Great Royalty Free Images – Why They Matter, and Where to Get Them
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Adam in Blogging, Business, Entrepreneurship, Internet, Websites
We’ve all heard the cliché, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” While it’s an overused phrase, the reason it’s used so much is that it’s absolutely true. Pictures communicate to us better than words alone can. They elicit feelings and emotion; they can explain complex concepts at a glance; and they can make an otherwise boring website come alive. That’s why many of the best and most professional blogs you find will include a picture with each post. Finding the right picture to go with your articles might add a few minutes to the time it takes you to create a post, but the extra time is well worth it.
There are some important guidelines to remember when choosing images for you site or blog though. If you want to make an impact, not just any image will do, and there are legal considerations to take into account as well. While it’s not always easy to find the right image to go with a post or page on your site, taking a little time to make a conscious decision about your images is important. Some titles lend themselves to easily finding an image. For example, a title like, “10 Great iPhone Apps,” would be easy to find an image for. Just look for a good picture of an iPhone! But even then, a picture of an iPhone with the screen full of apps communicates your post’s message better than a guy holding an iPhone might.
As for legal considerations, it’s important to know that not every image out there on the net is fair game. In fact, unless you have express permission to use an image (permission from the actual owner of the image), it’s not ok to post it on your site. There is a misconception by some that as long as you give credit somewhere on the page, you’re in the clear. This is not the case. In some cases, an image owner who has shared an image on a photo-sharing site, like Flickr, will attach a creative commons license to his or her photo and specifically say that it can be used with attribution (credit given). This is the only case where a simple mention of the image owner is enough to make its use legal. In other cases, an image owner in the same situation will give full rights, without attribution, which allows you to use the image freely in whatever way you want. This is more unusual, and the images you find with this kind of license aren’t always very useful, but they do exist.
The bottom line on image permissions is that you can only use an image on your site in one of three cases:
- You have express permission from the image owner. (Might or might not require attribution)
- You purchased the right to use the image.
- You are the image owner because you took the picture (or created the graphic).
Note: Even in the first two cases, there might be restrictions as to how you can use an image (i.e. commercial use vs. personal use), so watch out for that as well.
Ok, so now that we’re clear that images are important and what’s ok and not ok legally, where do you find great images for your site? There are a lot of free and paid sources to consider for quality images. Here are some of the best:
Paid Sites
iStockphoto – iStockphoto is the internet’s original member-generated image and design community. You get easy, affordable inspiration with millions of safe, royalty-free photographs, and more. You have the option of signing up for a subscription, or using their pay-as-you-go plan. Generally, images will end up costing you from $.99 each and up, depending on the image size and your plan.
Shutterstock – Shutterstock is the service we use for Blogtrepreneur.com, and our sister site, YoungEntrepreneur.com. They boast being the largest subscription-based stock photo agency in the world, and they provide a massive library of high-quality, unique images. You have a choice of their 25-a-day subscription, which allows you to download up to 25 images of any size each day (costing as little as $.33 per image on the one-month plan, if you max it out for one month), or you can choose their on-demand plan, which will end up costing you about $4 – $10 an image, depending on your needs.
Corbis – This site is a little more artsy and fairly pricy. They have a very attractive UI, for what that’s worth, but you’ll pay from $15 and up per image and a lot more if you plan to use the image in print. Rather than a subscription model, you pay per image, and the fee varies widely, depending on how you plan to use the image. If you’re publishing a magazine or a site where you want celebrity images or very high-end graphics, Corbis might be a good match.
Getty Images – Getty is the leading provider of digital media worldwide. Like Corbis, they charge by the image, and for royalty-free images (the kind you’ll most likely want to use), you’ll pay upwards of $10 for a small image (170 px square) and $25 or more for a 230 px + image. The only advantage to Getty is that they have very high quality images, and a lot of them.
Free Sites
Flickr Creative Commons – If you don’t want to pay for images and don’t mind weeding through a lot of pics to find the right one, Flickr’s creative commons area is a great resource. They list six degrees of creative commons licenses with explanations of each. With as many as 40 million+ images for a given license type, you’ll surely be able to find something worth using. Be careful though. If an image looks like it’s a pro shot, it might not actually belong to the person who uploaded it, and you might get a nasty email from the actual owner!
Stock.XCHNG – This site was recently bought by Getty Images but has been around since 2001. They offer free stock images of pretty good quality. It will be more difficult to find just the right image on SXC than on one of the paid sites, and the images are generally from amateur photographers and illustrators, but you might have an easier time than sifting through a million results on Flickr.
Google and Yahoo image search – Here’s where you have to be careful. You’ll find millions of results for any image subject you’re looking for on both Google and Yahoo, but chances are, you won’t have permission to use them. If you do find a great image using this method, try asking the site owner where the image is displayed if you can use it. As long as they’re the actual owner of the image, they might not have an issue with it and just ask that you give them credit.
Hopefully this post gives you some good ideas and resources for adding images to your site and blog. There are a lot of other image resources out there too. Which ones do you use? Share them with us in the comments!
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30 Responses to “Great Royalty Free Images – Why They Matter, and Where to Get Them”
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Waqas
25. Jun, 2010
Great post. I have actually had great luck with the SXC site (sxc.hu) and that is generally the first place I look for. After I am though with that site I then look at the paid sites to fill in images that I have been unable to find for free.
Brandon
25. Jun, 2010
The big problem I see is when the same picture is used to many times that anyone can pick it out as a stock image. For example, I saw the same woman’s picture used maybe 10-15 times, as a “satisfied customer” for a variety of different products. Before you go with a stock photo, check to see if your competitors are also using it!
Shawn
25. Jun, 2010
When we design sites, we use iStockPhoto all the time. We take the design and scale up the sample image. If/when we decide it’s *really* the image we want, we purchase it. I’ve also used Flickr creative-commons licenses for other projects, depending. Both are mainstays – not sure what I would do without ‘em.
Laptop Briefcases
25. Jun, 2010
Great resources. It’s been a while since I had to look for stock photos, but it’s good to have some reliable sites to turn to. Any serious blogger definitely needs to ensure they take the time to use good images. While a blog’s content is most important, poorly chosen images can really reflect poorly upon the blog.
Jamie Barclay
25. Jun, 2010
Pictures sends a strong message to our readers. Sometimes, pictures are enough to make your message send across to your readers. But we need to careful as well in choosing pictures in representing our posts or articles as it may also send wrong message.
JohnAtBlogtrepreneur
26. Jun, 2010
@Jamie: Great point. The wrong image placed on a post can make the message confusing. It’s important to take the time to choose the right one.
@Brandon: Yours is also another great point. Some of the paid sites will tell you how many times an image has been downloaded, or let you sort by popularity. If you do this and also check around you’ll reduce the chances of overusing an image. I think people pretty much know all the images on a site are stock images, so not sure that it detracts all that much, but being unique is definitely a big plus!
Jason @GameGlide.com
26. Jun, 2010
I also use PhotoXpress.com. You can get get free (royalty free) and paid photos there.
Of course, there is a much smaller selection of free photos than paid, but they are not bad.
Supermarket Soap
27. Jun, 2010
The Flickr thing is interesting. I use Flickr for a semi commercial project which requires artwork. The “Only Creative Commons Tagged Content” filter and “Commercial Use Allowed” filters are great. Just be aware that some people blindly label stuff as Creative Commons when it clearly isn’t.
Melinda
27. Jun, 2010
I use bigstockphoto.com for all my photos. If you buy credits in bulk you can really reduce the per photo cost. I’m going to check out some of these I didn’t know about.
JohnAtBlogtrepreneur
27. Jun, 2010
@Supermarket: You’re right, just because someone puts a creative commons license on an image doesn’t mean they’re the actual owner of the image. Have to be careful there. I’ve also found that people don’t necessarily tag images properly, so it can be a challenge to find what you’re looking for on Flickr. Still, it’s free, so worth the hassles perhaps!
Supermarket Soap
28. Jun, 2010
Yes, I think it is worth the effort, because you can get some really great stuff. I waded through about 1,000 images, rejected stuff because it really obviously wasn’t CC but came away with about 90 images which were almost certainly CC, and got a lot of praise for the artwork I found. One reviewer even commented that it was so good, he had trouble believing it was CC content!
Escort Service London
28. Jun, 2010
Imagine when the goal is not only to find good images, but also some images that you can openly and freely use without needing to pay royalties or one-time publishing rights. Luckily there are many online directories of royalty-free images that come to rescue.
Andrew @ Blogging Guide
28. Jun, 2010
I am really picky of the pictures that I’m using on my website. So, sometimes I use my own photos so as not to have any issues whatsoever.
Stephen
28. Jun, 2010
Great article. It’s always frustrating when you are looking for a specific article and your stock imaging website-of-choice doesn’t have anything to offer. This list will help me, as well as many others, tremendously.
I also want to add that for those who are looking for a little extra income, many of these stock imaging websites allow you to upload your pictures, and depending on how many times they are used, you get compensated. Fairly simple and easy process.
Tricia
28. Jun, 2010
This is actually a huge help. I have been seriously considering relying on my own photographs and picture editing skills (of which I have none) to illustrate my blog. I’ll be trying the first two unpaid sites.
Mark Nasri
28. Jun, 2010
Nice, I was looking for more information about this.
Credit Girl
28. Jun, 2010
Thanks for the resources. Lots of places can really get technical if you use their images without their consent.
Suggest link
29. Jun, 2010
I think the videos make the website come to life, but pictures have their role also…it’s a big difference between websites with images and websites without…great post I wish I had read this when I was looking for pictures for my website…things would have been much easier…
JohnAtBlogtrepreneur
29. Jun, 2010
@Jason: Just checked out PhotoXpress.com. Looks like a good service. Even some of their free stuff is pretty good. Thanks for passing it along.
John @ Vancouver WA Homes
30. Jun, 2010
Thanks for the resources. I try to use my own photos wherever I can to avoid licensing issues and to better ensure unique content. However, I just can’t take every photo so this will be a big help!
viral marketing
01. Jul, 2010
Keep an eye on the license. Sometimes even after paying for an image you might only have limited uses. For example you won’t be able to print it on T-shirts etc.
Kelvin Forex Indicator
01. Jul, 2010
Great stuff. I have been pictures and your resources has definitely come at the right time.
I prefer the paid one as they are more organised and easier to find
Outdoor Cat Enclosures
02. Jul, 2010
An image adds an extra dimension to a website and makes it more visually attractive for visitors. I am always on the look out for some top quality sites to get images from and now I have list thanks to you. Awesome. I’ll bookmark this post for future reference. Thanks again!
South Florida Pool Builders
02. Jul, 2010
I like iStock for simple pics, however I always make sure I add new alt tags for SEO.
cleaning services
02. Jul, 2010
thanks for the great list of places to get free images. I too am a fan of iStock images for my sites but sometimes when i just want to throw something together quickly it is great to have this free list on hand.
used tires
05. Jul, 2010
I actually really enjoy Zimbio, although there are alot of copyright images, it’s pretty cool that I can subscribe to a list, and it always updates me on the latest photos of the subject I am interested in.
Till then,
Jean
JohnAtBlogtrepreneur
05. Jul, 2010
@viral marketing: That’s a great point. Depending on where you get your images and the license attached to them, you might be very limited to where you can use them. Thanks all for the comments!
Laptop Briefcases
05. Jul, 2010
Yes you do have to watch image license details. You can’t simply go and post any images you find. You need to be sure that some day a lawyer won’t be contacting you to remove images asap or face legal consequences.
Marriage Information
13. Jul, 2010
I use Flickr and search through their creative commons 2.0 images for a few of my niche sites and just make sure to link back to the image for credit.
Jim Rodrigues
29. Jan, 2012
I am looking for old photos of movie stars such as Rock Hudson or Frank Sinatra etc.etc. Where would I find them and are their any celebrity photos i can use for free to be able to put on a DVD