We all like to use attractive photos and images relevant to the subject of articles (hubs) that we write. But, we are not experts in capturing beautiful photographs or creating attractive artworks. How do we find and use free images for your hub page articles in a legal way? You can do a image search on Yahoo Images or Google Images, but, often these photos would be copyrighted and you cannot use the images for free (legally speaking). In this hub, I will show you how to find best images and photographs and use it in your hubpages for free. Flickr is the best online photo sharing website where you can find images and photographs on every subject in the universe.

When you use a photo in HubPages - for legal purposes, it is considered as "Commercial" as you are making money from your advertisements shown on HubPages. So, follow this simple step-by-step tutorial. Check out the screenshots for guidance.

Photo Credit: visualpanic [photo]

Go to Flickr's search page (follow this link) and type a keyword on the search box and hit ‘Enter' key.

Now, you should see a link to ‘Advanced Search' beside the search box.

Click on it to go to the Advanced Search page's preferences.

Scroll down to the bottom of the page. You should see a section called "Creative Commons".

Check (put a tick) the box that says - "Only search within Creative Commons-licensed content "

Also check the box that says - "Find content to use commercially "

Now, hit the "Search" button.

All the photographs that you see can be used for your hubs. All you must need to dos is to provide a link back to the photographer.

Most important thing, if you hit the "Most Interesting" - Voila, you should see all the best, stunning photos that you can use.

Replace the keyword with something else and hit search - you will still come up with fresh set of photos that can be used for free.

If you want to use the photograph and create something by cropping, adding some effects, you should check the "Find content to modify, adapt, or build upon ".

If you are feeling bit geeky and do not want to go for all the ticks and boxes, you could modify the following URL and replace the keyword "cooking" with your own keyword and copy & paste this URL back to the browser's address bar. It will work and return legal, free creative commons licensed photos for you in a "Thumbnails" page.

For example,

http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=cooking&s=int&l=comm&ss=0&ct=0&z=t - for the keyword "cooking"

http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=money&s=int&l=comm&ss=0&ct=0&z=t - to find money related photos, use "money" as the keyword.

How can I credit the photographer?

You can include a link back by clicking on the photo that you would like to use and find the photographer's profile page. It will be something like http://flickr.com/photos/username - the username is the photographer's nick name. So, you can include by adding an empty Text capsule just under the Image capsule and type in a simple line such as Photo Credit: John

It is a good practice to provide a linkback to the photo page as well. When you click on a photo on the search page, you will go to the photo page. The URLis that you see in the address bar of your browser is photo's URL page.

For example, for the Cookie photo I have used in this hub, I would include Photo Credit: visualpanic [photo]

You can choose the content type as "Artwork/Illustration" and Flickr will return scanned drawings or illustrations. You need to follow the same procedure to credit the artist/creator.

Should you always save the image/photo to your computer?

Yes. Because, you should not directly use the image URL for your website. It is better to save the photo in to your computer, and then upload it to your blog or hubpages. In this way, you will not be depending on the Flickr server and you should not be stealing someone's bandwidth for the image's use.

Enjoy Creative Commons licensing. If you are interested, you can know more about Creative Commons from their official page. Creative Commons is a not-for-profit initiative.

Please ask your questions if you have any doubts about this article, I will try to answer here.

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