If, like me, your job (or even hobby) involves an element of creative design then you have absolutely no excuse for not signing up to istockphoto.com , a repositiry of royalty free stock imagery containing images from photographs to flash files. You would be hard pressed not to find what you need for your latest masterpiece somewhere in the vast collection.
istockphoto.com differs from many stock image suppliers in several areas, not least on price. Pricing is based upon a pre-purchased credits system with each image being available in various resolutions, typically costing between 1 and 3 credits. At time of writing one credit is equal to one US dollar, which by anyones reckoning is a fair price for design imagery. Another interesting feature of istockphoto.com is that the imagery is provided exclusivley by existing members and submission is open to all. Provided that the images meet istockphoto.com submission criteria it is possible for anyone to add their photos to the collection and earn commission on every download (see site for current commission rates).
The quality of images at istockphoto.com is generally good, with many professional photographers and designers being active contributers, however it must be remembered that not all the images are of a professional standard and it pays to be picky before making a final desicion.
The site has many other useful features to get the creative juices flowing, including an active collection of forums, plenty of articles submitted by pros and amatures alike and image searching functions that are second to none.
All in all istockphoto.com is one of my favorite haunts, and I must say I spend probably far too much time there browsing through images.
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