark.

Can an ImageBridge digital watermark survive non-lossy compression?
Non-lossy compression such as Compact Pro, Stuff-It and the .ZIP format do not affect survival of the digital watermark because no data is lost.

Does my watermark survive other types of post compression manipulation?
An ImageBridge digital watermark can survive the following changes to an image:

  • Any amount of image rotation
  • Renaming
  • Digital copies
  • Cropping above a minimum size of 256x256 pixels

Can an ImageBridge digital watermark be seen?
At high magnification, the watermark appears as a slight change in the image's grain or texture.

What is a Transaction ID?
A Transaction ID is a customer-selected number that can be included within a digital watermark’s data at the time of embedding to link back to metacore data within a company’s asset management system. The Transaction ID can be dynamically created and can be unique to a specific image.

How much data does a digital watermark hold?
ImageBridge digital watermarks carry several pieces of relevant data, including ImageBridge Creator ID and transaction / image ID or copyright year, as well as optional flags for Restricted Use, Do Not Copy and Adult Content.

What is the "Restricted use" flag?
The Restricted Use flag is information stored in the digital watermark. It does not actually restrict use – it only communicates that use is not public domain. It is used as a warning to those who read an image watermark is owned and should not be copied or used without permission.

What is the "Adult Content" flag?
The Adult Content flag is information stored in the watermark that is a service Digimarc provides to adult content distributors to use as a self-policing function. Flagging images as Adult Content disables display of images when viewed through the "Protecting Kids with Digimarc" reader.

What is the "Do Not Copy" flag?
The Do Not Copy flag is information stored in the ImageBridge watermark does not restrict use – it communicates that use is not public domain and the content should not be copied. It is used as a warning to those who read an image watermark that this image is owned and should not be used without permission.

What does the "C" in the title bar mean of an image?
If a digital watermark is present, the application displays a copyright symbol (©) in the title bar of the image window, providing an instant visual cue that it is a digitally watermarked image.

How fast is a digital watermark detected within an image editing application?
Automatic detection within an image editing application generally takes between ½ and 1 second regardless of image size.

Is reading the digital watermark an automatic function within an image editing application?
The passive detection and proactive notification are key features of ImageBridge digital watermarking. To read a digital watermark, open an image in any of the image editing or asset management applications that ImageBridge is integrated with. Select Digimarc "Read Watermark" from either the Filter or Image menu. The ImageBridge Creator ID and linked information is shown immediately.

How can I read a ImageBridge digitally watermarked image?
The image editing and asset management applications are capable not only of digitally watermarking images, but also of detecting and reading them. When an image is opened or scanned into one of these applications, the ImageBridge plug-ins' auto-detection software quickly scans the image for the presence of a digital watermark. One can download the free ImageBridge reader, Digimarc's stand-alone application to detect and read a digital watermark. It is available free for Windows and Macintosh platforms.

Can’t I use the digital watermarking that is in Adobe PhotoShop for free?
The demonstration version of the software shipped with Adobe Photoshop is for testing purposes of ImageBridge and does not provide copyright or link back service without a Creator ID subscription.

After downloading your software from the website, it’s not working. Why?
The free reader software available from our site is a reader for Internet Explorer for Windows. This free reader software has the ability to read watermarks, not embed them.

After watermarking images, and saving them in a compressed format, the watermark is not there. Why?
ImageBridge digital watermarks survive a range of compression, but extreme compression causes image data loss and therefore watermark data loss. Make sure the target output setting in the embedder is correct, then try increasing the watermark durability and/or reducing the amount of compression.

How does a digital watermark communicate my information?
ImageBridge embeds an ID into the digital watermark of the image, enabling the image to link to the web destination of an account’s choice to contact profile in Digimarc's online database registry.

Can I change the information displayed from my ID? How?
A subscriber can change the destination or contact information linked to their ID without re-watermarking images. This ensures that digitally watermarked images will always be current, giving you the flexibility to change marketing programs, web destinations, or even your company’s name without having to re-process your images.

Can I restrict ImageBridge link back services to not providing information when the watermark is read?
Yes, ImageBridge customers may opt to not display any information when a digital watermark is read.

What are the Bits per Channel settings necessary for adding a Digimarc watermark to my images?
The Digimarc watermark function in Adobe Photoshop is found under the Filter/Digimarc menu item. Only images with 8 bits per channel can have Digimarc® ImageBridge™ watermarks added to them. Images at other bits per channel settings need to be set to 8 Bits under the Image/Mode/Bits per Channel option.

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