Copyright comes into existence the moment the work does.Unless it was made under contract, the copyright automatically belongs to the creator of the work. Gets murkier if you've used an image without permission, but I hear that might be easier soon as there's talk of allowing people to use images without permission in the case of parody.
(
Colonel Boris "...a desperate Buzzfeed imitation...",
Tue 12 Feb 2013, 19:57,
archived)