Stock Photography

[driller41]

I neeed to buy some photographic images for my website - legal only.

Getty and Corbis charge silly amounts - where can I buy some from at a sensible price?

[Syzygy]

Welcome to Webmasterworld...

There are loads of suppliers out there. Off the top of my head:

iStock
Moodboard
Jupiter Images

Many 'traditional' photo libraries nowadays cater for customers who want images as lower res files, typically for use on web sites and in other 'digital' media. Just go through the normal machinations of searching their databases for images and see if they offer rates for smaller file sizes.

Using your favourite search engine the keywords you want to search with are microstock photography.

There are numerous photo libraries offering the bulk supply of royalty-free images on disc at very good prices - Ingram is one that I've used before.

Syzygy

[edited by: Syzygy at 7:55 pm (utc) on Nov. 29, 2007]

[Beagle]

Many 'traditional' photo libraries nowadays cater for customers who want images as lower res files

Getty has just started some new pricing for this (well, at least I just found out about it). For low res and 3-months' use, I believe. The only time I look at theirs is when I want a photo related to a specific news event. I've never actually used one at this point - I just drool. With this new pricing I may actually try it out. For less specific things I stick with more inexpesive sites - even with Getty's new pricing, iStock charges a fraction of what they do.

[Syzygy]

...even with Getty's new pricing, iStock charges a fraction of what they do.

If memory serves me well, Getty bought up iStock some while back. In the stock photography world all roads lead to Getty - eventually. :-)

Syzygy

[Mr Bo Jangles]

I used to steal, but now I istock - cheap and really, really good.

[Mr Bo Jangles]

Yes, correct, Getty bought istock a while ago.

[Beagle]

Ah - That explains why, whenever I search for something on iStock lately, there's a note at the bottom "inviting" me to also search at Getty if I haven't found what I wanted.

[driller41]

Hi, thanks, so I can assume if I buy an image from IStock it is fully legal as they are owned by Getty?

I have been reading some of the problem other users had with unlicensed images and want to avoid similiar problems.

cheers

[DamonHD]

There are other free sources of Web-quality (not necessarily print-quality) material with permissive Ts&Cs and zero cost. I know, since I've been running once for over a decade, but clearly I must not give its URL here. There are others like mine.

Rgds

Damon

[Syzygy]

...so I can assume if I buy an image from IStock it is fully legal as they are owned by Getty?

Yes, indeed.

Syzygy

[Beagle]

There are other free sources of Web-quality (not necessarily print-quality) material with permissive Ts&Cs and zero cost.

There's one I've been using for close to a decade. The site doesn't offer information about model releases so I avoid using any photos that might require one, except for my own personal use. But their nature and artistic material show up on my sites regularly (with a credit line and a link).

[edited by: Beagle at 7:33 pm (utc) on Dec. 6, 2007]