How to find creative commons images
All images included in MyFrenchLife™ articles are to be either the author’s own or Creative Commons.
In short, Creative Commons is a type of licence that enables content to be reused and shared – so long as appropriate attribution is given.
Although Copyright licensing means content belongs to someone and cannot be reused without permission, Creative Commons licensing allows free distribution of someone’s work. There are different levels of licensing, but so long as we provide appropriate accreditation for images, we’ll be fine!
The easiest places to find creative commons images are Flickr, Wikipedia or Google.
On Flickr, use the ‘Advanced Search’ function. Scroll to the bottom of the page, and tick the box that says ‘Only search within Creative Commons-licensed content’.
On Google type-in the search term you’re looking for and ENTER, then select ‘images’ (under the search term). Next select ‘settings’ (towards the right). Then, select ‘Advanced Search’ from the dropdown. Then, down the very bottom of this page, you will see a field entitled ‘usage rights’. From this dropdown box select ‘Creative Commons license’.
All images from Wikipedia are also creative commons.
And, we often use images from Yelp for articles places to eat and drink, so long as we credit the photographer by name/username.
Lastly, a number of websites offer nice stock images that are free, and creative commons. For these websites, we don’t have to provide a credit. We generally use these websites for creating the graphics on our website. We don’t like tacky stock imagery, but we are happy to use good quality images from sites like Unsplash, Gratisography, Little Visuals, or New Old Stock.
