As a Web designer, you may want to use free images to enhance your work. Although the Internet is full of images of all types, you can’t use just anything you find on the Web; this can lead to a lot of headaches, the main being an expensive lawsuit.
Unless you’ve created or taken a photo yourself, you must get permission from the owner/creator before using Web images in your work. This is where Creative Commons (also known as CC) images come into play.
It would be an inconvenience and take too much time if you had to personally ask permission for every single Web image that you wanted to use. Instead, you can simply search for Creative Commons images using the online sources outlined below.
These sources will show you beautiful images that you can use for free in exchange for an attribution link on your website. Best of all, this attribution link is often provided for you by the source; all you have to do is copy and paste it into your website’s HTML.
There are different types of Creative Commons licenses. So you need to pay attention to this when searching for images. Some let you modify, adapt, and build upon the image, while others won’t let you change a thing – you will have to use as-is.
So be sure to look for the appropriate license based on how you’ll be using the image. Without further ado, here are eight of the best online sources for free Creative Commons images.