Image banks (Rudai Thing #3)
It is really remarkable that in the age of the Image we create so much and care so little about how our products are used. Intellectual property on visual products is something we should all care about, either we are creators or mere users.
Throughout my professional and private life I have always tried to act in a fair way to intellectual products - and an image is an intellectual product as it involves the mind and viewpoint of the person who creates it apart from the technical medium used for its birth.
I decided not to use one of my own photos as the cover image for this blog and I chose Flickr to find the appropriate one. I had opened an account some years ago so I skipped this process and after logging in, I searched for pictures on "books". Plenty of results appeared on my screen and I opted to filter them by "modifications allowed"; I was not sure, if I would need to crop the image or resize it to use on my blog. In the end I did nothing of these because the picture fitted nicely as it is. The photo can be found here.
It was interesting to dig through the image bank once more. I usually go to the Creative Commons website directly to look for photos I need to use and I had forgotten that Flickr can provide pics under a license that allows modification and non-commercial use.
There is so much material on Flickr and some really interesting accounts like those of the British Library and the New York Public Library. One can also choose to "Follow" a certain account, if they need to be notified of new images added in a collection.
So, next time you need to find another person's picture for your studies, work, a presentation, a post on social media, etc....remember that this photo is not yours, it should be treated with respect and its creator should be given the appropriate credits.
Throughout my professional and private life I have always tried to act in a fair way to intellectual products - and an image is an intellectual product as it involves the mind and viewpoint of the person who creates it apart from the technical medium used for its birth.
I decided not to use one of my own photos as the cover image for this blog and I chose Flickr to find the appropriate one. I had opened an account some years ago so I skipped this process and after logging in, I searched for pictures on "books". Plenty of results appeared on my screen and I opted to filter them by "modifications allowed"; I was not sure, if I would need to crop the image or resize it to use on my blog. In the end I did nothing of these because the picture fitted nicely as it is. The photo can be found here.
It was interesting to dig through the image bank once more. I usually go to the Creative Commons website directly to look for photos I need to use and I had forgotten that Flickr can provide pics under a license that allows modification and non-commercial use.
There is so much material on Flickr and some really interesting accounts like those of the British Library and the New York Public Library. One can also choose to "Follow" a certain account, if they need to be notified of new images added in a collection.
So, next time you need to find another person's picture for your studies, work, a presentation, a post on social media, etc....remember that this photo is not yours, it should be treated with respect and its creator should be given the appropriate credits.
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