By the way...

[telophase]

...you might see me linking to my book cover design and illustration website around here periodically because apparently my blog has been around long enough and has enough authority (whatever that means) to have a decently high authority score, which means that things it links to rank a wee little bit higher on the Googles.

The Googles also wants to ensure things have actual content, so I shall point out that I have, in recent days, posted articles on why you shouldn't use free stock photos and part 1 of my process in making a digital illustration for the cover of Sherwood Smith's Time of Daughters.

I also set up a newsletter that I hope to send out monthly, letting people know of blog posts, new premades, and covers and art I've done in the previous month. Do feel free to sign up. :) (Or don't, it's fine either way!)

link text brought to you by spending way too much time learning about SEO

Comments

[havocthecat]

I...really love that blog post and damn it, maybe I should buy some stock photos for my blog? Not my fandom blog, but my pen name blog.

Fuck, I don't know enough about this all. I need to save a link to your post in my links page.

[telophase]

Stock photographers around the world trying to earn a living will thank you! XD

[havocthecat]

Iiiif I can find good sales, anyway!

Shit, I'm going to have to learn a new thing.

Wait, I never really mind that. Okay, carrying on.

[telophase]

:)

If you anticipate needing a good amount of photos, get yourself on the AppSumo mailing list. A couple of times a year they partner with Depositphotos and run sales like 50 pics for $50 or 100 pics for $100. That's pretty much the best deal out there at the moment.

I use a lot of photos from Envato Elements, but it's a subscription service for graphic designers (has Photoshop actions, stock photos, and a lot more) so if you don't have a use for the other stuff, it's not worth it.

[havocthecat]

I have no idea! But as a person in the legal field (who uses the stock phrase I Am Not a Lawyer all the time), I'm up for not fucking around with copyright in a professional sense, and 50 pics for $50 sounds like a really good deal if I wanted, say, website pics and things like that.

Or even pics for a, uh, private worldbuilding wiki that will never be made public but currently might have some Redfin and Zillow pictures on it and I already know how much trouble that one McMansion Hell blog got in over those (well, from Zillow).

I like not getting in trouble. And supporting artists! Plus someday this fucking book is going to be fucking well finished. (Life gets in my way all the time.)

[telophase]

Yeah, I get more and more strict about copyright the more real-businessy I go. :) I'm at the point now that if I use free photos from Pixabay or Unsplash, (a) there are no people or identifiable locations in them and (b) I've satisfied myself that I can't find the image on a stock site, and (c) I can't find an equivalent image for pay at all.

[havocthecat]

For our NFP LARP, by which I mean, "I was the only one who wanted to incorporate or worry about liability because, uh, I work with lawyers," I used images from Pixabay (did not know about Unsplash, but will look into it) or Wikimedia Commons, because we were literally taking $5 cash in hand and then spending it on supplies or site rental, so I wasn't worried. Also I was just using it for our game event pictures on Facebook, so no big.

I might get a free picture now if it's, say, the moon or fields of grain or something?

But I don't even work in intellectual property law and I know how sticky an issue it's becoming so. I can imagine how it's been for you.