How to find free pictures online

Everyone working online needs pictures. For a blog, for video backgrounds, for creating Christmas cards for a client... When you are searching for pictures, you don't want to waste too much time.

Taking pictures yourself... the best way! (c)

A first tip: the best way to find royalty-free pictures is to take them yourself. You took them, so you can do anything you like with them. It is maybe obvious, but why search the internet for a picture of a table if you can take the picture yourself with your own smartphone?

A second tip: don't ever take pictures anywhere for any public purpose just like that. There are very big fines for doing so, even if you didn't earn any money with the picture. The person taking the picture needs to give you permission to use it. And that brings us to copyright.

A third tip: go for public domain pictures. The persons putting their pictures on line say that you can do anything with their pictures: change the colours and sell it, remix them in a video, putting them in a blogpost,... a good example is the picture in this post. You can't do much wrong - but don't claim you made the picture.

Where can you find pictures in the public domain?

1. Pixabay is one of the great sources with only pictures that are in the public domain. It's one of the easiest databases to use.
2. Flickr is a great website to find public domain pictures. Make sure to take the right option in the menu, because not all pictures can be used.
3. Everystockphoto searches different websites like Flickr and Wikipedia for pictures. Again, make sure to check the option 'public domain' in the advanced search. The search is not as good as for Pixabay and Flickr.

However, beware and use your common sense. If someone puts a picture of his car with the car's logo, you can't use it. Even if that person puts it in the public domain. The same goes for pictures of persons. Better someone that is posing for the picture than someone turning away from the camera. These websites can't check every single picture.

Another way is to search for a picture with a license. If you find one, make sure to read the license very well. Having a license doesn't allow you to do anything with it. Some allow for modifications, some are obliged to be shared with the same license, and others can't be used commercially. The best ones are CCBY, or the attribution license: you only need to give source, name and a link to the license.

Of course it's difficult to find just the right picture for your article - but remember you're not paying cash for them, only your time.