Brenton
AhmedWhere do I get Artwork for my Blog?
August 20th 2008 11:28
Copyright is a right pickaxe up your nose, hey? Luckily it’s not all as red tape-y as it looks. There are plenty of ways to find images that you can do whatever you want with.
The main sources are Creative commons, Fair Use and Public Domain. There’s an article about Creative Commons in more detail here.
Creative commons means that, instead of existing with an automatic ‘all rights reserved’ license, certain images are created with a license that allows for them to be used by everyone, pending certain conditions. See the above article for more detail.
Fair use is not a category of image so much as a rationale for use. Some images that are legally held under an all rights reserves license can be used in particular circumstances. If you use a low resolution file (as in, of low quality), there is no free equivalent and you could not otherwise illustrate the point, you may use an image, provided you provide the rationale in writing. For example, images from a film you are discussing, a political cartoon on which you are commenting, images of public figures where few are available.
Finally, some images are in Public Domain, meaning they are owned by everyone. They may be in public domain for a number of reasons. Firstly, if they are an older image with expired copyright, they will be public domain. Secondly, if they have been produced by a government body, they will be in Public domain. Finally if the author of the image or the copyright holder has given the image into public domain, it may be considered as such.
So how do we take advantage of this? There are a number of sources from which we can take images legally. The best known are as follows;
WIKIPEDIA.
Images on Wikipedia are held under different licences and rationales, and it is important to know which rationale your image is held under before you use it. When you are on Wikipedia you are able to click on images to see more information on the image. This will allow you to see the rationale Wikipedia has used. You may use any images from public domain, but be sure to follow the conditions of any Creative Commons images, and to only use copyright images if you can produce the same fair use rationale. JUST COPYING ANOTHER PERSON’S RATIONALE FOR FAIR USE IS NOT ACCEPTABLE.
Flickr.
Flickr is another source of images. Most of the images are going to be copyright protected so you will have to search for the ones you can use. You’ll need to click search, and go into advanced search. Then you’ll need to limit yourself to only searching for Creative Commons images. If you make money off your blog, you’ll need to only search for the images which you can use for commercial purposes. This is the fastest and less efficient way of doing it. The much slower, and more efficient way to do it is to simply contact the creator and ask their permission to use the image on your blog.
Remember to be extremely detailed when you give your spiel about who the image belongs to – and the bottom of your post you should have { IMAGE X – by PERSON – Licensed under a– TYPE OF LICENSE (if you alone have been granted permission, say all rights reserved.)} Have this line link back to the original image. This is the safest way to do it, as some people get picky when you use it. IF they ask you not to, just find another.
PD Photo;
PD Photo is a completely awesome page full of Public Domain images that can be used for practically damn well whatever you want. The dude who offers them requests that you let him know what you’re doing with his images, out of curiosity so it would be decent of you to let him know.
Of course there’s more than this but this should set you up well. Basically, be sensible, ask permission where in doubt (usually you’ll get nothing more severe than a request to link back) and have fun!
The main sources are Creative commons, Fair Use and Public Domain. There’s an article about Creative Commons in more detail here.
Creative commons means that, instead of existing with an automatic ‘all rights reserved’ license, certain images are created with a license that allows for them to be used by everyone, pending certain conditions. See the above article for more detail.
Fair use is not a category of image so much as a rationale for use. Some images that are legally held under an all rights reserves license can be used in particular circumstances. If you use a low resolution file (as in, of low quality), there is no free equivalent and you could not otherwise illustrate the point, you may use an image, provided you provide the rationale in writing. For example, images from a film you are discussing, a political cartoon on which you are commenting, images of public figures where few are available.
Finally, some images are in Public Domain, meaning they are owned by everyone. They may be in public domain for a number of reasons. Firstly, if they are an older image with expired copyright, they will be public domain. Secondly, if they have been produced by a government body, they will be in Public domain. Finally if the author of the image or the copyright holder has given the image into public domain, it may be considered as such.
So how do we take advantage of this? There are a number of sources from which we can take images legally. The best known are as follows;
WIKIPEDIA.
Images on Wikipedia are held under different licences and rationales, and it is important to know which rationale your image is held under before you use it. When you are on Wikipedia you are able to click on images to see more information on the image. This will allow you to see the rationale Wikipedia has used. You may use any images from public domain, but be sure to follow the conditions of any Creative Commons images, and to only use copyright images if you can produce the same fair use rationale. JUST COPYING ANOTHER PERSON’S RATIONALE FOR FAIR USE IS NOT ACCEPTABLE.
Flickr.
Flickr is another source of images. Most of the images are going to be copyright protected so you will have to search for the ones you can use. You’ll need to click search, and go into advanced search. Then you’ll need to limit yourself to only searching for Creative Commons images. If you make money off your blog, you’ll need to only search for the images which you can use for commercial purposes. This is the fastest and less efficient way of doing it. The much slower, and more efficient way to do it is to simply contact the creator and ask their permission to use the image on your blog.
Remember to be extremely detailed when you give your spiel about who the image belongs to – and the bottom of your post you should have { IMAGE X – by PERSON – Licensed under a– TYPE OF LICENSE (if you alone have been granted permission, say all rights reserved.)} Have this line link back to the original image. This is the safest way to do it, as some people get picky when you use it. IF they ask you not to, just find another.
PD Photo;
PD Photo is a completely awesome page full of Public Domain images that can be used for practically damn well whatever you want. The dude who offers them requests that you let him know what you’re doing with his images, out of curiosity so it would be decent of you to let him know.
Of course there’s more than this but this should set you up well. Basically, be sensible, ask permission where in doubt (usually you’ll get nothing more severe than a request to link back) and have fun!
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