How to protect video from piracy?

[Anonymous]

How to protect video from piracy?

More and more people upload their video files to internet sites, and problem of video protection from unauthorized usage becomes more and more important.

The most effective way is to apply watermarks for example text with sites address or graphical logotype. Even if someone uses such video content, it will only advertise the author.

However, it is very simple to cut out logotypes of such type using any program for video editing.

Cut off part of video giving up small part of a frame – and your video will lose any protection! Or if watermark is displayed only at the beginning, simply to cut out video scene with watermark

Of course, watermark could be applied in a way that it couldnt be cut out, but at that image will suffer as will contain one big watermark.

Solution Im offering here is very simple. You need to create watermarks which would appear in different places, be shown during some period of time and faded, appear again but in other places (or the same) and so on several times while playing video.

Evidently, for one thing, its difficult to cut off such watermark (especially if it appears in different places), to cut out the scene if therere several ones, and the main thing – every such watermark needs individual processing – it will tire anyone!

And how to make several watermarks that would appear and fade randomly. I can suggest to use Watermark Master program. Using its wizard its simple to implement that.

In a nutshell, run Watermark Master (Google), following wizard instructions select text watermark, click Next until you get Watermark Timeline Settings, set time for watermark displaying, 10 seconds, for example; using Advanced button, select Display repeatedly option – set time for pause between watermarks displaying and thats all!

However wizard will create only one watermark, if you need more go back to main application and Copy-Paste required number times, for every new watermark, mix Timeline and thats all.

Hope, it will help someone, if you have any questions, write and Ill answer more fully.

[birdcat]

Seems like a lot of work for something I could just as easily do in my NLE and with much more control.

What is the advantage of using such a program over me doing that directly in post?

[CraftersOfLight]

I get nervous when someone signs up for the forum and, within a few moments of that, post an “ad” for software that you download to do something you can already do with anyNLE and maybethe paint type graphic program that comes freewith your computer OS.

When posts like this occur Istart to think of spyware, keyloggers and other melicious software and wonder why Iwould want to download it.

[composite1]

“When posts like this occur Istart to think of spyware, keyloggers and
other melicious software….”

And you’d be correct. Putting a ‘bug’ in your video has been around since at least 1996. As ‘Cat said, ‘not that tough to do.’ Right now Digital Rights Management (DRM) is offered by many online distribution companies and sites like Vimeo have options that you can select as to who and where your posted videos can be seen. Not sayin’ that Kosmo is one of the many wannabe software peddling hacks that pop up constantly on this forum, but he does fit the pattern. Hate to say it though, if it smells like fish….

[EarlC]

Instead of responding, I would have simply removed the post, but sincere there ARE now responses, guess it’ll play out on its own. Anyone half familiar with his/her NLE will see through this pitch, ignore it and go on with creating whatever it is they prefer for their watermark or bug components and apply them judiciously.

[birdcat]

I was gonna remove the post but thought it would make an interesting conversation – Let’s see if the original poster responds in any way.

If he doesn’t, that is a huge warning NOT to use this software.

[composite1]

“Anyone half familiar with his/her NLE will see through this pitch….”

Definitely. I agree with ‘Cat that despite that which ‘looks like a duck…’ it is a relevant topic. I too await with raised eyebrow whether Kosmo responds to lend legitimacy or crawls under a rock.

[210pe]

I’m not a moderator but it wasn’t hard to see through that. Anyone that comes here much sees at least some familar names. I don’t post a lot but I have a profile and have not posted any ads, and don’t plan to, so it is definitely a flag when you see am ad then check and see they just joined, posted and ran.

[composite1]

“… It is definitely a flag when you see am ad then check and see they just
joined, posted and ran.”

Whoo, fish smell and ‘quacking’, not looking good for ol’ Kosmo….

[Shekinah]

“Protect video from piracy” is somebody joking???

I live in sunny Vanuatu which is a small western pacific nation.

We have no piracy control of ANY description.

ALL computer software is available for a few bucks at the Chinese and other outlets (and NO don’t ask, I’m leaving soon.).

Most movies are similarly available, as are most music CDs and DVDs.

Our small TV broadcast company aired Avatar one evening not long after its debut…everyone loved it!!!

We do have an alternative…..a local stringband (locally made music) brought out a CD which they sold to their mates and friends. within a couple of weeks it appeared in one particular shop whose owner ended up with a broken leg and a few bruises….I didn’t follow the ‘saga’

With 90% unemployment what would you expect?

I’ve been here a few years so I’m blase – especially when the problem is worldwide and almost unstoppable!

Tom

[composite1]

“… A local stringband (locally made music) brought out a CD which they sold
to their mates and friends. within a couple of weeks it appeared in one
particular shop whose owner ended up with a broken leg and a few
bruises….”

Tom,

We’ve got that ‘alternative piracy protection’ in the US too! Not one condoning violence, but I understand how a local band or producer would feel violated by having their hard work pirated. Problem is, though the shop owner you spoke of shouldn’t have been selling, you bring up one of the major points of why piracy is so prevalent… it’s profitable. However, the shop owner is only a tiny part of the problem. Using the ‘alternative method’ all the people who freely purchase pirated goods are also to blame. Then there’s the loooooooong line of folks that create and distribute pirated materials. I too have stood in shops in Thailand, Hong Kong and a number of other countries that openly sell pirated goods.

In most cases, few in developing countries could possibly afford the whopping 1733 Euros or $2600 bucks for CS5 Master Collection let alone $249 just for a ‘license’ to use MS Office ’07. Hate to say it, but there are many, many folks in the US and Europe who can’t afford that either! As both a producer and consumer of potentially lucrative digital products, I can see both sides of the coin. On the one hand, there’s this kind of satisfying ‘EFFU’ one gets when one thinks they’re ‘getting over’ on the greedy studio, software and distribution execs by buying something far cheaper or getting it free. On the other side you see all your hard work, money and time being stolen by a bunch of freeloading parasites who are just ‘cashing in’ on your work. To quote a line from Cyprus Hill’s “So You Wannabe A Rock Star?”, “… At least in the Drug Game if you see someone stealin’ from you, you can shoot’em….” However, the ‘alternative method’ is both illegal and futile.

Piracy only makes things worse. Because you’re not going to beat the ‘Big Players’ (i.e. the big corporations and countries that sanction piracy either directly or indirectly.) The more you pirate, the more control the big corps want over the material and how it’s distributed. It’s like the old ‘Cold War’, in that it continues to escalate and the only people who ‘lose’ are the artists and paying consumers.

[Grinner Hester]

Just copyright it and welcome piracy. Easiest way to multiply your rate.

[Shekinah]

Hey Comp1,

I understand and totally agree with what you are saying but having set up and run a humanitarian project here in Vanuatu for the last ten years – without wages and always within the ‘non profit’ arena etc., I have been reduced to a slightly different mindset. Please also note I am a very ordinary working class bloke!

There are a few thoughts to follow here as we step outside the box.

Consider first….you can’t stop piracy! Look at the conundrum from outside of the ‘artist’s’ pure monetary gain

If you make some music, piracy WILL extend your listening audience!

If your videos are pirated, your viewing audience will increase AND your message will be ‘heard’ by more people….Is your message important enough to step outside of commercial interests?.

With so many people on both sides of the equation making a living (and some absurdly so) and the poor people enjoying some of the ‘wealth’ there is a partial ‘win, win’ situation (from an employment point of view)

Hmmm so are ‘artists’ contributing to reducing unemployment (please don’t all shoot at once ha ha).

How much control is being manufactured when a corporation tries to digitise every book on the planet that’s ever been published! or individual songs are downloadable for “a few cents” and didn’t we all watch as computer chips and RAM etc was released in ever so small increments over so many years!

I personally don’t lose much sleep when the big boys cry foul

Tom

[composite1]

Tom,

Just like Grinner said, ‘we’re going to have to live with piracy.’ As an artist, I have enough problems trying to keep distributors from rippin’ off me, my company or other artists I’m promoting. Now I got some $@#%bird in China duppin’ my hard made work and not kickin’ me jack sprat for royalties. That’s theft, straight up. Now when I try to buy something legitimately like say software, I gotta’ go through a whole bunch of BS registering because the company that produces it is going off the rails trying to ‘prevent piracy’. Like I said, ‘only artists and honest consumers lose when it comes to piracy.’ The ‘big boy’s’ as you call them are always going to get their money, it’s just going to come out of yours and my pockets.

[Shekinah]

Yes, and we’ll never see an end to that directional flow of cash…well, maybe the world economy will have its input to the problem through profiteering versus survival…in the meantime, the sidelines can be a good place to watch from.

[EarlC]

One day there will BE no sidelines. No watchers. Only those who participate in what the world has become.

[birdcat]

D. Eric Franks (videopia.com) claims that at some point soon, there will be no physical delivery mechanisms (DVD, BD, etc…) but that all content will be viewable (and listenable) online.

At that point we may have a start to battling piracy.

Of course, there will still be folks who record and resell, but if the price is reasonable (like less than $5 for something current or $1 or even free for something not) it will be cheaper to pay for the legit version than to buy the knockoff.

I have this now with my cable company – I pay a fee (high but I get every channel except the sex channels and extra fee sports channels) and can watch/record all sorts of premium content plus there are hundreds of free channels and thousands of on-demand shows/movies available.

[Shekinah]

“One day there will BE no sidelines. No watchers. Only those who
participate in what the world has become.”

NEVER!!!

Come on Earl, are you suggesting the average guy in the street really cares about the things he can’t control….or those things that don’t touch his wallet? No clean drinking water in thousands of villages or one meal every few days says to me they are victims not participants.

Utopia is a dream that few can afford!

But getting back to piracy I have sensed what D.Eric Franks (Birdcat’s post) was eluding to (a future where everything is stored online) but then we have to trust those who control that particular beast.

Trust……The Chinese have just started to establish a Global Position satellite System of their own!!!!

I wonder if there is a lack of trust in what’s already up there???

I think I’ll just stay in my computer room and edit!!!!

Tom.

[composite1]

“… At some point soon, there will be no physical delivery mechanisms (DVD,
BD, etc…) but that all content will be viewable (and listenable)
online.”

I think that’s going to be a very dark day. At that point we will be back 100% to the old ‘have’s and have not’s’ model (meaning only those who can pay can play.) Bad as things you mention are in your home Tom, look on the bright side… you’re ahead of the curve in that you have a computer, software and internet access with some means to pay for it.

However, even when that ‘dark utopia’ descends upon us, there will still be a black market out there that will record stuff the old fashioned way by just setting a camera in front of a screen or siphoning off the feed to unauthorized users. By now, you would think that the big corps would have learned that the more control they seek, the less they actually have. By putting more restrictions on how content is distributed, they create more and more resourceful pirates. I mean now whole countries’ gross national products are fueled by online and digital piracy. WT…?

The more the big corps push to stop all this the more valuable they make the pirating enterprise. Now we have ‘institutionalized piracy.’ Messed up part is, the big corps already have factored in their potential losses to piracy, yet still keep raising prices on consumers to keep up their profit margins.

Hate to tell you, there are already no ‘sidelines’. You’re already in this. If you bought your stuff legit, you’ve succumbed to the corps. If you bought your stuff out of the back of a car, the pirates got your money. So unless you are able to ‘create’ your own programs, movies and tv shows from the ether, you’ll have to choose one or the other.

[Shekinah]

“you’re ahead of the curve in that you have a computer, software and
internet access with some means to pay for it”.

For that I’m eternally thankfull! and my ‘window on the world’…..I will just have to keep the drapes drawn.

Tom

[composite1]

“Drapes? Drapes ‘e sez? Ha! Back in my day the only way you got drapes is when the burnt out buildin’ next door fell in front of the sewer pipe we lived in!” “What? You lived in a sewer pipe? What cushy life you ‘ad din’t ya? We were so poor we lived in a burnin’ garbage pit!” “I don’t know what you’re complainin’ about, at least you had heat!”

[Apache5905]

So much interesting things wouldn’t have been writen if a moderator would have discard kosmodamien post … 🙂 .. thanks.

[Anonymous]

yes i am agreed with your statement

[D0n]

I posted a how-to a while back using photoshop (or any image editor) to make a nice border with a chroma green center, and watermark that you could easily apply to any web video even in simple nle like imovie ’09

[Anonymous]

it the broken english that is the best bit if you go back and read it again you will see what i mean…

[EarlC]

On the average scale of production your common VM forum readers and independent video services providers operate. frankly protecting our video productions from piracy is the least of our worries.

[composite1]

Amen to that Earl.

The only time a true Indie has to be concerned is when they have a hit that makes it into the mainstream and becomes profitable. You’re main concern is people stealing your ideas outright.

[D0n]

add about ten minutes of blacked out video to the end of your project.

Burn then flip your finished dvd over….

look at the circular rings and it is easy to see where the “Burned” portion of the disc is.

make three 5-10 mm scratches (each one third the way around the burned in portion) on the disc near the burned in edges.

that should make your disc very hard to copy, but still playable…

should…..

maybe.

[siddhant123]

There are two type of securities -encrypted video streaming with authentication and second is the watermark technology. Now a days, lot of CDN and video hosting companies are coming up with video DRM solutions. Akamai DRM is a leader in this but it is mainly for big enterprises and is thus costly. Catering to small and medium businesses is VdoCipher.com The videos hosted through them can;t be downloaded plus they also provide dynamic watermark feature. 

[Author]

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