How the use of images can make reading easier and content more engaging

Images connect with your audience

The use of imagery in design can make the world of difference and is powerful in all contexts. In the age of information overload, we’ll do anything to filter information out. Imagine designs without any imagery at all just blocks of endless text — goodbye audience. With almost 50% of our brain involved in visual processing, it’s no wonder visuals are important when consuming information.

2025 update

The Google algorithm leak has shown us that unique content will be promoted by Google (more likely to appear in search results) and stock imagery with be demoted (less likely to appear in search results). There are a lot of factors that would affect this, including the competitiveness of the keywords used—you may be able to get away with it for low competitive search terms. If you can get into the habit of creating your own unique graphics, using a photographer to create your own branded library of stock photos, or use a tool like Canva with a set of branded graphic templates that you can use Canva’s stock (they have access to a bunch of different paid libraries) to create a ‘branded’ stock photo of your own that should help boost your use of stock beyond the norm for an easy hybrid option.

Use copyright-free images or get permission for use

There is a common misconception that images available on the net are automatically free to use. What’s important to remember here is that the majority of these images are copyright protected, so can’t legally take these images and include them in your work. Copyright can seem complicated to get around, but it’s not. The main thing to bear in mind is that copyright applies to all images, as it’s automatically granted to the creator of any work. From the time it is generated, a photo or other image is automatically protected by copyright. You then need the correct license to use copyrighted images and, failing that, permission from the artist/photographer themselves to ensure the images are used correctly.

Are Google images copyright-free?

Google images are not free. This is a common misconception. Just because an image is on the internet doesn’t mean the image is free to use. As mentioned above, copyright automatically applies to all images for the moment of their creation. You still need the correct license to use a Google image, either for a personal blog or for commercial use. Although there are sources of free, legal images, they still have copyright applied to them, so the creator of the image must expressly declare the image free to use.

It can sometimes be more trouble than it’s worth to track down the source photographer of an image you’ve found on Google. You do need permission for any image you want to use from Google or any other source on the internet, so it’s best to avoid getting your business in trouble over a very avoidable offence. Play it safe and take the opportunity to enhance your brand by using your own photographer (I recommend Snappr for a fast and affordable option and a global network of photographers) or by using a free or paid photo library, where you are covered for use under a license.

Everyone should worry about copyright infringement

I’m always pulling out the violins on this one. As a creator myself, I get it! Why should someone benefit from my hard work without my permisison? It’s important to know that creators are protective of their works and infringement may result in fines, lawsuits and costly legal fees.

Remember it does not matter:

• If you credit the photographer
• If you link back to the source
• If you only use part of the image
• If you have a specific disclaimer
• If you made no money from its use

You are still violating copyright, so using these tactics does not release you from liability. You could be sued. It’s a serious matter, as you need specific permission from the copyright holder.

This can be confusing when you come across an image on Google Images, but these days you’ll notice a declaration to remind you to check: “Images may be subject to copyright”. Google Images sources images from all over the internet and catalogues them for easy searchability. Images have digital rights managed (a sort of ‘fingerprint’) and their use is easily detectable. New software enables identification of unlicensed imagery and acts to protect copyright owners. So imagery can be tracked and found, even if it has been modified or even recreated. The image is then flagged up to the copyright owner so that they can verify if the correct license is held.

What are the alternatives to Google images?

Your best bet to ensure copyright compliance is to use a photographer or take your own photos. Everyone has a digital camera or a smartphone with a camera. You can create perfectly branded and styled photos this way. And hiring a photographer isn’t as expensive as you might think. This can be a valuable investment for your business that pays off again and again as you maximise the use of your images across a range of marketing collateral from your website to your social media accounts.

If you don’t have time to take your own photos or can’t afford a photographer, stock image libraries are going to be your best bet. Stock photos are particularly useful in support of blog content and social media updates, where you aren’t able to allocate time or budget to these quick and regular marketing activities.

Image stock libraries

The problem is that not everyone has the time to take photos! That’s when media agencies buy expensive subscriptions to stock banks; this allows agencies to search among millions of images, and use them for any purpose and client, anytime.

To avoid all the stress and potential financial loss of using unlicensed images, Wikipedia Commons is a great place to start (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Commons), an online repository of free use images, sounds, and other media files. You can use images that are Creative Commons licensed or simply public domain. Just check the usage guidelines for each image to check if and how you should be crediting the image owner.

Creative Commons (CC) licensed images (http://creativecommons.org/about) are still protected under the country’s intellectual property laws. There is indeed an owner who has copyright, but has allowed his/her work to be used by anyone for personal, educational or non-profit non-commercial purposes. There are different types of CC licenses, and depending on the authorisation granted, images can be copied, distributed, or altered, provided that the owner of the work is acknowledged. Note that this attribution is not needed for images in the public domain.

Public domain images are works not protected under intellectual property laws. They are images whose copyrights have expired or their creators can no longer claim exclusive rights over them; the public now owns the work. Anyone can then display, copy, manipulate or distribute them. Next time you Google search images, consider using the search tool button to filter images by license labelled for: reuse, reuse with modification, non-commercial reuse with modification or non-commercial reuse.

Where to find great images without infringing on copyright

It’s actually really easy to search for and find stock images, and to get an image that connects with your brand. Using stock images is also way faster than sorting through the many inappropriate images that may come up in a Google Image search, especially knowing that once you’re found an image there you still need to confirm copyright compliance. There are loads of great stock photography websites on the internet these days. We’ve collated a massive list of stock photo sites to get you started.

How much do images cost?

The cost of images also needs to be considered. It’s all very well sourcing and purchasing a stunning image for $20 (for example) but if you’re working on a large project that requires a collection of images to be sourced, you could be looking at a much bigger bill. This takes money out of your budget that could be better spent on developing your brand or marketing elsewhere. For cash-strapped start-ups in particular, this kind of money is just not there.

10 FREE image resources on the internet

1. Unsplash

Unsplash is our ultimate favourite free online image resource. Specialising in landscape, lifestyle and portrait photography, the photographs are simply breathtaking and are all released under the Creative Commons public domain license. The minimalist style of the site allows easy navigation and there is an option to tailor your search for more specific results. There is also the option to browse collections people have put together and by subscribing to the mailing list you will be sent 10 free high-resolution photos every 10 days!

Score: 8/8 | Stunning, considerate images beautifully presented throughout the site that don’t require attribution — what more could you possibly wish for?!

Search facility: Yes Membership required: No License: Creative Commons Zero Attribution Required: No High Resolution: Yes

2. StockSnap.io

With a huge collection of stunning free high-resolution images available and hundreds more added weekly, Stocksnap.io is a must for your image resource kit. In addition to the search feature that enables quick and easy navigation, every photograph is displayed with the number of views, ‘likes’ and downloads, which is a great addition when wanting to see the most popular images. All photographs are released under the Creative Commons public domain license, and you don’t need to credit the author when using images. StockSnap also gives users access to their graphic editor, Snappa, which is similar to Canva. It’s free for a small number of downloads and integrates with StockSnap so that the entire StockSnap image library is available for use in Snappa.

Score: 7/8 | Although not quite on the same level as Unsplash, photographs have clarity and finesse and the site is a great online resource for finding some awesome imagery.

Search facility: Yes Membership required: No License: Creative Commons Zero Attribution Required: No High Resolution: Yes

3. Pixabay

Pixabay is a great easy-to-navigate site that is home to over 600,000 free stock photographs — all of which may be downloaded, modified and distributed. The uniqueness of Pixabay comes from the huge variety of creative media that is readily available in the form of vectors, art illustrations and videos. We love the searchable features that the site has to offer. Not only is the user able to browse images using the search feature, but the Explore option offers a large collection of stunning images and videos that have been hand-picked by the Pixabay team. Another lovely addition to the site is the information panel that appears next to a photograph when selected that outlines what camera was used to take the photograph, the image type (e.g.: JPEG), the image resolution, when it was created, uploaded and how many views/downloads have been made. One point to watch out for is that not all of the images on this site are up to scratch. Amongst the many beautiful, professional gems you can find, there are also many images that are more generic and of stock-photo quality so be sure to take the time to select the best images for your work.

Score: 7/8. A clean, easy to use site with some stunning imagery too, Pixabay is a must visit for some excellent additions to accompany your content.

Search facility: Yes Membership required: No License: Creative Commons CC0 Attribution Required: No High Resolution: Yes

4. Snapwire Snaps

Snapwire Snaps hosts a beautiful collection of images from 200,000 of the world’s most talented photographers. It is possible to copy, modify and distribute the images, even for commercial purposes without needing permission. By signing up to the mailing list, subscribers receive 7 photographs every 7 days. You can also browse the collections from the home page or by making use of the search bar on the http://snapwiresnaps.tumblr.com/ site.

When using the site it’s easy to be switched to the section of the site where you have to pay for images when the user clicks on More photos. Snapwi.re gives users the option to request an image they’d like and for photographers to submit their images in line with the creative brief. These photographs would incur a fee, but it may be worth considering if you need a very specific image — just ensure you know which site you’re browsing before you download any images.

Score: 7/8 | Some really stunning photographs that would enhance your content considerably, just be sure to know which site you’re browsing to get the freebies.

Search facility: Yes Membership required: No License: Creative Commons Zero Attribution Required: No High Resolution: Yes

5. 500px

Images that are available on 500px are of higher quality than sites such as MorgueFile for example, and there is a much larger collection too. Images can be either downloaded or code can be copied and then embedded in your blog post. Note that you do have to pay to use some images on 500px, but there’s a huge selection of free to use images as long as you attribute the photographer (the embed code adds attribution for you automatically). Just ensure you are searching Creative Commons licensed images to narrow down the freebies. Similar to Pixabay, 500px has some great search options. Users are able to browse images with the search feature at the top or alternatively browse the Editors, Upcoming or Fresh selection options for some inspiring collections.

Score: 7/8 | A minimalist site with a fresh design and some beautiful high quality images, just make sure you check the licences before you download any images.

Search facility: Yes Membership required: No License: Creative Commons Attribution Required: Yes High Resolution: Yes

6. Death to Stock

A lifestyle image resource, Death to Stock is a great site to visit when needing inspiration and wanting to find unique photographs that’ll help your brand stand out from the crowd. By signing up to the mailing list, you can receive 10 free photos by email every month. With many different artists posting their design blogs and photographs on the site, the collection of images available is really diverse — ensuring there is something for everyone. Death to Stock uses their own license so it’s important to double-check the terms before use.

Score: 6/8 | There’s no search facility as users have to subscribe and the image collection is small unless you have been signed up for a while. With beautiful images, however, it may be worth splashing out to get access to the bigger collection and search capability for $180/year.

Search facility: No Membership required: Yes License: DDTSP Photograph End User License Attribution Required: No High Resolution: Yes

7. Foter

If you want variety, look no further! With over 220 million high-resolution free images available (primarily from Flickr), there really is something to fulfil every search possible. The simple design of the site and search feature enables easy-navigation that is enhanced by the clean grid structure of images. The site offers a lightbox feature that is a great addition and similar to paid sites such as Shutterstock, enabling favourite images to be stored in a designated themed folder. Similar to 500px, there is the option to copy code to embed the images in your blog post and a Wordpress plugin is available (the embed code adds attribution for you automatically).

Score: 6/8 | A great site with some stunning photographs but many images can’t be used for commercial use and attribution must be given on all imagery. Be sure to filter your search options and check the licence before downloading.

Search facility: Yes Membership required: No License: Creative Commons Attribution Required: Yes High Resolution: Yes

8. Picjumbo

Picjumbo offers some really lovely photographs of high quality and finesse. Created in 2013 by 22-year-old photographer and online entrepreneur Viktor Hanacek, the site has 1000s of images readily available. Similar to Unsplash, Picjumbo showcases images in large, single-column format. This allows the user to appreciate the quality of the imagery, however it can make browsing the site a little slow. There is also a lot of advertisement encouraging the user to enrol in Premium Membership that is a little distracting. In general, the website is quite busy so it would benefit from being stripped back a little with more prominence given to the photographs themselves. The quality of the images however should not be ignored and there are some great gems on the site that would be a great addition to written content.

Score: 6/8 | Some lovely photographs but the site is a little busy in comparison to others and image collection not as large and varied as some other sites. Premium Membership of $7.50/month may be worth considering for a larger collection of photographs that aren’t available on the free site.

Search facility: Yes Membership required: Not essential but Premium Membership offers more License: All photographs are taken by the founder Viktor Hanacek so there are no copyright problems Attribution Required: No, but appreciated High Resolution: Yes

9. Morgue File

MorgueFile — put together ‘by creatives for creatives’ and in collaboration with iStock by Getty Images — is a great site that contains free high-resolution stock photographs for both corporate and public use. What’s with the name? ‘MorgueFile’ is an old print term used to describe the file containing archived post-production assets. Taking inspiration from this concept, MorgueFile.com is presented as the morgueFile of the internet. With a diverse collection of over 350,000 photographs and options to filter and tailor your search results, it’s a great online resource. The main caveat to note here is that these images are intended to be used by creatives and adapted within larger projects. No attribution is required when they are used in this way; however if used in isolation to accompany a blog post, for example, permission and attribution is required. Another good thing about MorgueFile’s search facility is that you can simultaneously get search results from a few of the major paid image libraries, so if you can’t find what you’re looking for free you do have some other options.

Score: 6/8 | Not all of the images on MorgueFile are stunning to look at. Many are very basic, but it remains a good resource and there are some gems in there too.

Search facility: Yes Membership required: No License: morgueFile license Attribution Required: Yes when images are used in an editorial (blog context); if designers or illustrators alter the image it can be used without attribution High Resolution: Yes

10. DesignersPics

DesignersPics offers free high-resolution photographs for both personal and commercial use with no attribution required. The site is a little basic in its design approach but with a search feature, it allows easy-navigation throughout the site. Many photographs on the site would be categorised as amateur photography and despite being high-resolution, don’t meet the clarity and finesse of the images that are available on the other sites mentioned above. The collection is quite small but there are some lovely images in there. With no attribution needed and a free reign to use the images, the site is still worth a look.

Score: 5/8 | Both the search facility and site structure is a bit clunky and the collection is quite small. With no membership or attribution required, it’s still worth a look.

Search facility: Yes Membership required: No Attribution Required: No, but appreciated High Resolution: Yes

In case you’re worried we missed a gem, here’s the giant list of the sites we researched:

• 123rf.com (http://www.123rf.com)
• Albumarium (http://albumarium.com)
• BigFoto (http://www.bigfoto.com)
• Camarama.de (http://www.camarama.de)
• Compfight (http://crowthestone.com)
• CreativeCommons.Photos (https://freeimages.red)
• Dreamstime (http://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos)
• Every Stock Photo (http://www.everystockphoto.com)
• FindA.Photo (https://www.chamberofcommerce.org/findaphoto)
• Foter (http://foter.com)
• Free Images (http://www.freeimages.com)
• Free Media Goo (http://www.freemediagoo.com)
• Free Nature Stock (http://freenaturestock.com)
• Free Range Stock (https://freerangestock.com)
• Freestocks.org (http://freestocks.org)
• Free Stock Image Point (http://www.stock-image-point.com)
• FreeDigitalPhotos.net (http://www.freedigitalphotos.net)
• FreeImages.Pictures (http://freeimages.pictures)
• GetRefe (http://getrefe.tumblr.com)
• Good Free Photos (http://www.goodfreephotos.com)
• Gratisography (http://www.gratisography.com)
• IM Free (http://www.imcreator.com/free)
• Image Finder (http://imagefinder.co)
• ISO Republic (http://isorepublic.com)
• Jay Mantri (http://jaymantri.com)
• Jeshoots (http://jeshoots.com)
• Kaboompics.com (http://kaboompics.com)
• Life of Pix (http://www.lifeofpix.com)
• Little Visuals (http://littlevisuals.co)
• Lock & Stcok Photography (http://lockandstockphotos.com)
• Magdeleine (http://magdeleine.co)
• MMT.li (http://mmtstock.com)
• Moveast (http://moveast.me)
• Negative space(http://negativespace.co)
• New Old Stock (http://nos.twnsnd.co)
• Pexels (https://www.pexels.com)
• Photo Everywhere (http://photoeverywhere.co.uk)
• Photo Pin (http://photopin.com)
• Photober (http://www.photober.com)
• Pickupimage (http://pickupimage.com)
• Picography (http://picography.co)
• Pixel Perfect Digital (http://pixelperfectdigital.com)
• Pond5 (http://www.pond5.com)
• Public Domain Archive (http://publicdomainarchive.com)
• Raumrot (http://www.raumrot.com/10/)
• RGBStock (http://www.rgbstock.com)
• Skitter Photo (http://skitterphoto.com)
• Smithsonian on Flickr (https://www.flickr.com/photos/smithsonian)
• Snapographic (http://snapographic.com)
• Splashbase (http://www.splashbase.co)
• SplitShire (http://www.splitshire.com)
• Startup Stock Photos (http://startupstockphotos.com)
• StockPholio (http://www.stockpholio.net)
• StockPhotos.io (https://stockphotos.io)
• Stokpic (http://stokpic.com)
• Superfamous (http://superfamous.com)
• Tookapic Stock (https://stock.tookapic.com/?filter=free)
• Travel Coffee Book (http://travelcoffeebook.com)
• Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page)
• Wylio (https://www.wylio.com/)

Sourcing images for online marketing

While it may seem there are many issues to consider when finding the perfect image, it’s important to take the time to continuously source high-quality, dynamic images — they bring written content to life and make a lasting impression on your audience. Imagery adds an increased element of interest and dimension to designs by reiterating the message portrayed in the text. By breaking up the text, images also help to create content that is far easier to digest. Engaging content brings a more responsive audience, allowing you to really connect with and convert leads.