Digital Watermarking Via Eye - Canon Iris Registration Watermark

Any photographer knows how frustrating it is to have their images used without their permission. A new innovation, however, would allow for photo copyrighting to be all in the eye. Don’t see what I mean?

Two protection techniques used before are watermarking and severe compression, yet those ruin the overall appearance of the image, making it hard to assess its detailed attributes. A new concept, for which Canon is trying to get the patent for, actually uses the ultra unique pattern of the eye’s iris to protect the image.

When a photographer looks through the lens (point and shoot digitals don’t work in this case) of the camera, a tiny secondary camera within captures the details of the photographer’s iris, the coloured portion of the eye with patterns just as unique as a fingerprint.

This would be activated when the Canon is put into “REG” mode, so could be shut off if the photographer chooses.

The information would be stored along with the rest of the photo details (such as ISO setting, aperture value, etc.) and added to the image’s metadata.