For the non-copyrighting photo owner the best thing you can do is to protect your work and limit unauthorized use. In order to avoid issues with copyright law and/or unwanted attention from copyright holders there are a few easy steps you can take to protect the work you've made. Create an original, unique image, with no background or markings, you can use one you've captured with your camera's built in image stabilizer. Here's an example of one of those photos. This piece is of a photo I took of two men playing basketball. Since I was out in the sun I added a watermark using photoshops watermark filters. 1. First, create a new “Background” layer. 2. Set your opacity at around 15%, as this is what the background will be. 3. Set the color of the watermark image to the color you want as the color of the background. 4. Click “Filter > Add Layer Style” 5. Fill it in with black and add an adjustment layer under “Background” with the “Gradient > Blur,” “Hard Light,” & “Colorize” options selected, the “Smooth” value at 100% 6. Name your “watermark” layer “Watermark” 7. Create a new layer of black to use as the background layer. 8. Set your blending mode to “Diffuse” 9. Set the opacity of your “watermark” layer to -100%. 10. Set the layer blending mode to “Lighten” 11. Use the “Blur” function (Opacity: 0%) and a 50% size as the value 12. In your brush, click on “Add Noise” and set the values at 50, 55 and 60 13. You will now see “watermark” appear in your layers palette If you wish to create another copy of the original photo for your watermark it's now time to go back in to the “Watermark” layer and edit these values. 14. To edit your “watermark” layer click on the layer, then go to “Image > Adjustments > Desaturate.” 15. If you like the result, “Layer > Render Image” 16.