How To Find Pictures To Use For Your Logos
How To Find Pictures To Use For Your Logos
Something that was a stumbling block to me when I first began to build my own websites, was learning how to use software to manipulate images that I could use for my banners on my niche sites. Before figuring out that I could and should outsource this kind of work, I wanted to make absolutely sure that I was proficient enough to make graphics on my own. I am not exactly what you would call an artistic individual. But overtime, I have improved a great deal in this area.
This naturally meant that as I got more proficient with this tool, I would need to find pictures that I could legally use. Next step for me was doing a quick Google search to find out how to score some pictures to use on my sites. At this time I had no idea what royalty free images were. Actually, I had never even heard the term before.
I understood that I probably shouldn't go stealing just any image I come across on the web that I liked. Fortunately, for most niche affiliate sites, the merchant you are affiliated with usually won't have a problem if you "steal" their images to use on your own site. After all, you are promoting their products and it is simply another way to help you promote their products. This isn't something that is set in stone though. But typically, if you are actively promoting their products, they will probably be good with it.
Make sure you read their terms and conditions prior to using any product images though. This should go without saying, but to protect yourself from any lawsuits later on, just make sure you have permission to borrow them. And if you are even the slightest bit hesitant about it, you can always email their customer support center to make absolutely sure you have permission to use their images.
It isn't good practice to go around the internet and ripoff other people's pictures. I am positive anyone could easily do this, but I don't recommend it. Take any photo editor out there, and you could easily edit a picture in about two minutes, making it look completely different. Basically, just crop a part of the picture, and color it differently and it would be very hard for someone to prove that you stole it from them.
Does this happen a lot? I am almost positive this happens all the time. Ultimately, as easy as it would be to steal a picture and doctor it up a bit, it still isn't necessarily a good thing to do though. Not that it will hurt anyone, but it is still technically stealing another's property. Unless of course they stole that image without permission. Then it would be stealing a stolen image.
So the safest way I have found to go about finding images to use for your website, is to go to websites that specialize in stock photos or royalty free images. I like the second choice better because I can simply download a picture in about 10 seconds and start using it to make a background image, header image, or whatever it is I am making for my site.
I use Gimp simply because it is free, and that was a plus to me when I was first starting out and couldn't see myself paying for Photoshop. Ever since then, I have stuck with Gimp because I am rather familiar with it. However it does sound like Photoshop is a bit better than Gimp. I actually don't know, that is only what I have read.
Do a simple search on Google by typing in something like "royalty free images" to find images that you can use on your site. Make sure you read any instructions, because sometimes there are a few rules you have to abide by. For instance you might have to give credit to the photographer or something similar. If it was me, I would move onto the next photo, but for the most part I don't think you will have to worry about this.
You could also try a couple more popular websites like Free Digital Photos or Morguefile. Morguefile would be my vote here, because many of the other sites will charge you a small fee to sign up and get your pictures, although not all of them do, you might just have to search a little more if you are just looking for free pictures to use.
Morguefile is great, you can log on and enter your keyword and it will return with as many pictures as it has for whatever you typed in. They seem to have a nice variety of pictures as well. I would also highly recommend going to Stockphotorights to find out more information about how the licensing of photos works. They will do a much better job than I can of answering any questions about stock photography.
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