Fantastic Photos: Use Pictures to Enhance Your Blog Part I
People like images, white space, and easy-to-read fonts when they are reading blogs and websites. A full page of small, cursive-type text with one or two paragraph breaks and no photos may not be read even if it contains the secret to becoming a millionaire. A question I often hear bloggers and writers ask is, "Where do you find photos that are not copyrighted?"
The source I use the most often on my blog and when I write for Demand Studios and Bright Hub is Flickr. It is super easy to get a free account on Flickr and to find photos on any topic. People upload their photos into different levels of copyright protection. I mostly use Creative Commons at the lowest level. This means that I can download other people's photos, give them credit on my blog (by putting their user name and https://www.flickr.com/), and use their photo for free. Currently, there are over 15 million photos in this lowest, easiest to use level of Flickr Creative Commons photos.
You can also find over 5 million photos in the next level of Creative Commons. This is where you must give the photographer credit for the photo, and you can not change the image in anyway through Photoshop or some other means. So, as of now (and the number is always increasing), there are over 20 million photos at your disposal for free to use on your blog or website.
When I want a photo, I just do a search in the Creative Commons photos with keywords. For example, on my post about how I was going to change the format of my blog, "Read These Books and Use Them," I wanted a picture about change. So, I typed in change as my keyword. Believe it or not, I got this great photo that depicted exactly what I wanted to depict.
Besides Flickr, you can also use Photobucket, which was recommended to me by Annette Fix, author of The Break-Up Diet. I haven't used this photoshare site personally, but Annette uses it for her blogs!
Stay tuned for some more tips on putting photos on your blogs and websites when I post again for The Muffin with part two of "Fantastic Photos."
Until then,
Margo Dill
Labels: blog photos, blog promotion, creative commons, Flickr, Margo Dill
