So how do you find good images without breaking the bank? The answer is THE CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSE.

What is that, you ask? Here is a good definition I found regarding academic papers on the University of Bradford website. The principle is the same for photos:

"The full CC-BY license, as used by many OA and hybrid journal, allows maximum re-use rights to a published paper and removes any ambiguity regarding re-use rights. The license also protects the moral rights of the author(s). This license permits others to distribute, remix, alter and build upon a paper as long as the original authors are credited. The copyright in any third-party materials in such papers must also be respected. All these actions may be taken without approaching the authors or journal publisher for permission even if it is for commercial purposes."

In layman's terms, it basically means that any work that is licensed under a creative commons license may be used without talking directly with the author/creator so long as they abide by certain rules.

It is easy to identify creative commons licenses. When you look at a photo, it will typically either say "all rights reserved", "some rights reserved", or "no known copyright restrictions".

Let's go through each and find out what they mean.

All Rights Reserved

This one is pretty self explanatory. The creator has retained exclusive rights to the photo. You are not allowed to copy, redistribute, or adapt the photo without first obtaining written consent from the photographer.

Often times, the photographer will give you a license to use the photo if you are willing to pay. Many photographers will place photos on stock photo websites to sell photo licenses.

Some Rights Reserved

The creator has retained some rights to their work, but not all.

There are a lot of things that fall under this category. Many amateur photographers will license their photos in this way to get there work out there.

This is great news for people like me who don't want to pay for photos.

However, this is not an all access pass to their work. There are various restrictions that these artists can impose on the use of the photos. Here are the most common ones.

Share: This one is pretty cut and dry. It gives permission to copy and redistribute the photo.

Attribution: You are required to give the photographer credit for his/her work. Sometimes the photographers name is enough. Others will require you to site the name of their work as as well.

Commercial Use: Creators can dictate how their photos will be used. They may or may not allow their photos to be used for commercial use.

Derivatives: The creator may or may not allow you to make alterations to the photo. In many cases, they will ask you to indicate if any changes were made.

No Known Copyright Restrictions

Pretty much exactly what it sounds like. There are no known copyright claims on the photo.

This can come up for various reasons, but the most common two are these:

1. The copyright has expired. This occurs when the photographer has been dead for at least 70 years, or the work was done before 1923.

2. The creator has rights, but does not want to control the image, thus giving complete access to any would be user.

So where can you find images like these?

Read on for a list of places to find creative commons and public domain images.