Shutterstock’s Top Tips For Using Stock Images Online
Shutterstock is a royalty free stock photography website that let you subscribe for one month, three months, six months or one year, and download up to 25 images per day. There are no hidden or additional fees after you become a subscriber. They’ve kindly written this guest post to give our readers some handy tips on using stock photography.
You can find out more information at http://www.shutterstock.com
When it comes to using photos on websites, we all know about copyright issues – or do we? If you’re not sure of the pitfalls, check out these pointers from Shutterstock, an innovative global e-commerce company and a leading provider of stock photos, illustrations, and footage.
1. Get Permission
The most common mistake people make is using images they find online without obtaining proper permission. This can land you in serious trouble. The legal option is to buy from a royalty-free image library.
2. Model Release Forms
If you plan to use images of people on a commercial site, you need a model release form – even if you have taken the photos yourself!. Photos containing people sourced from Shutterstock already have the necessary model releases in place, so you can use the images without worry that a model might make a claim.
3. Check the Terms
Check the image agency’s Terms of Usage and the different types of licences. For example, most royalty-free stock images cannot be used in conjunction with unlawful or immoral content.
4. What Type of Licence?
Most stock agencies offer two or more licences differentiated by the scope of permitted uses. This means that if you intend to use a stock image to sell or promote a product with high distribution (such as a CD cover that would be reproduced in excess of 250,000 copies), you first need a licence that allows for this higher volume. This is to ensure that the photographer or artist who created the image is properly compensated.
5. Editorial Use Only
Another common mistake is confusion between ‘editorial’ and ‘commercial’ images. Images labeled ‘Editorial Use Only’ cannot be used for commercial purposes – i.e. the image can only be used to illustrate a news-related story. It cannot be used to sell or promote a product, service or idea, which rules out most websites.
6. Logos and Trademarks
Royalty-free images cannot be used as part of a ‘branding’ campaign: they cannot be incorporated into logos or trademarks.
More Information
With images playing such an important role in web design, it’s well worth looking atShutterstock’s 25-A-Day subscription which lets you choose from millions of photographs, illustrations and vectors for a flat rate. You might never worry about images again.
All images in this blog post have been sourced from Shutterstock’s library of images.
You can find out more information at http://www.shutterstock.com