Sourcing images for your web site

The year was 1993 and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) released a new web browser called Mosaic. This wasn’t exactly front-page news to many, but in certain geeky circles it was a watershed moment.

The breakthrough of Mosaic was its ability to display images embedded on pages (rather than in a separate window) - paving the way for the web to metamorphasise from a black-and-white, Times New Roman world into the colourful, visually-rich medium it is today.

Fast-forward 15 years—through the rise of e-commerce, dot-com boom and bust, the blogoshpere, web 2.0 and the social-web—and good imagery is one of the most important aspects of success on the web.

If you are on the web to do business high-quality, relevant photography goes a long way to promote your products or services to potential customers. Along with killer content it can persuade and influence, turning visitors into buyers.

However, one of the trickiest (and often most time consuming) decisions marketers have to make when producing a new publication, whether it be print or web based, is the sourcing and selecting of photographic material. Of course, this becomes even more problematic when it’s a specific ‘niche’ that you’re promoting.

Not that winter tourism can be described as ‘niche’, but the particular image your business is looking to portray within this industry may be just that.

Finding appropriate shots is the first and, in most cases, the hardest step. There’s just so many considerations; quality, file size, colour scheme, cost, legalities of use, the list goes on.

Many of our readers will have come across at least one of these problems before. So we’ve decided it time the Tactical Thinking team bring you a series on how to source, select and utilise photographic images. To kick it off, this first post discusses the different methods of sourcing photographs and the pros and cons of each.

Use your own… who doesn’t own a camera these days?

The cheapest source of photographic imagery is probably sitting in your computer’s hard drive right now. Nowadays most people own a digital camera and some even own a digital SLR (single lens reflex). If you enjoy photography and have an eye for what looks good, this is certainly the cheapest, most realistic option available. All you need is a decent editing programme, like Adobe Photoshop, some time to learn how to use it, and you’re away.

That said there’s a big difference between your Sony Cybershot and a professional SLR camera - and the person behind the lens. If you’re in need of small ‘filler’ images for your site then your Sony Cybershot may well do the job. However, if you’re looking for larger images suitable for web page furniture like banners or, even more importantly, for printed publications, high-resolution images are essential – this is where your Cybershot just ain’t gonna cut it.

So where can you find high-res, good quality photographic images?

Well, there’s actually quite a few options here but we’ve boiled it down to four different sourcing categories for the sake of simplicity.

1. Public domain images

Described as ‘freely available’ and ‘copyright-free works’, public domain images are available at no cost. However, it is your responsibility to ensure the image you’re using is actually free-to-use. Complications here include photos of people (often requiring a model release) and of recognizable building structures.

2. Royalty free (or stock photography)

This is defined as ‘free of royalties’ and essentially means you can pay a single fee to use an image repeatedly. The amount of times a buyer can use the image is usually defined in the agreement of sale. Royalty free also means that no one can own exclusive rights to the image and the photographer can sell the image as many times as they want. As a buyer you cannot resell the image on, no matter of circumstances.

3. Rights managed (or licensed images)

As the next step up from ‘Royalty free’ this is simply just a logical increase in availability and exclusivity. Here the buyer usually pays each time the image is used in a different format or medium, but has complete exclusivity to the image for an agreed time frame. If you’re finding it hard to distinguish between Royalty free and Rights managed read more here.

4. Commission a shoot

Predominantly used by larger companies with more market spread and deeper budgets, commissioning a professional photographer for a specific shoot is certainly the most exclusive method. Most photographers charge for their time and per image that you purchase. However many provide a full-package price allowing the buyer to own all images taken during the shoot.

Right, with those definitions out of the way, let’s take a look at the pros and cons of each…

Option/Source	Pros	Cons
Public domain	No cost involved Can use an image repeatedly	Images are widely used and not unique Can be hard to find the legalities of an image Often very ‘cliched’ images and can be low in quality
Royalty free (and stock photography)	Relatively low cost Huge choice Competitive market - helpful for buyers	Prices vary, but there’s still a cost invovled Images can be used in multiple places by multiple companies Sometimes there are restrictions on how an image can be used, e.g. changing the composition
Rights managed (and rights reserved)	Professional quality images Exclusive rights to use an image repeatedly More flexibility for licensing	Higher cost Limited time frame for usage
Commission a shoot	Absolutely unique images You own the images for ever Use of a relevant landscape or person(s) Tailor to your business and/or niche market	Expensive Potentially very time consuming More commitment required from working with an external supplier

Hopefully, that’s given you enough information to roll with for time being - and will lead to some good image sourcing decisions. There’s more information to come; the next post in the series will reveal Tactical Thinking’s top 5 photographic web resources (places you can find and download images).

In the meantime, please share your thoughts and experiences on image sourcing and licensing here, so others can from learn them too.

This entry was posted by Posted by Keith on Sunday, February 24th, 2008 at 8:50 pm, and is filed under Photography, Working with images. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.