FREE Photography On The Web - Where To Find It
FREE photography is available on the web for you to use on Steemit! There are some sites you can use for FREE images. USE THEM! Read to the end to see a list of resources.
Every day, as I read my Feed, I see dozens of stock images from Getty, Shutterstock, Adobe Fotolia and the other agencies being used as eye candy! Stock images cannot be used in the fashion I am seeing them used here.
In fact, they really cannot be used at all unless you are the photographer! No stock image can be used in a standalone fashion to make profit for anyone other than the photographer. You may provide a link to the image, BUT THAT IS ALL!
An image with no credit claims by insinuation that you are the copyright holder, and is image plagiarism as well as copyright violation for unauthorized use if it is from one of the licensing agencies and not a free image! However, credit alone for a stock image is not good enough. You must purchase a license, but a license would do no good here, because you would still be in copyright violation for making a profit from the image!
Just as your blog is copyright protected, so are the images by professional photographers that are showing up in blogs on Steemit! Please do respect that!
There are some sites you can use for FREE images. USE THEM! You still need to be careful and need to know how to trace back to the source. If you find an image on one of the free sites, I suggest you drop it into Tineye to see what results come up. If the image also comes up in any of the main stock agencies, click on the find to see if it is still available there. If it is, then the image has been placed illegally on the free site and you are not authorized to use it.
Tineye is for Reverse Image Search, and most professionals use it to find out where their images are being used on the web. The stock agencies use a more sophisticated method, so be warned!
By far the best idea, is to use your own images. That way you can be 100% sure that you have the right to use them, but be careful with images of people and certain properties which require model and property releases!
(I will later add a small tutorial for Tineye for those who need to know how to use it.)
I am not a lawyer but, if you are a bit skeptical about what I am saying, here is a good article by a lawyer about the problem. Everyone on Steemit needs to take his advice very seriously, as Steemit is a for-profit site! For better advice on using Stock Photography, please read his article.
Here are some free sites for you to get images that you can legally use on Steemit! But be careful. When you find an image you like, run it through Tineye to make sure it does have a CCO License.
Avopix
Pixabay
Pexels
Unsplash
The image was photographed with my old Canon EOS 5D and the EF100mm f/2.8 Macro USM lens.
Camera settings: 1/125 sec; f/20; ISO 100 in the studio with professional strobe lighting.
Image © Diane Macdonald. All Rights Reserved.
My original image on Getty Images
Thanks for taking the time to read this! I appreciate it.
To find my photography and designs on Steemit, please search on #dianemacphoto. lens.
Very good, people forget photographers are putting a lot of time, money and effort into making photos and trying to make a living with them. You cant just take someone elses work and pretend everything is fine, its not. Its called theft.
And many of us who are professionals have spent thousands of dollars on education, as well as equipment. No other profession would put up with this, but I know that for many it is just a lack of education. I hope to educate so that no one gets caught having to pay a huge sum for what was thought to be a free image!
Well maybe thats what should be happening to send a clear message
I hate this "Give credit to the photographer" for images that are stolen! (OK for images that are free, if they are sure they are free!) If I stole someone's car, would it be OK if I told everyone who the car belonged to? LOL!
Maybe if you let everyone have a good look at it...no but seriously though. Its a big problem
I'm not out to spoil anyone's party - just to get recognition for the hard work that photographers put in and the recognition that it is a legitimate business!
Hello @dmcamera. Thank you for sharing your photos.
Friendly Reminder:
1. If you shoot this photo yourself but share at other web site before post on Steemit, please remember to link back to the web site because Cheetah is very clever.
2. If you share someone else photos, please remember to link back the sources of the photos and add some value by adding your own thought or comment.
Photography Slogan: A camera that puts a world of possibilities at your fingertips. Literally.
What @photography-help? Please explain! I have just written a post about this subject, and got this reply within seconds of posting! Please note that THE IMAGE IS MY OWN AS ALWAYS and if you had read my post you would know that. Also, I provided a link to where it is listed on my Getty Images account!
I now know this is a bot, everyone! Lol! Annoying, though!
I like toast 🍞
Nice Picture and nice to meet you.
@ryancornett I hope you enjoyed the post too! :-)
Thanks for this! I use pixabay and pexels for my articles. You can find tons of great images on them. I'll look at the others you recommended as well as checking out tineye!
Yes, it's safer to double check using Tineye. There are images on the free sites that don't belong there.
http://makerbook.net/ - "A hand-picked directory of the best free resources for creatives."
A site that categorizes and links to many different stock sites. From photos to video to music.
@taga That's a good resource. Thanks for sharing. again, I still suggest using Tineye to double check that an image you want is not copied and uploaded from a license paying stock site.
I agree, though I personally don't plan on posting anyone else's images. Google also has a reverse search functionality btw. Paste the image location into google search, click on images or search by image, and it will bring up any other versions of the same image.
It's not as good as Tineye, though. Tineye has the filter that allows you to see the images only on stock and filter out the rest. It was made wth the professional in mind. You have to wade through everything on Google images .
Ahhh, it's been a while since I've used Tineye. Didn't realize they added that feature. Good to know.
It's very helpful, but you need to pay attention to the webcrawling dates too, because sometimes stuff is removed from the stock sites and placed on the free sites too.