Finding copyright free images for blog posts - do you use Flickr etc?

[Ali from The Office Diet]

Hi all,

I'm thinking about using images more effectively on my blog (it's a little more minimalist than I'd intended at present!)

I am well aware that strong artistic skills are not amongst my many gifts, however ;-)

Where do people find images for blogs? I've heard Flickr mentioned, but I'm wary of just "taking" photos from there. Would it be appropriate to message people on Flickr and ask their permission to use their photo on my blog?

What do others do?

Thanks in advance,

Ali

[Brutha]

In flickr you can search for images with a specific licenses like creative commons .
There a lot images that you can use commercially when you link back to the source (attribution).

[Angela]

Ali, I know you want free, but I came across something in the bookstore yesterday that I hadn't known existed -- little books of thousands of graphics w/ cd -- all kinds. I liked the historical ornaments. They had dozens of themes, and each one cost about $14. You can certainly find free stuff on the Internet, but I don't mind paying $14 to have so many graphics that are exactly right, and just be able to flip through a book to pick out the right one (so old-fashioned!). At my local Barnes & Noble, they were on a swivel rack in the photo/art books department.

[Lauxa]

I second Brutha on recommending Flickr, you can find the licensing options in the Advanced Search, all the way at the bottom of the page. You can also find free images at Wikimedia commons, Main Page - Wikimedia Commons

I don't know what kind of images you are looking for, but I think you will be impressed by the number of images you can use for free as long as you give attribution.

[Ali from The Office Diet]

Thanks, Brutha and Lauxa, I've found lots under the Creative Commons attribution licence which are just fine. :-)

Angela -- that's a really interesting idea! $14 sounds very reasonable: I'm happy to pay a small amount for a collection, just don't want to be paying for individual images from iStockPhoto or similar. I don't think I've ever seen anything like that ... I'm in the UK so might have to order it online. Don't suppose you have a link to anything similar on the 'net?

Cheers,

Ali

[Angela]

Yes, it's Clip Art and Design on CD-ROM.

They have zillions of different category collections, mostly graphics but a few photographs, too.

[ellie]

I use istock photo, but someone suggested something that I thought was quite good. If you see a photo on flickr that you like, why don't you just approach the owner and say you will pay a small fee to use their photo.

[yogesh sarkar]

Maybe because he wants to use those images for free!

[Patricia]

Flickr is among the best alternatives, as already mentioned. stock.xchng - the leading free stock photography site is another one I've used several times in the past. It's worth checking out.

[Ali from The Office Diet]

I came across this brilliant wordpress plugin a couple of days ago, which has made finding Creative Commons licensed images from Flickr (and automatically citing them) a tad quicker!

Get the Photo Dropper Flickr Wordpress Plugin

Thought it might be useful to others too.

Best,

Ali