I Set Up My Content Credentials. You Should Too.

For centuries, art was created in a physical form and limited to one original copy. If an artist wanted attribution, they could sign or carve their name into the artwork. No matter where the art traveled, the attribution traveled with it. Today, much of our work is shared digitally, where watermarks or crediting do not appear alongside the art. Widespread adoption of the new Content Credentials standard may give digital artists the recognition they deserve.

As detailed in a previous Fstoppers article, Adobe has introduced Content Credentials, a system of tagging digital photographs with information about how the art was created and modified. This information can also include details about the creator’s social media accounts, making it easy for fans of the image to connect with the creator to view their future content or to hire them for a paid project.

When photographers first began posting their work online, some used watermarks printed on the image itself to ensure that viewers knew who created the image. Watermarks are problematic for two reasons. First, watermarks are unattractive and detract from the photograph’s aesthetics. Second, it is easy to crop or digitally remove a watermark. For any artist, particularly those who infuse their soul into their creations, it is important that their name travels with their work. Attribution can lead to opportunities. But artists want credit for their work for reasons that go beyond wanting to book more jobs in the future. When artists pour their soul into their work, they want viewers to know that this photograph or painting isn’t just a random collection of colors and shapes; rather, this creation is a reflection of the life experience of the creator. In today’s world of viral videos and photographs, there is no telling what image will grab the attention of the masses. It is possible that a random photograph you have taken—no matter how ordinary it may seem to you—may spread all around the world. Without attribution, you can rest assured that you will receive no compensation or recognition for your creation. For any creator, even those not looking to monetize their talent, it is desirable to have eyes on their work.

Although Content Credentials is a new tool, Adobe boasts of 3,500 companies and organizations expressing support and proclaiming support for the initiative. And though the platform has not been officially launched yet, there is a beta version available that allows photographers to tag their work with important information that will be accessible by viewers instantly, no matter how the photograph is used. While it is not uncommon for an image to be intentionally used without the permission of the photographer, it is perhaps more common for someone to use an image without proper attribution because they don’t know who took the original image. In either situation, it is not a good feeling when you see your work being used without being recognized as the creator. Sometimes, a person who has paid proper fees to use an image on their platforms does not feel obligated to credit a photographer. If an image is tagged with Content Credentials, the information about who created the image will always be accessible even if the client did not credit the photographer.

As someone who has had hundreds of images used without attribution over the past three decades on everything from social media accounts, websites, merchandise for sale, and mixtape CD covers, I was eager to set up Content Credentials for my photographs. Fortunately, the process was easy and took only a few minutes. Lightroom is an indispensable part of my workflow each day, and that is where I set up my Content Credentials for images I intend to share.

The first step in setting up your Content Credentials would be to add your name into your camera so that images are instantly tagged with your information at the moment of capture. At this time, the only camera that has this ability is the Leica M11. Because my cameras of choice (Nikon Z9 and Leica M10) do not have CC built in, I started the process at step 2, which was to open Lightroom and navigate as follows: File > Preferences > Export.  

Here, I am given four options. In the Producer field, I entered my name. The second option is for Connected Accounts. When I select Manage on this page, I am taken to a page where I can connect my LinkedIn and Instagram accounts (as well as a few other platforms). This is useful to me because LinkedIn is the platform that has the best possibility of leading to a real-world job when my images are shared there. If dozens of people share my corporate event photography images on their pages over the course of a year, it is possible that one creative director will access my Content Credential information to inquire about my services.

You will note that the Lightroom page where I initially set up my Content Credentials allows me to choose whether or not I will share information about how my images have been edited. In the demo presented at Adobe 2024 MAX, this screen featured a before-and-after slider where a viewer can see just how the image was modified from its original form. (Note: Content Credentials is currently in beta. Some features described in this article are not yet available in the current version.)

To understand how a viewer might utilize Content Credentials, let us examine my editing process for the image at the top of the article taken with my Leica M10 Monochrom. After importing an image into LR I applied a preset created by David Farkas as the starting point for my exposure and contrast adjustments. Next, I used a Generative AI brush to remove a bicycle in the background. Normally, I would not have removed this element, but I did so to show how Content Credentials would indicate the use of Generative AI. Using the brush tool in Lightroom, I was able to remove the bicycle without having to import the image into Photoshop. My final step in adjusting the image was to Export the modified image as a high-resolution JPEG for use on the Instagram account that I use for sharing my Leica images.

In viewing the image in Photo Mechanic or Preview, there is no indication that the image has been brightened, nor is it evident that I removed a distracting element. While the ability to read Content Credentials may be built into Mac and Windows operating systems at some point, the best way to view Content Credentials today is to visit the Content Credentials homepage. Here, we see a stark page that allows for uploading an image and inspection of its Content Credentials. A viewer can quickly find information about who took the photograph. The viewer can also see a record of the changes made to the photograph, including the fact that a visual element was removed from the scene. If this photograph had been entered into a contest that did not allow for manipulation of images, the Content Credentials would inform that the picture was ineligible.

Content Credentials also allow an artist to indicate whether an image may be used for AI training. Many photographers have objected to text-to-image platforms that are suspected of downloading photographs without permission for training of their AI models. Some images generated appear to have remnants of watermarks still present. Any photographers who do not want their images used in AI farming will be able to indicate this preference.

Setting up my Content Credentials took less than five minutes, but now I can add my credit and portfolio to any image that I post on the web. Content Credentials are added instantly to all images I export from Lightroom. Most people who view the image will ignore the Content Credentials indication in the corner of the photograph. There is always the possibility, however, that a potential client sees an image online and is interested in hiring the creator of that image. That information is now easily accessible.