[waaronw]

This is the kind of non-ambiguous license that benefits all parties involved. Unfortunately, not all the sources for images out there are nearly as clear. (Flicker using CC licensing, for instance) For the record, I am a big, big fan of CC licensing, but it does need more definition, which is happening as it moves forward. Of course I am also a proponent for severe roll-back of copyright to the point that it is a benefit to society once again.
Good luck dewey123, I have a lot of respect for your profession.

[dewey123]

Thanks waaonw! It's amazing how photography has changed so much in the 15 years I have been in it since college. These CC licensing and such are great products, honestly, for jut about anyone with a digital camera, a Flickr account and the desire to have people think so much of your photo that they would acutally use it for something!! It is the highest form of flattery and acceptance, and we all love that! The link backs to the shooters are great to help one of the most imporant needs of ALL photographers; get your work out there and seen! But it all comes back down to one simple concept: If you like it enough to use it, then you should pay for it!! As soon as you say that and the person turns off, well, then they really didn't value it that much at all. So both ego and back account are let empty and crying in the shower. I have won major sponsorship and other advertising accounts BECAUSE I was charging top commercial dollar; the others said " I am just so glad you like it enought to consider using it, take it for free!" Well, if you think it is valued at nothing, then so do I, then that is what what ALL imagery is; worth nothing really.
The image for Windows, the green grass hill and clouds was sold by Chuck O Rear for outright all rights to Microsoft for millions of dollars. Grass. A hill. Blue sky. Some clouds. Really, honest, milions. Differnt image stlll owned by Chuck (http://www.wineviews.com/wccfineart/files/page16-1000-full.html) Now, by todays standards there are a GAZILLION images like that available for free, and used for free. Like I said in the fisrt sentence; amazing how photography has changed in a few years!

I am happy for CC and Flickr......and I am actually happy to see so many people out there shooting, sharing and getting use out of more imagery than ever in history. As a business, it SHOULD make real profesionals like me to be even more valued since our work should be vastly more attractive and useful and admired.......providing that the general quality of what "looks good and is of high standards" doesn't get dumbed down along with the plethora of free images of lesser quality out there.....sort of like Walmart of photography!!!!

It's a tough busiess for sure. But it is an amazing art that is accesable to everyone, and I think that is outstanding. I just hope we can educate everyone about it, art, creative thinking and pursuit of passions, and WHAT IT"S WORTH and HOW TO VALUE IT!

K, I'm off my soap box now!

[dewey123]

Phil, thanks for this! I was trying to find this in my booksmarks from Photo District News. Cheers

[cgmpowers]

Nothing is free...
I think any designer worth there salt finds out whose the copywriter of any image before using it and obtain it legally.
Sure, I use iStock, Veer and Commstock and I use these images legally. I've had the clients who are "a little web saavy" who beg me to use these "free sites" and I always decline... If its not worth paying for an image legally, how much are you willing to spend defending yourself when I sue you after I get sued for using an image illegally?
Chris

[Torley]

It's usefun to keep a bookmarks folder to free image search tools close to your heart, especially when you're a prolific blogger. I highly recommend http://www.compfight.com/ for searching Flickr. It offers many-thumbnails-on-a-page view, and is simpler to use than Flickr's advanced search.
Too bad Mac doesn't have a blogging tool like Windows Live Writer yet, which integrates well with Flickr and is a snap to drag-and-drop pictures (and videos) into posts (and preview them live!).

[dougoftheabaci]

cgmpowers said:

Nothing is free...

Open source is pretty free... Creative Commons licensed stuff is completely free.

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I think any designer worth there salt finds out whose the copywriter of any image before using it and obtain it legally.

I make it part of my contracts. Clients certify that they are responsible for any images they provide me with and I likewise am responsible for any materials I provide. That covers everyone.

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Sure, I use iStock, Veer and Commstock and I use these images legally. I've had the clients who are "a little web saavy" who beg me to use these "free sites" and I always decline...

Why? You're costing your client money. I only use paid stock if I can't find a free stock image that both I and the client approve. If you feel uncomfortable with using free stock you should get your clients to sign an agreement taking responsibility for it's use. That way you hold no liability and they're happy.

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If its not worth paying for an image legally, how much are you willing to spend defending yourself when I sue you after I get sued for using an image illegally?

Nothing. Nada. Zip. Zilch. Zero. You see, I keep rather meticulous logs on all the stock images I use. The reason for this is if someone comes to me claiming rights to the image and they threaten me with legal action if I don't pay I can show them my logs ? my logs include dates, links, and any licensing agreements ? at which point they'll move on from me to wherever I got the image and I, of course, will replace the image on my site.

If they push it I have no legal responsibility as I got the image form a reputable site which labelled the licensing agreement. If that agreement is incorrect the liability is with the person who posted the image and possibly Stock Xchange, not with me.

Contracts and work logs: Saving designers since 1950.

[dougoftheabaci]

Torley said:

Too bad Mac doesn't have a blogging tool like Windows Live Writer yet, which integrates well with Flickr and is a snap to drag-and-drop pictures (and videos) into posts (and preview them live!).

Sounds a lot like Flock to me.

[Torley]

Alas, Flock chokes on videos and has other quirks. Nothing compares to WLW on Mac yet, which is why I run it via virtualization.

[neutrino23]

While not free I'd also recommend istockphoto.com. You can get high resolution photos for just a few dollars. Lower resolution images for as low as a dollar. That is less than you pay for a greeting card at Hallmark. Hardly onerous and it grants you the legal right for commercial use of that image in brochures and such as long as you are not reselling the image (t-shirts, coffee cups).
If you are just putting together a Keynote presentation for mom's 80th birthday party you can use any images you like. If you are using an image for a business purpose it only makes sense to make sure that you have the rights to that image, whether it is a free image or not.

[aegingo]

This is timely.
I just art directed a job where I had the photographer shoot B&W FILM! He's an old school type - fantastic photographer - and was very excited to be shooting film. His PA was a little confused at first, but quickly got into speed (like riding a bike!) ANyway, during a lull, we were talking about this kind of stuff. As an art director, it just keeps getting cruddier and cruddier - I can't imagine for you professional photographers.
Years ago we had the big black books, and we even (gasp!) SKETCHED our ideas out and came up with concepts. We commissioned a photog, and shot some slides or negs, and got exactly what we wanted. Then Photodisc came along, and sent us their books, and we paid a few hundred or less for a nice, albeit vanilla image, but the sales people loved it - more commission for less work! Concept be damned! Quality be damned! So we moved into this phase, and I'm sure the photogs were kicking and screaming (rightfully.)
Then we moved online - Corbis, Getty, Comstock, and many others who have come and gone. hundreds of thousands of images at a click! Now we didn't even have to buy a ÇD! We could get JUST an image! (Mysteriously, the price of one image tended to equal the price of the entire CD we used to pay for.) Again - a virtual photo studio filled with some very nice work, but mostly a lot of vanilla one size fits all stuff. And compared to a days' rate for a photographer, who could argue? (More gnashing of the teeth by you shooters)
But that wasn't enough. Some very resourceful people came up with the whole istockphoto concept - wow! Photos for a buck! Now, most jobs are priced by the AEs so that we don't even consider a shoot - or even semi decent stock - move right to the cheap stuff! It's just a picture, right? How the heck can a photog compete with 10 dollar photos? As an AD, I can scream and yell, but the client is sold a bill of goods by an AE who has no care whatsoever about quality - "the client just wants a picture of a snowmobile.) Nice.
NOW you're telling me I can get FREE images? Wow. watch that pencil and sketch pad move farther and farther into the trash. I'll just let google or flickr design for me. After all, you can't beat free, right?
This coming from a site where a majority of readers have paid a premium for the best (a mac, silly) but can't understand why quality photography should cost anything. After all, it's just a picture, right? Anyone could take it.
Bitter? Yeah, I guess I am. But you get what you pay for, and the picture in the article taken with a camera phone speaks volumes. (I realize that this article may not be intended for pros, but they will use this, and it's just plain stinky.)
thanks. Rant over. Back to my crayons and tracing paper...

[dougoftheabaci]

aegingo said:

Years ago we had the big black books, and we even (gasp!) SKETCHED our ideas out and came up with concepts.

We still do.

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We commissioned a photog, and shot some slides or negs, and got exactly what we wanted. Then Photodisc came along, and sent us their books, and we paid a few hundred or less for a nice, albeit vanilla image, but the sales people loved it - more commission for less work! Concept be damned! Quality be damned! So we moved into this phase, and I'm sure the photogs were kicking and screaming (rightfully.)

Agreed, rightfully. If the image isn't exactly what you want then you shouldn't use it. But that''s just smart design, it says nothing about cheap (or not so cheap) stock photography.

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Then we moved online - Corbis, Getty, Comstock, and many others who have come and gone. hundreds of thousands of images at a click! Now we didn't even have to buy a ÇD! We could get JUST an image! (Mysteriously, the price of one image tended to equal the price of the entire CD we used to pay for.) Again - a virtual photo studio filled with some very nice work, but mostly a lot of vanilla one size fits all stuff. And compared to a days' rate for a photographer, who could argue? (More gnashing of the teeth by you shooters)

And sometimes those images are not so vanilla, it depends on what you're going for. I've found images that were exactly what I was looking for.

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But that wasn't enough. Some very resourceful people came up with the whole istockphoto concept - wow! Photos for a buck! Now, most jobs are priced by the AEs so that we don't even consider a shoot - or even semi decent stock - move right to the cheap stuff! It's just a picture, right? How the heck can a photog compete with 10 dollar photos? As an AD, I can scream and yell, but the client is sold a bill of goods by an AE who has no care whatsoever about quality - "the client just wants a picture of a snowmobile.) Nice.

And sometimes the client and AE care. And sometimes that cheap stock fits.

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NOW you're telling me I can get FREE images? Wow. watch that pencil and sketch pad move farther and farther into the trash. I'll just let google or flickr design for me. After all, you can't beat free, right?

I don't see the connection of images for the final product and preliminary sketching of a concept... At all.

This coming from a site where a majority of readers have paid a premium for the best (a mac, silly) but can't understand why quality photography should cost anything. After all, it's just a picture, right? Anyone could take it.

Some of us understand but some of us also understand our clients don't have a few hundred to do a shoot. Likewise we understand that a photo is just a photo and the source matters not in the least. If it's good, it's good. You can do a shoot and end up with crap as well.

Bitter? Yeah, I guess I am. But you get what you pay for, and the picture in the article taken with a camera phone speaks volumes. (I realize that this article may not be intended for pros, but they will use this, and it's just plain stinky.)

I can see you've never browsed around Stock Exchange. If you did you'd know that most of the photos are extremely high quality, full-spread print quality. So, yeah, this article is intended for pros. I'm a pro and I use free stock when I can.

No offense but you really strike me as the kind of art director who would have told me how print and web design are actually the same when you get right down to it. Or one that would tell me not to use Symphony, WordPress, jQuery or any open source project because they are free and can be edited by anyone irregardless of how these projects are actually better than almost any enterprise-level option.

[dewey123]

In response to Aegingo,

Thanks mate for sharing the creative/ad side of the discussion!! I fear sounding too one sided and jilted.....which I am...but I am also fairly objective as well. I feel as bad for your profession as I do mine, and I spend a fair chunk of mine teaching new budding photographers. I sometimes blame you guys for not holding to quality imagery and design. But I realized a few years ago it is all at the hands of the clients..i.e. the general public, not you. You are as much affected as I am. Hell, I have Illustrator, I have Quark, I can do page layout and play with the text tool....so can my clients and yours. So I am aware that you also have lowered rates and more difficulty with work than you use to. Remember 'mechnicals'? I LOVED getting comps and layouts, mocking things out, discussion, collaboration, 4 martini lunches, 3 shots a day in the studio, charging $2500 a day minimum, assistants, designers, set builders, stylists, CDs, ADs and Account Execs! Yeah, we lived high on the hog back in the late 70's & 80's.

As a business model I and all photographers need to bear in mind that we also control OUR market, just like Apple. Despite all the other dime a dozen computer makers out there, Gateway, Dell, HP, IBM, Sony, etc. They just got cheaper and cheaper, and Apple just stayed the course, but they did one major important business function; THEY CREATED A UNIQUE WELL DESIGNED HIGH QUALITY EASILY USEABLE PRODUCT!!!!! And then they learned to market the hell out of them. I LOVE Istock, I can sell all my stupid cloud pictures and leaves and friends hiking and partying for $5, but I sell them about 1000 times a year, since SOOOOO many people are buying from there. So even my "vanilla" imagery can make me money. I take that money and help build/create and produce my higher quality, more unique and distinctive CUSTOM MADE images for my higher end advertising and editorial clients, and still charge $2200 a day for it, minimum, and then USAGE/LICENSING on top of that. It is far fewer in number, but I am still sought after for more creative and technically cool imagery and still get top dollar when I do, providing that I market and let people know that I can do that.

It is just a matter of marketing your work aggressively, understanding that your mind is a product, ALL your imagery is a product, and now more than ever there is a market for ALL of your imagery. Whether it is a random shot of a green hillside and blue sky and some clouds for $5 each use, or a shot of a Pulitzer prize winning moment and license it for $100,000 for a few months and have it published around the world and seen by everyone. Both are possible and both are likely as long as you truly understand VALUE for your work, constantly create and shoot work of all kinds, and get that work out there and market!!!! Yes, even some of these free sites can benefit us if we learn how to use them and capitalize on them; which is all part of being a business. We have to adapt just like the rest of the world. Like Ian Summers photo Guru says (www.heartstorming.com) GROW OR DIE!

"Bitter, party of one, Bitter, party of one your table is ready"

Thats for me, so I better go. This is by far the best thread and discussion I have had to date on imagery, usage, web photography and advertising. Thanks for this. I feel so much better about going broke in a dying occupation!

[aegingo]

Very well retorted - I'm afraid that I may have come off like a curmudgeonly crusty old AD who doesn't like change - not the case at all. I guess my main point is that MORE often than not, the free wins out just because it is free, not because it is right.

I have no problem with free at all - that would just be plain silly. But when the spectre of free vs. what SOLVES THE PROBLEM correctly raises its head, I have a problem.

I see too many folks (I'm guilty for sure) turn right to the box to "find a concept" or "Find a photo" instead of really understanding the visual problem that needs to be solved, and banging out a good idea.

I have found many nice images as well, and use them quite often. I just hate to see an AE give right in when a great solution is on the table, and we are hamstrung with using "free"

Or, when the CLIENT discovers they can "pick their own photos and save some money."

I don't want to come off like a design snob - sorry if I am, but when all of this becomes the rule rather than the exception, I get burned up. Free is good, but how low do we go? Then we are "just a pencil" as I like to say, and merely production workers - which won't make me money, frankly.

Does this ring bells from days gone by? In the 60's, was there a backlash against illustrators who used electric erasers or photogs who used that newfangled Fuji film? All is cyclical, right? I hope so.

So I see your points for sure, but I still have a problem with all of this cut rate stuff. Yeah, free is good, but in the end, it doesn't pay the bills - unless you're selling that photo of the sunset off of Maui 10,000 times for 5 bucks a pop! Bully!

[dougoftheabaci]

aegingo said:

I have no problem with free at all - that would just be plain silly. But when the spectre of free vs. what SOLVES THE PROBLEM correctly raises its head, I have a problem.

Oh, that I can completely agree with. I came up to this recently when doing a poster for a short film. The client didn't have the budget to pay me what I should have gotten ? he was a friend, I did it anyway ? and we needed a picture of an old TV. We couldn't afford to do a photo shoot and I couldn't find a good free stock pic no matter where I looked. Thus we bought some cheap stock that worked brilliantly.

The thing is I tend to start from the cheapest option and work up from there. If free doesn't work I look for cheap. If cheap doesn't work I look for more expensive stock. If I still can't find what I need I recommend a photographer.

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I have found many nice images as well, and use them quite often. I just hate to see an AE give right in when a great solution is on the table, and we are hamstrung with using "free"

I believe that's their job, no? Hehe...

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Or, when the CLIENT discovers they can "pick their own photos and save some money."

Yeah, I squish this one in the outlying agreements with my clients. While I let them do whatever for minor stock on websites if it's a major image that effects the design we both have to sign off on it.

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I don't want to come off like a design snob - sorry if I am, but when all of this becomes the rule rather than the exception, I get burned up. Free is good, but how low do we go? Then we are "just a pencil" as I like to say, and merely production workers - which won't make me money, frankly.

But choosing photos is only one small part of our jobs. I'm a web designer and developer. I spend most of my time just figuring out the layout and then building it. Very little of my time is spent agonizing over an image, if only because by the time I get to that point I'm running short on time thanks to my wonderful client.

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Does this ring bells from days gone by? In the 60's, was there a backlash against illustrators who used electric erasers or photogs who used that newfangled Fuji film? All is cyclical, right? I hope so.

A bit, but design is progression. The big battle I see now is people in print telling me they know how to design for the web even though they don't know the first thing about the limitations and abilities of the web in relation to print. I like to think web designers have a harder time.

So I see your points for sure, but I still have a problem with all of this cut rate stuff. Yeah, free is good, but in the end, it doesn't pay the bills - unless you're selling that photo of the sunset off of Maui 10,000 times for 5 bucks a pop! Bully!

Actually, that's what happens. I saw an article somewhere, I think it was Freelance Switch, and it was talking about how you can make money off of cheap stock sites, as well as free. The idea was that on the cheap sites your images, if they're good, can get used hundreds of times and you get a rather hefty percentage of the sale each time. Now while on one photo that might not be too much on 100 photos it can add up. So instead of 1 photo 10,000 times for $5 you can do 1,000 photos 10 times for $5.

With free stock sites the idea was that younger, less experienced photographers get a way to get their images used and build up a presence. It's also good for hobbyists who take great photos but have no real desire to go pro.