USAFA Library Guides: EAP 109/209: Finding Images

Image Database

Britannica ImageQuest
**On base access only** Provided by the Air Force Portal Online Resources, Britannica ImageQuest includes 3.3 million images from 62 leading collections that aren’t freely available on the Web. All images in Image Quest are rights-cleared for non-commercial, educational use including use in reports and projects or on school Web sites and flyers.

Note that many other databases include images on the topics they cover, particularly encyclopedias and other background sources.

Public Domain Image Collections

Images in the public domain do not have a copyright; this includes older works with expired copyrights. Images in the public domain may also be used for free.

Pixabay
Pixabay provides images that are licensed under CC0 - Public Domain so they are free to be copied, modified, and used in any situation.
Getty Open Content Program
The Getty makes available, without charge, all available digital images to which the Getty holds the rights or that are in the public domain to be used for any purpose. No permission is required.
New York Public Library Digital Gallery
Explore over 900,000 items digitized from The New York Public Library's collections.
Internet Archive Book Images on Flickr
Millions of images in the Public Domain from books digitized in the Internet Archive.

Creative Commons Licensed Images

Chances are, you've seen a Creative Commons license. These licenses enable copyright holders to provide preemptive permission for certain uses. Instead of "All Rights Reserved," Creative Commons licenses enable creators to share work with only "Some Rights Reserved." Educational uses such as reports and presentations will be allowed, though you will need to credit the image creator and follow any other restrictions in the license.

Flickr Creative Commons Group
Flickr is a popular online photo management and sharing application. Use the advanced search function to limit results to reusable images with Creative Commons licenses.
Wikimedia Commons
Wikimedia Commons is a media file repository making available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content to everyone.

Attributing CC Licensed Content

Here is a photo licensed under a Creative Commons license:

And this is an ideal attribution: "Creative Commons 10th Birthday Celebration San Francisco” by tvol is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Because it includes:

Title: “Creative Commons 10th Birthday Celebration San Francisco”
Author: “tvol” – linked to his profile page
Source: “Creative Commons 10th Birthday Celebration San Francisco” – linked to original Flickr page
License: “CC BY 2.0” – linked to license deed

How you attribute authors of the CC works will depend on whether you modify the content, if you create a derivative, if there are multiple sources, etc. Find out more about attribution on the CC Wiki.

The content of this box is a derivative of "How to give attribution" by creative commons, used under a CC BY 4.0 license