Copyrighted 
If you sell prints, your photos travel as files long before anyone hangs one on a wall: shop previews, social posts, files sent to labs and galleries, and digital downloads. Metadata lets each of those files say who made it, where to buy it and what a buyer may do with it. Four fields do most of the work: the Copyright Notice, the Credit Line, Usage Terms, and a Web Statement of Rights link to your shop or licensing page. This article shows what to put in each one, how to handle contact details, and where metadata stops helping.
Why a print seller needs metadata at all
A print is paper. It carries no metadata. The files around it do, and those files are what people copy, share and ask about. A few situations come up often:
- someone saves an image from your shop and wants to know where it came from;
- a gallery, framer or lab receives your file and needs to credit you correctly;
- a buyer of a digital download wants to know if they may print it for a friend;
- a blog wants to feature your work and looks for the photographer’s name.
In each case, clear metadata answers the question without an email. It works only where the metadata survives, so it is one part of how you present your work. Many platforms remove some or all metadata on upload, and they change it over time. Test the places you sell and post with the free copyright checker.
Web Statement of Rights: the link that sells
The Web Statement of Rights (xmpRights:WebStatement) holds a URL to a page about the photo’s rights. For a print seller it earns its place, because it turns an anonymous image into a path back to you.
Point it at a page that stays put. Good choices are:
- your shop’s main page;
- a “Licensing and prints” page that explains how to buy a print or license the image;
- a page for a series, if you sell work in collections.
Avoid links to single product pages if you rotate stock often. A photo can circulate for years, and a broken link helps nobody. Google also documents support for this field in its image search, as part of showing licensing information for images. See Web Statement of Rights and Usage Terms for how the field is defined.
Usage Terms: say what a buyer may do
Usage Terms (xmpRights:UsageTerms) is free text. Write one or two plain sentences that match what you actually offer. Some examples of the kind of wording people use:
- For shop previews: “Preview only. Prints and licences at example.com.”
- For a digital download sold for home printing: “Licensed for personal printing and display. No resale or commercial use.”
- For a file sent to a lab: “Printed under licence for Jane Doe Photography.”
These are examples of format only. Your actual terms depend on your agreements and on the law where you sell, so decide them with that in mind. Metadata records your terms. It does not create or enforce them.
Credit Line and Copyright Notice
Credit Line
The Credit Line (IPTC 2:110, XMP photoshop:Credit) is the text you want printed next to your work when someone features it. Write it exactly as you want it to appear, for example Jane Doe Photography. Keep it under 32 bytes if you want it to fit the older IPTC IIM field. More in the Credit Line.
Copyright Notice
The notice (EXIF 0x8298, IPTC 2:116, XMP dc:rights) names the owner, usually with the © symbol and a year: © 2026 Jane Doe. All rights reserved. Put the same notice in all three layers so every reader shows the same owner.
Creator
The Creator (EXIF Artist 0x013B, IPTC 2:80, XMP dc:creator) is the photographer’s name. If you sell through a studio or a company, the creator can still be you while the notice names the business. Creator vs copyright owner explains that split.
Contact details
IPTC defines a Creator’s Contact Info structure in XMP, with fields for an email address, a phone number, a website and a postal address. Some photo editors let you fill it in. Two points before you do:
- Everything you put in metadata is public wherever the file goes. Use a business email and a website. Leave out a home address.
- A website link ages better than an email address. If your Web Statement points to a page with a contact form, you can change the contact details there without touching a single file.
Not every tool writes the Contact Info structure. A web statement link to a page with your contact details covers the same need in any tool that writes the web statement.
Putting it into practice
Set up a set of values once and apply them to every file that leaves your hands.
- Write your values. Notice, creator, credit line, usage terms and a web statement URL.
- Consider two sets. One for shop previews and social posts, one for files delivered to buyers or labs, with different usage terms.
- Stamp your masters and your exports. Exports made by some tools drop metadata, so check each export preset.
- Label the prints themselves. Since paper holds no metadata, put your name, the title and your website on the back or on a label.
- Test your shop. Save an image from your own shop as a visitor would, and read it with the checker.
Copyrighted makes the stamping step quick. Save each set of values as a profile, pick a folder or an album, and apply the profile to a whole group. It writes EXIF, IPTC and XMP together without re-encoding the image, and every batch can be undone from History. It writes the notice, creator, credit line, usage terms, web statement and copyright status; it does not write the Contact Info structure. Photos library pictures get a stamped copy in a “Copyrighted” album, and the originals stay as they were. It works on iPhone, iPad and Mac, on the device. It is free for your first 50 stamped photos, and Pro removes the limit.
Checklist
- Set a Web Statement of Rights link to a shop or licensing page that will last.
- Write short, plain Usage Terms that match what you sell.
- Fill the Credit Line exactly as you want it printed.
- Use the same Copyright Notice in EXIF, IPTC and XMP.
- Keep contact details to a business email and a website.
- Use separate profiles for previews and for delivered files.
- Label physical prints, since paper carries no metadata.
- Save an image from your own shop and read it with the checker.
