Basic studio setup

In the studio you have basic lights, which you may use to create a professional portrait.

As you see, here are five light sources. Each of them has its own purpose:

• (M) Main – This type is your main source of light, it is most powerful light in the whole set. It is used to light the person and create mood of the portrait.
• (F) Fill-in – This light is less powerful and is used to soften the shadows, which are created by the main source of light. Usually the ratio of main light to the fill-in is about from 1:2 to 1:9. The weaker the fill-in the more prominent the shadows. Use the light to create three dimensional feeling (the ratio is about 1:3).
• (B1) Background I (Optional) - You will use this light to remove shadows on the background and create a bright spot on the background, which will help you to separate the head of the person from the background.
• (B2) Background II (Optional) - This light usually used to create a nice hallo around the person’s head and is another way to separate the head from the background. The light is usually good for women because they have fabulous haircuts and the light will add “air” to it.
• (H) Hair Light (Optional) - Actually there are two types of this light. One of them ( Hair Light ) is to enlighten the hair generally and usually placed above the head. Another one is to create a small beam of light placed upon a shoulder or side of the head and is called Accent Light , this light source will create a small highlight on the hair or shoulder to give some accent to it.

I cover the lights and their purposes in more details on page ” Portrait Lights”

Using an Umbrella

A photographic umbrella is very useful tool for creation a soft, broad and pleasing light. Sometimes you may use only one light with the umbrella to create a good portrait. Usually the umbrella is used for photographing kids, they could move easily without restrictions and you don’t have to adjust the lights every minute.

Umbrella as main light

Here the umbrella is used as the only front light source, you may even remove the rest of lights. It will be the simplest setup, but you will still produce good portraits.

Umbrella and Reflector Board

You may upgrade the previous setup with a reflector board to soften the shadows as shown below:

Umbrella as main and reflector to fill-in

Moving the reflector board to and from the subject will change the power of the reflected fill-in light falling on the subject. You even use a black reflector to remove some light from the subject and create more depth. A black reflector is a good tool for location session in a cloudy day, when the light just envelopes the subject, by using the reflector use remove some light and give it some direction.

Umbrella as Fill-in Light

You may prefer to broaden the fill-in light and use the umbrella for it. The following diagram shows the setup:

Umbrella as fill-in

Requirements and Upload

1. Google Sync is only supported on iPhone OS versions 3.0 and above. You can check your current version by going to Settings > General > About > Version. To upgrade, follow the instructions at http://www.apple.com/iphone/softwareupdate/. Please upgrade to iPhone OS 3.0 before setting up Google Sync.

2. Perform a sync with iTunes to ensure that Contacts and Calendars from your iPhone are backed up to your computer. Learn more.

3. If your business, school, or organization uses Google Apps, your administrator will first need to enable Google Sync before you can take advantage of this feature.

Getting Started

1. Open the Settings application on your device’s home screen.
2. Open Mail, Contacts, Calendars.
3. Tap Add Account….
4. Select Microsoft Exchange.

Enter Account Info

5. In the Email field, enter your full Google Account email address. If you use an @googlemail.com address, you may see an “Unable to verify certificate” warning when you proceed to the next step.
6. Leave the Domain field blank.
7. Enter your full Google Account email address as the Username.
8. Enter your Google Account password as the Password.
9. Tap Next at the top of your screen.
9a. Choose Accept if the Unable to Verify Certificate dialog appears.
10. When the new Server field appears, enter m.google.com.
11. Press Next at the top of your screen again.

12. Select the Google services you want to sync.

13. Unless you want to delete all the existing Contacts and Calendars on your phone, select the Keep on my iPhone option when prompted. This will also allow you to keep syncing with your computer via iTunes.

If you want to sync only the My Contacts group, you must choose to Delete Existing Contacts during the Google Sync install when prompted. If you choose to keep existing contacts, it will sync the contents of the “All Contacts” group instead.

You’ve set up Google Sync for your iPhone. Synchronization will begin automatically if you have Push enabled on your phone. You can also open the Mail, Calendar or Contacts app and wait a few seconds to start a sync.

Nên hôm nay mình quyết định làm bài hướng dẫn này mong giải đáp dược phần nào câu hỏi

Nếu ban thấy những câu hỏi đại loại như trên thì copy link của bài viết này đưa cho họ.
Hoặc ban biết thêm những đường dẫn khác trong phần hệ thống của Iphone thì cứ post ở đây,

Bắt đầu:

Cài đặt OpenSSH cho Iphone: (Phần này cho Beginner, nếu bạn đả biết rồi thì bỏ qua step nay)

-Vào Cydia bấm vào thanh Search tìm và cài đặt OpenSSH (xem hình)
-Reboot iphone khi yêu cầu

=====================================

Xong phần đó bạn trở lại máy tính cài đặt software để kết nối Iphone với máy tính qua Wifi

Nếu dùng Windows thì download cài đặt cái này: WinSCP
Nếu dùng Mac thì download cài đặt cái này: Cyberduck

=====================================

Xong phần cài đặt cho máy tính quay trở lại với iphone,
Vào Settings–>Wifi–>bấm vào mũi tên màu xanh của mạng Wifi mà bạn đã kết nối
bạn sẽ thấy dòng IP Address: 192.168.1xx(xem nình) (mỗi mạng đều có 3 số cuối khác nhau)
Ghi lại hoặc nhớ những con số này

======================================

Trở lại với máy tính mở WinSCP mà bạn vừa mới cài đặt
Bấm vào thẻ NEW và điền các thông số sau rồi bấm Login (xem hình phía dưới)
IP Address: 192.168.1.xxx (số ghi lại lúc nãy) dĩ nhiên là máy tính và Iphone kết nối mang internet giống nhau
Username: root
Password: alpine
Lúc login lần đầu tiên có thể phải thử vài lần thì mới vào được phần hệ thống của Iphone

======================================

*Sau đây là các đường dẫn để back up lại toàn bộ hệ thống Iphone.
Chú ý: Khi copy lại các Folder như:NOTES, CAMERA ROLL, TEXT v.v nếu bị lỗi thì SET permission toàn bộ các file bên trong các folder đó thành 0777

Contacts, Notes, CallHistory: Danh bạ, Notes và lịch sử cuộc gọi
private/var/mobile/Library

Photo (Camera Roll):Hình chụp trong Iphone
private/var/mobile/Media/DCIM/100APPLE

Voice Memos: Thâu âm
private/var/mobile/Media/Recordings

ROMS:Game cho Nes
private/var/mobile/Media/ROMS

MobileSubstrate: Kg biết kêu cái này là gì
Library/MobileSubstrate

Backup/delete your Cydia repo: backup hoặc xóa dữ liệu trong Cydia repo
private/etc/apt/sources.list.d
AND/OR
var/lib/apt/lists

Backup/delete your Cydia Applications: Backup hoặc xóa App install từ Cydia
private/var/stash/Applications.xxx

AppStore Application’s Saved Data: Game/App AppStore đã saved trong Iphone
private/var/mobile/Applications/(whatever your application number folder is)/Documents

Custom Themes:Cái này ai cũng biết òi
private/var/stash/Themes.xxxxx

Ringtones:Nhạc chuông
private/var/stash/Ringtones.xxxxx

System Sounds (Lock sounds, Unlock sounds, SMS Sounds, etc…) Âm thanh hệ thống
System/Library/Audio/UISounds

SBSetting’s Themes:)
private/var/mobile/Library/SBSettings/Themes

Mobile Substrates::-/
Library/MobileSubstrate/DynamicLibraries

hoặc download tại http://www.blackra1n.com

Hãy bắt đầu nào
Bước 1: Nếu máy bạn là Windows bạn chọn file Blackra1n.exe(hoặc Blackra1n_win.zip nếu download trực tiếp từ sau bài viết này), còn máy Mac bạn sẽ có file Blackra1n.zip(Blacra1n_mac.zip). Giải nén file Blackra1n.zip rồi chạy Blackra1n.

Bước 2: Kết nối iphone hoặc ipod vào máy tính rồi chọn nút make it ra1n

Bước 3: Chương trình sẽ đưa máy bạn về Recovery mode

Sau đó bạn sẽ thấy màn hình của Geohotsẽ xuất hiện trên iphone của bạn.

Chương trình Blackra1n vẫn chạy cho tới khi iphone reboot.

Một tin nhắn sẽ xuất hiện thông báo cho bạn phần mềm BlackRa1n là miễn phí và nếu bạn đánh giá cao nó, bạn có thể liên lạc với GeoHot tại địa chỉ geohot@gmail.com để tặng tiền.

Bước 4: Khi iphone đã reboot xong, bạn sẽ thấy icon của Blackra1n(giọt nước đen) trong máy bạn. Bạn chọn Settings/Wifi để kết nối wifi. Nếu kết nối wifi thành công thì bạn thực hiện tiếp tiếp theo.

Bạn chọn vào icon của Blackra1n để chạy, chọn sn0w nếu bạn muốn mở khóa iPhone của bạn. Nhấn nút Install ở phía trên bên phải màn hình để bắt đầu cài đặt. Sau khi cài đặt xong, trên dòng Carrier sẽ xuất hiện dòng Seaching…. và 1 chút sẽ có sóng kèm theo tên nhà cung cấp dịch vụ mạng di động mà o cần phải dùng công cụ Fix lỗi cho carrier nữa.

BlackRa1n sẽ bắt đầu tải về và cài đặt các gói bạn đã chọn.

Nếu bạn đã chọn để mở khóa iPhone bằng cách sử dụng blacksn0w bạn sẽ được xem thông báo đang cài đặt sn0w. CommCenter sẽ tự khởi động lại và không cần phải khởi động lại iPhone. Nếu máy của bạn không hỗ trợ 3G nó sẽ vô hiệu hóa. Bấm nút Close để tiếp tục.

Bước 5: Sau khi hoàn tất BlackRa1n sẽ respring iPhone của bạn và bạn sẽ tìm thấy cydia và cài đặt lên iphone.

Bước 6: Sau khi đã Unlock thành công và cài đặt Cydia lên máy của bạn. bạn có thể gỡ bỏ Blackra1n

Cuối cùng là xin cám ơn Geohot, nếu bạn nào có hảo tâm hãy tùy hi đóng góp cho Geohot theo địa chỉ mail trên nhé.

I’ve decided to bring this entry back from archive to front page after receiving tones of emails asking for alternative proxies. Instead of the previous 2 proxy websites, here’s my personal collection on proxy websites. Full list after jump.

share it

90+ Proxy Websites To Access Blocked Websites

1. http://www.hidemyass.com
2. http://www.anonymizer.com
3. http://www.wujie.net
4. http://www.ultrareach.net
5. http://surfshield.net
6. http://www.guardster.com/subscription/proxy_free.php
7. http://anonymouse.ws/anonwww.html
8. http://www.browser-x.com
9. http://www.spysurfing.com
10. http://www.xerohour.org/hideme
11. http://www.proxyz.be
12. http://www.sc0rian.com/prox
13. https://www.proxify.us
14. http://kproxy.com/index.jsp
15. http://www.brawl-hall.com/pages/proxy.php
16. http://www.proxify.net
17. http://proxy.computersteroids.com/index0.php
18. http://www.unipeak.com
19. http://flyproxy.com
20. http://alienproxy.com
21. http://proxify.com/
22. http://www.unfilter.net
23. http://www.proxymouse.com
24. http://www.surfonym.com/cgi-bin/nph-proxy
25. http://www.superproxy.be/browse.pl
26. http://www.websiteguru.com/mrnewguy
27. http://www.letsproxy.com
28. http://www.fsurf.com
29. http://indianproxy.com
30. http://www.letmeby.com
31. http://Boredatschool.net
32. http://www.ibypass.org
33. http://www.ipzap.com/
34. https://proxify.biz
35. http://kproxy.com/index.jsp
36. http://www.attackcensorship.com/attack-censorship.html
37. http://mrnewguy.com
38. http://www.evilsprouts.co.uk/defilter
39. http://www.proxify.info
40. http://www.torify.com
41. http://www.switchproxy.com
42. http://www.proxifree.com
43. http://www.secure-tunnel.com/
44. http://www.proxify.cn
45. http://www.arnit.net/utilities/webproxy/new
46. http://www.proxify.co.uk
47. http://www.betaproxy.com
48. http://www.proxify.org
49. http://www.proxychoice.com
50. http://www.proxysnail.com
51. http://www.anonypost.com
52. http://www.thestrongestlinks.com
53. http://www.hujiko.com
54. http://www.anonproxy.info
55. http://www.peoplesproxy.com
56. http://www.freeproxy.us
57. http://www.proxyweb.net
58. http://www.nopath.com
59. http://urlencoded.com
60. http://www.pole.ws
61. http://www.browseany.com
62. http://www.spiderproxy.com
63. http://www.clickcop.com
64. http://www.sneakysurf.com
65. http://www.mywebtunnel.com
66. http://www.thewebtunnel.com
67. http://www.3proxy.com
68. http://www.yourfreeproxy.com
69. http://www.proxy7.com
70. http://www.fireprox.com
71. http://www.stupidcensorship.com
72. http://www.letsproxy.com
73. http://www.sneak2.com
74. http://www.cecid.com
75. http://www.freeproxy.ca
76. http://www.ibypass.org
77. http://www.goproxing.com
78. http://www.projectbypass.com/
79. http://www.ipsecret.com
80. http://www.nomorelimits.net
81. http://www.proxify.de
82. http://www.bywhat.com
83. http://www.snoopblocker.com
84. http://www.anonymizer.ru
85. http://www.proxyking.net/
86. http://www.perlproxy.com
87. http://www.proxylord.com
88. http://tntproxy.com
89. http://satanproxy.com
90. http://zombieinvasion.info
91. http://demonproxy.com
92. http://www.myfreeproxy.com
93. http://www.gezcem.com/nph-proxy.pl.old
94. http://mpleger.de
95. http://www.the-cloak.com/login.html

Disclaimer

Note that not all of them are working perfectly; some of these websites could be offline too. I’m not encouraging you to use this to bypass sites that you are banned from surfing in colleges, work place, etc. Use them with cautions make sure you know what you are doing. I shall not be responsible for any damages or rules and regulation you violate from using these proxies.

9 Alternative Ways To Access Blocked Sites

Is you school, college or office blocking you from getting on social network sites like Friendster, Facebook, Myspace, Bebo, Hi5, Orkut, etc? Here’s few ways you can bypass the restrictions and surf like normal, but please check with your local authorities before using them. We will not held any responsibility if you’ve breach the regulations of any.

Full list after jump.

1. Using IP Instead of URL

   This depends on the software/application used. Sometimes blocked sites are stored as a list of URLs (eg. www.yahoo.com, www.donwload.com,etc) and typing the IP instead of the URL might sometimes work. In a local computer, doing a ping domain.com command in Command Prompt (Mac users use Terminal) will return you the IP address. You can also do it online via www.whatsmyip.org

2. Redirection with Short URL service

   Sometimes the URL you intend to browse might be ban, but converting them to another a shorter URL with short URL services might just help you to bypass the settings.

   Here’s 2 Short URL service we’ve previously mentioned – MooURL, SnipURL

3. Google Cache

   Search engines like Google and Yahoo cache webpages and these cached pages are stored in search engines themselves, which likely will be added to the blocked list. Click on the ‘cache’ will bring you to a cache version of the page, as updated as how Google caches it.

   

4. Internet Archive – Wayback Machine

   Wayback Machine is a internet service that periodically keeps a copy of almost all websites in the Internet way from the date they’re started. Clicking on the latest copy of what Wayback Machine have should be somewhat similar to the real site. Another way to access blocked sites via caches.

   

5. Anonymous Surfing

   Some site allows you to take advantage of their proxy or domain to surf other sites as anonymous. Here’s 90+ proxy websites we’ve previously mentioned.

6. Use Proxy in Browsers

   There are tons of sites out there that distributes free proxies of almost any country.Check out the following methods on how/where to insert proxies in your web browsers.

   Proxy Surfing – Firefox

   

   Under Advanced tab, select Network tab, then click inside Connection Settings. Select Manual proxy configuration, put proxy under HTTP proxy.

   Proxy Surfing – Internet Explorer

   

   Go to Tools -> Internet Options. Select Connections tab. Click into LAN Settings, check Proxy Server. Insert your proxy URL inside Address.

7. Bypass with Translations services

   Online translation services like AltaVista BabelFish, Google Translate allows you to translate a website from one language to another and display the translated results on their own page.The trick here is to enter the URL (website you’re blocked), retranslate it even if you don’t need to and let Google or AltaVista fetch you the content.

8. Subscribe to RSS Feed

This might not work for all sites, but if the site you intended to visit provides RSS feeds, you can subscribe and read it with a RSS reader, or have it regularly send the contents to your email

9. Retrieve web pages via Email

Web2Mail is a free service that sends websites you want to read right into your inbox. All you need to do is send an email to www@web2mail.com with the URL as subject title.

Realistic Gadget Design with Photoshop

Black iMac
This tutorial will help you create a realistic black iMac in Photoshop. The image is recreated in Photoshop using a front look iMac picture found via Google Images. It is  a step-by-step tutorial to help you easily create an iMac of your own, in PhotoShop that is.

Apple Remote
Apple has always throbbed our hearts with their exceptionally innovative and beautifully designed products. Apple remote is no different. Here is a tutorial to teach how to design a Apple remote in Photoshop with a realistic view and shiny looks. The tutorial also shows you how to change colors of such objects in photoshop easily.

Sony Playstation 3
A gadget like Playstation is great to play with and it can add a lot more fun if we could turn it into a Photoshop image. And it’s not a tough task when you have a very well written tutorial infront of you.

Nokia 5300
Using just multiple vector shapes, layer styles and some other tools, you can easily create mobile phone mockup in PhotoShop. The tutorial here shows you how to create a look-alike of Nokia 5300 Mobile phone.

PlayStation Portable
Designing a portable gaming console couldn’t get easier that this. Here is a revamped tutorial for creating beautiful PSP in PhotoShop. No-doubt it is going to take some time to finish this up, but in the end you will have refreshed your photoshop skills and have a cool-looking PlayStaion Portable to add to your PhotoShop creations.

Nintendo Gameboy
If making a PSP in photoShop doesn’t get you excited, how about a Nintendo Game Boy? The tutorial will help you create a truly realistic Game Boy in PhotoShop and it involves using just basic tools that PhotoShop users use everyday.

USB Stick
This tutorial explains USB stick image formation in Photoshop. It is a pretty basic tutorial and you can even have the PSD if you want.

Mouse
Simple things are always fun to create in PhotoShop. This is a tutorial for creating a realistic computer mouse in  PhotoShop. You will alos be able to get a free PSD from the author’s blog.

XBox 360
Microsoft’s XBox 360 is a very eye-catchy gadget. The looks are stunning and what’s more interesting is that you can create it in PhotoShop too. Here is a step-by-step tutorial for creating a Xbox 360 look-alike in PhotoShop. There are simple techniques involved in this tutorial, like gradient tool and pen tool which, most likely, every Photoshop user should be used-to.

Nintendo DS Lite
This tutorial is not for newbies. Although it is easy to follow, but the author doesn’t explain the minute details. However if you are an intermediate level PhotoShop user, you can easy follow along and make you own DS Lite in PhotoShop with this tutorial.

Digital MP3 Player
Creating an image of an mp3 player in 3D view is certainly an interesting thing to do in Photoshop. But that won’t be easy if you just hang around without knowing the techniques. Here is a tutorial which guides you throughout the procedure of recreating the image in 3D view.

Custom MP3 Player
This tutorial shows you how to create a custom MP3 player in Photoshop complete with buttons and the display. It can be done at ease when you know what steps to follow and this tutorial will provide you the steps in a very detailed manner. You can also work on shade, the button dimensions and the button patterns.

LCD Monitor
Creating shiny gadgets in Photoshop is fun. Creating a Monitor is no different. The easy steps in this tutorial will guide you through the procedure to accomplish it.

Microsoft Zune 2
This is a tutorial which teaches you how to create a Microsoft Zune media player in Photoshop from scratch.

Loox Pocket PC
Here is a tutorial to create a Loox Pocket PC in photoshop and boost your PhotoShop creativity.

Detailed Audio Player
Yet another Photoshop tutorial about creating an audio player with minute details. This tutorial will be a great opportunity for all designers to practice the Shape Tools and Layer Styles skills. It involves a los of adding and subtracting of Shapes.

Sony Ericsson S500
In this tutorial you will learn how to make a glossy, shiny and a very beautiful mobile phone in PhotoShop. The author has provided a PSD file too, incase you need take it as a reference to create your own design.

HTC Touch Diamond
In this tutorial, Constantin Potorac shows how he created an amazing look-alike of HTC Touch Diamond phone.

Apple iPhone
Apple iPhone is a great innovative and heart throbbing gadget. The sleekness along the curves, the ‘Home’ button and and other minutes details are not that easy to design in Photoshop. But, this tutorial shows you how to create a realistic iPhone easily. You just have to follow the clear instructions on this tutorial carefully and with-in no time you will be an expert in creating  an iPhone in PhotoShop.

Sony Ericsson W800
This tutorial shows you to create a Walkman phone in PhotoShop. The designing of Sony Ericsson W800 will require some skills with the brush and pen tool though.

Strawberry Mobile Phone
Now here is an interesting tutorial to look at. This tutorial will guide you to create a Straberry phone in Photoshop. You just need images of strawberry and your mobile phone as reference images.

iPod Nano Video
Refresh your layer structure and pen tool skills by recreating an iPod Nano Video in PhotoShop.This tutorial will also give you a glimpse of how to recreate objects in PhotoShop from an original image.

Apple MacBook
Apple’s sleek gadgets are fun to create in photoshop because they look beautiful on the screen as well as in the real life. Here is a step-by-step guide for creating a MacBook from scratch in Photoshop.

Wii Controller The Wii controller in the image below is a true creation of Photoshop. Learn to create a simillar one in Photoshop by following this simple tutorial.

Woofer
Here is a tutorial to create a woofer in Photoshop with a wooden texture background. This tutorial also shows how to put on screws on the woofer to make it look more realistic.

Portable Media Player
Fancy creating a portable media player in Photoshop? Now you can. Create your video mp3 player in Photoshop by following some simple steps detailed in this tutorial. The reference image used in the tutorial is of RCA Lyra X3030 portable media player.

Retro Atari Game Catridge
If you have ever owned an Atari gaming console, you will definitely love to create this mockup in Photoshop.  This tutorial is about making a super retro game cartridge. Theme of the tutorial is to teach you to create a very easy, but really cool, 3D and geometric effect in Photoshop.

Blackberry Mobile Phone
Obsessed with Blackberries? You will love to create one in PhotoShop too. You will learn how to create a blackberry mobile phone look-alike in Photoshop by followwing the instructions in this tutorial. Author has explained in a detailed manner how to use Vector Shapes, Masks, and mostly Layer Effects to create this elegant design.

iPod Classic
A very simple yet inspiring tutorial of creating an Apple iPod Classic in PhotoShop from scratch.

iPod Shuffle
iPod Shuffle is one of the simplest gadgets to design in photoshop. If you are just starting to design tech related stuff in Photoshop, you should start with the iPod shuffle. Read the tutorial, and create one of your own.

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
While Apple fanboys may enjoy designing the iPhone, there are Nokia fanboys out there too who will love to design Nokia 5800 XpressMusic. This tutorial is a 12 step precedure for attaining something like the below image.

We believe when desktop wallpapers are constantly changed, it not only help inspire ourselves but also spice up the desktop, giving it a fresher look. With the help of free wallpaper changer softwares  there’s no reason why your wallpaper should station on desktop for more than one month.

here’s another 60 most beautiful apple related wallpapers; inclusive of apple logo, Mac OS X, time machine, iPods, and more.

90 wallpapers in total, some must be your favorite. Full list after jump.

Apple logo

iPod

Mac OS X Leopard

Mac OS X Leopard – Time Machine

Macbooks, iMac

Misc

Release date : Dec. 2009

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

Preview

Here is a preview of them. Click on their title or image to go to their Flickr pages where you can download various sizes. Alternatively, you may wish to browse the Six Revisions Grungy Wood texture set on Flickr.

Grungy Wood 01

Grungy Wood 02

Grungy Wood 03

Grungy Wood 04

Grungy Wood 05

Grungy Wood 06

Grungy Wood 07

Grungy Wood 08

Grungy Wood 09

Grungy Wood 10

Licensing Information

The above works featured here in the Grungy Wood texture set are licensed under the Creative Commons license and can be used for personal and/or commercial purposes.

The Creative Commons license requires you to “attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor”. Our attribution specification: you don’t need to attribute the work to us (though you’re more then welcome to, and we will definitely appreciate it).

In this article, we review the 15 best places to free stock photos online for designers.

Note: Although these sites feature free stock photos, you should read the terms, limitations, and licensing of each work that you use; read the fine print!

Dedicated free stock photo sites

1. stock.xchng

stock.xchng is all free, all the time. Their advanced search is only basic by paid site standards, but hey, did I mention that the service is free? They have over 350,000 images contributed by 30,000 photographers. The one downside to getting photos from stock.xchng is that they’re quite well known, so designers may find that the smaller subset of quality images on site are quite heavily used in many other places, making it difficult to be original. Stock.xchng is a Hungarian site and was founded in 2001.

one of the most popular paid stock photo sites – iStockphoto, sponsors them. There’s a good selection of illustrations and vectors for free on stock.xchng, which you just don’t get with the big free sites.

Aimed at: Web designers and web developers, illustrators, print designers

2. Freerange Stock

Their admirable goal is to provide stock photography for both commercial and non-commercial use, for free. They give away their collections with the hope that they are useful and enjoyed.

A small team of in-house professional photographers supplies the photos in the site. After each upload, the color and image is sharpened and they are keyword-tagged by professional photographers. This is a great place to get high impact and good looking pictures, but the focus is on quality, not quantity so the collection isn’t as big as other sites.

Aimed at: all creatives, most pictures are reasonable resolution

3. Morguefile

Morguefile is for creatives, by creatives. It started in 1996 and is highly recommended by many web design and development professionals. Morguefile currently contains 9,148 pages at 24 photos each page, and the photos are very good resolution. It’s called “morguefile” in reference to the term used for a place to keep postproduction creative materials.

The photos are mostly great quality, and you can filter your results by several characteristics, which is handy. Keyword tagging is relatively basic, with between five and fifteen tags per photo, so use a few terms to search. If you use a photo from Morguefile, you’re asked to credit the photographer when possible. The site can be a bit slow to load sometimes.

Aimed at: Illustrators, artists, designers, teachers and all other creative pursuits, according to the home page

4. Pixel Perfect Digital

The name is certainly not misplaced as the pictures on the site are quite polished, especially the illustrations. There are around 7,500 images on site currently.

The photos, although quite small in number, look good and have been post processed by professionals. Each photo has an accompanying short story, which can be quite handy, and certainly endearing! You can either browse categories or use the very basic search facility.

Aimed at: Both web design and print designers (photo resolution is usually excellent)

5. Free Media Goo

Free Media Goo has a memorable name for a not-so-memorable site; it certainly has some good features, but is more a niche search engine. The site was created by web developers for web developers, hence the presence of free Flash and audio as well as stock photos.

Alongside free stock photos, the site also has free textures, audio and Flash movies. Unfortunately, the collection is tiny and many photos are a bit amateurish.

Aimed at: Web designers and web developers, illustrators, print designers

6. openphoto.net

openphoto.net has been collecting free photos since 1998, with contributors from all over the world. Many people use it is a photoblog site, so you might find many Flickr-style personal shots.

Search is extremely simple (keyword only), but you do have the option to browse categories to find images (which is probably the easiest way). Keyword tagging is very basic on the site and in many cases, a photo has only one tag. Unless your search is quite literal, you are better off browsing the categories of openphoto.net. Almost all photos have a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike license.

Aimed at: Web designers and developers – images are often too low resolution for many print jobs.

7. Flickr

Flickr is one of the largest online photo sharing sites on the web. There’s an enormous mix of complete amateur pictures and professional photographer images. The admin team at Flickr numbers almost 50, and the site was recently purchased by Yahoo! so a great group of folks manages it.

Use the Advanced Search and check the ‘Creative Commons licensed’ box to find pictures that can be used in your web design and development. The site has excellent tagging so it’s quite easy to find images under the subject that you’re interested.

Aimed at: web design and development professionals because most of the photos featured on the site have too low of a resolution for print design work

8. Stockvault

A reasonable sized collection of quite good photos is available at Stockvault. They have just over 16,000 stock photos from 4,000 photographers. All images are licensed under a Creative Commons attribution license. The site began as the personal site of Bjorgvin Gudmundsson in 2001.

Keyword tagging is quite basic, so explore the site with both the search option and the categories. The resolution is what most ordinary stock photo sites would call “small to medium”. You can download pictures, logo templates, clip art, textures and backgrounds without signing up on the site. Stockvault has a nicer and friendlier user interface than many stock photo sites.

Aimed at: mostly web designers

9. NASA

Yes, this image site is ‘the’ NASA. All photos are space themed, but the collection is large and the photos are very professional.

Keyword tagging is good and the resolution is invariably 640px x 480px, so they’re not ideal for print design. Many of the shots are better as textures/repeating background than actual pictures. The size of the collection is substantially increased by checking the external collections.

Aimed at: People interested in space exploration, but useful for web designers looking for textures or space themed shots

10. deviantART’s Stock Images section

deviantART is a popular website for digital and traditional media artists to showcase their work. They have a great stock photography section on site. deviantART is a big site, with a big team and big ideas. The site is full of personality, as the name suggests.

The images are gorgeous, image resolution is enormous, you can download without registering anywhere, oh, and did I mention that the images are gorgeous?

Aimed at: Artists, print designers, and web designers.

Free stock photo search engine

11. Everystockphoto

It was only a matter of time before someone found a way to aggregate free stock photo results and monetize the concept somehow, and that’s what Everystockphoto does. There are a huge number of pictures indexed on this site, numbering in the millions. For example, there’s over 67,000 results for the search term “clouds“.

You can search free stock photos from Morguefile, Freerange Stock, Photoxpress, Flickr, stock.xchn, NASA, Wikimedia Commons and more, in a single site. They have good sorting and filtering options to help you find the perfect photo, but not heaps of search options, though. You may be able to search all the different sites here, but you still have to sign up for accounts on the site that hosts the image.

Aimed at: Web designers and web developers, illustrators, print designers

12. Creative Commons Search

The Creative Commons Search finds images through Google and Yahoo, Flickr, Blip.tv, jamendo SpinExpress and Wikimedia Commons. Probably the largest collection of free images in one place but beware, some search results may not be Creative Commons so do your homework before using a photo.

You can search for a single term across quite a few different media quickly. You can refine your results by commercial use and modification allowances. You have access to each site’s own search features instantly, but have to log in to download the image in some cases.

Aimed at: Web designers and web developers, illustrators, print designers

Free areas in paid sites

13. Dreamstime’s Free Section

Dreamstime has one of the largest libraries of stock photos on the net. At the time of writing, they have just under 7 million images, and just under 80,000 contributing photographers. In order to stand out among the huge crowd, Dreamstime photographers often put their photos in the free section of the site. A search for house, for example, yields 26 pages of 20 results each. The site has been online since 2000.

Most free photos require no attribution to the photographer in your design. Photos at Dreamstime remain on the site indefinitely. Unfortunately, you can only search photos by keyword; there are no advanced search filters like orientation, color or model options, etc.

Aimed at: Web and print designers

14. Fotolia’s Free Section

Fotolia is one of the oldest stock photo sites on the net. Their free section is quite good, but changes every day and the free photos that were there yesterday, may not be there the next. Fotolia has an office in France and their global headquarters in New York.

They offer ten to twenty free photos every day. If you have the time to download and tag all of them every day, you could build quite a library of photos. You won’t find isolated shots, and photos are frequently just a tiny bit lower quality than you’d pay for.

Aimed at: Fotolia in general has photos, illustrations, vectors and videos for download for many digital media professions

15. iStockphoto’s Free Images

iStockphoto is one of the most popular stock photo sites on the net, with excellent quality photos that are often Photoshop’ed to within an inch of their lives already (which is either a good or bad thing). iStockphoto has a responsive helpdesk and a comprehensive FAQ.

They only offer one free image a week, but it is always high quality. Free images from the last three weeks are kept available for download. Similar to Fotolia, you’ll have to make it a habit to download and tag these photos yourself so you can search them on your own computer.