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Amy McCray

SGF, Supreme Grumble Framer
Joined
Dec 3, 2002
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North Prairie, WI
I have been visiting web sites for photos and find some to be very confusing. They say they are "free" with no royalty or subscription fees, yet charge to download pics. How are they free if they charge for them? Is this typical?

When is free really free? BTW, I think it's perfectly acceptable to charge for them since they are the results of talented photographers.

Any suggestions for good photo sites?

Thanks!
 
My two favorite stock photo sites are Morguefile.com and SXC.hu (yup, literally type just that).

The photos are free, do not require a subscription, and most, like my own photos, only politely request an e-mail as to what the photo is used for. I've had over 160,200 downloads of my photos from just those two sites, and maybe only a couple hundred e-mails. Some of the e-mails are facinating! I'm Penywise on both sites.
 
www.istockphoto.com appears to apply a higher level of scrutiny to the photos submitted than other sites.
www.dreamstime.com good photos and I cannot tell the difference in quality from istockphoto

The fine print of the freebies usually says "not for commercial use". Images from the sites above can be used commercially within parameters for the cost of the download. Both are very reasonable priced. Both have 'free image of the week or free image of the day" and carry the same "not for commercial use unless purchased" disclaimer

I've used both to purchase high resolution and webresolution photos for my commercial use.
 
Amy McCray said:
They say they are "free" with no royalty or subscription fees, yet charge to download pics. How are they free if they charge for them?
Click to expand...

A royalty is a per-use fee every time something is used.

A subscription is a fee based on time.

There are companies such as IStock that charge to download and then have no further royalty or subscription fees (IStock does limit the print use to I think half a million copies, after which you must pay a royalty).
 
We use this site :

http://www.bigstockphoto.com/


We use them for chromakey backgrounds, templates for sports team photography, and in graphic design/advertisments for our clients.
 
Thanks everyone! I had looked at istock and that was one that said they're free but charged to download - huh?. I was just having yet another senior moment.
 
Also, pay attention to the usage restrictions. Some require extra payment or restrictions depending on usage. A common restriction is that you cannot primarily be re-selling the image alone (say, as a framed item), rather than using it as a background in an ad or such.

Joseph
 
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