The question I’ve heard most about blogging is, “Where do you get your pictures?” Pictures can help make or break a blog. Good pictures can help pull a reader in to your post and make a simple blog look professional. Today I will discuss a few places to find pictures for your blog.
Purchase Photos at Stock Photography Sites
When I began this blog, I really wanted to find a picture I could use to visually express the leap of faith I was taking. I began with a google search. The first photo I fell in love with was on another blog. There was no photo credit. It appeared to be a professional photo and since there was no photo credit, I assumed that maybe it came from a stock photography site. I searched high and low and never found that picture. I didn’t know about TinEye at the time, if I had, I would have started there. TinEye is a great website that allows you to enter the location of a picture and it will search the internet for the picture. If it’s stock photography available for purchase, it will find it. TinEye also offers browser plug-ins which can begin a search from a right-click on a photo. I ended up purchasing the above picture from Photos.com. Purchasing stock photography is a good place to start when you want an iconic image to represent your site or for pictures that you plan on using over and over. Keep in mind that you don’t need a high resolution image when purchasing photos for your website. 72 dpi will work great and costs the least. Other stock photography sites include iStockphoto and Veer.
Use Photos from Free Stock Photography Sites
Many of the images on this blog come from Morgue File. Morgue File is a free stock photography site. Their images can be used for personal or commercial use, without attribution. Free stock photography sites can be hit or miss. Some images are nearly impossible to find. You also have to use a variety of searches to find what you are looking for. But the images are free and many of them are very good. This is a good choice for finding photos of widely photographed subjects (like holiday photos or famous landmarks). When using these sites, be sure to check out their licensing information. Some other Free Stock Photography Sites are Photos8 and Stock.XCHNG.
Your Own Photos
One of the best ways to develop your blog is to use high quality original images. Many of the blogs I enjoy most do this. This is why learning to use my camera’s manual features is one of my resolutions for this year. There are a lot of free resources for learning photography available on the web. My Photography pin board on Pinterest has links to several. Check out blogs like Making it Lovely, The Pioneer Woman and Heart of Light for inspiration.
This is a subject that I am always studying up on. The photos on a blog can be a big determining factor in how much I enjoy a blog. Photos can bring warmth and excitement to a blog that words alone can’t. How do you use photos on your blog?
