Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12395

I'll answer this as best I can, but a good place to ask this question would be the [copyright forum](http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12395)! :~) As far as people stealing your images, well unfortunately there is no guarentee that they won't. I've noticed that you watermark your images, but obviously that isn't enough. People can easily clones those off of the image. Secondly, a suggestion would be to make the images smaller, and of lesser quality. The bigger they are, the nicer a screen saver it makes, and the easier it is to get a quality print from. How do you find them....? Not very easily...! My answer would be you probably can't. Usually image theft is found by someone other than the artist. Someone will recognize an image on another site as belonging to someone else and will then notify the real artist. And you are correct in your assumption that an image is yours from the moment you snap the shutter. While officially registering each and every image could be prohibitively costly you can still claim and prove copyright by keeping your original full size, high quality images intact, and on file. I have in the past posted links to sites that dealt with copyright issues and laws, if I can refind them I will repost them for you.... but in the meantime do stop by the copyright forum. :~)

I am, therefore I create.......
--- michelleamarante.com