These pages are here as a service for Kit users but
other visitors are
welcome too.
Index
Home
Pages To Find
Resources
Finding Fancy
Text & Images
Software
eBooks
Site Building
Marketing
Advertising
 |
Online
Resources
******************
Article on a frequently asked question....
Royalty
Free does not mean free by any means. It
just means that you
pay only once for the image
then
you can use it as many times as you like - maybe. The term “royalty” is
widely
applied to a payment that is charged for the use or sale of someone’s
copyright
property such as a book or song, a play, an electrical circuit or the
design of
a physical item such as part of a car engine. The
charge for a royalty usually depends on
the number of times the original is duplicated. Where payment for
graphic
images is concerned there seems to be a vast array of different
arrangements
within a huge image market. My
interest in
researching this subject was motivated by a desire to find sources of
photos, preferably
but not necessarily free, for eBook cover designers and home marketers
to use
in making virtual product covers. What I found is that you need to be
careful
with all Graphics Sites especially those that use the words “Free” or “Royalty Free” in their
promotional text. Some
sites are much
more straightforward than others though I would advise you to read the
small
print carefully with all of them. There are ones that definitely are
Royalty
Free and you pay once for the image and use it as you wish, possibly
subject to
some conditions. Both prices and conditions vary greatly. It’s
not unusual for a
site to demand a credit or a link be placed in close proximity to any
image
that you use. In a lot of situations this requirement could be a real
inconvenience so consider carefully before committing to a payment or
downloading images with this restriction. On the other hand there are
situations where it may be a reasonable request and compliance a simple
matter,
even a pleasure to let the photographer know his or her work is
appreciated. Some
other sites claim
quite blatantly on the home page to be “Free” but read the details and they
turn out to be only royalty free. Annoyingly, their real terms
and
conditions can also be hard to find and difficult to understand. Many
require
you to register with an email address and I have done this with more
than a few
but happily I have received no heavy marketing mail from any of them as
a
result. Another
thing my research
brought up was that there must be a whole world of publishers with a no
shortage of cash resources. Possibly a nationally distributed
glossy
magazine would be able to justify paying a $680 yearly membership fee. These
sites are obviously
not aimed at me, nor you either probably. If you strike one of them in
your
searches just remember we live in a free enterprise society – wish them
well
and move on because there are a lot of other graphics sites and some of
them
have fantastic material at sensible prices or even free,
and I mean FREE for
real. Whatever
sites you visit
while looking for images keep in mind that copyright
is a serious international legal matter
and you
do need to know where you stand with the
legitimate You
certainly don’t
want a call from a lawyer demanding half of everything you’ve made from
For my future reference I frequently make a text file with details of terms and conditions and the URL of the site. Then I store it with the images in the folder to which I download them. If there is a confirmation email from the site I’ll save a text copy of that to the folder as well. To
conclude on an
optimistic note, if you are prepared to do a bit of looking around it
is
very ******************************* Don Morrison has had a long involvement with many aspects of computers, the Internet and marketing. His latest product MyCoverGraphicsKit is aimed at making it easier for people who need Cover Graphics such as eBook Writers, Software Producers and Home Marketers to create their own attractive and technically correct promotional images for just about any digital download product you can think of. The product's site has resource pages, with links to some good places to look for copyright free images as well as links to other useful resources. For
more information visit;
http://www.MyCoverGraphicsKit.com Copyright © 2008 Don Morrison. This article may be used freely on a site or in an ezine as long as the copyright/signature section and URL at the bottom is included and no changes are made to the article text. (A smaller font may be used for the signature section). Before you continue, once again -- READ THE CONDITIONS OF USE FOR EACH ONE CAREFULLY.
************************************************************ Pictures
can be
downloaded straight from the site and most are high density
professional
quality photos. The files are large to download but the quality is
great. You
can use a program like The
************************************************************
Xara3d Instant
3D Headings.
***************************************************************************** Free Images you can download right from the display page. as far as I can work out. Have a look here for the sort of image you want and you may ************************************************************ Cooltext.com
Flamingtext.com
Coolarchive.com Logo
Generator Clipart.com
Comstock
Complete Probably
for
professionals only. Massive stock of images but requires heavy fees -
US $299
per month. FreeImages.co.uk
http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/imagemanagement/gr/irfanview.htm
Return to top There are many PDF making programs available ranging from very expensive to free. The bought ones have some excellent features like safeguards against copying and choices about graphics quality and so on. These may be worth your paying for if you really need them but I would say most people don't and many eBooks have been produced with free PDF makers. I have tested many and they all seem to have strong and weak points. There may well also be others I have not come across that do a good job. The main drawback I have found with the free ones is that they are fantastic with print documents but not so hot with graphics. The ones I am listing below are the best free ones for graphics and print that I personally know of. As far as I know PDFs (Portable Document Files) were invented by the Adobe company and all the other versions available are compatible with their free reader. For a free standing program I have found the following to work well for both text and graphics. These do not require a lot of space on your hard drive and once you install them the name will appear on your printer list. To make a PDF you just make your document in your word processor and then act as if you're going to print it out. You choose the PDF maker from the printer list and when it opens up it will ask for a location to send the finished PDF to and that's about all there is to it. http://www.pdf995.com/http://www.cutepdf.com/ Have a look also at the entry below because the OpenOffice.org program is better for using graphics in a PDF than the two mentioned above. It is a complete FREE office program very like "MS Word". The drawback may be that it is a big download and requires a fair bit of space on your hard drive. If that's not a problem I would really recommend you install this one and write your eBook in this program right from the start. One advantage of using OpenOfice.org to make PDFs is that it makes hyper links that will work in all Windows Operating Systems. When I last tested them the two PDF making programs above make links that will not work with older Systems - Windows98 - 95. This is probably not a problem for many applications but if you want to distribute a PDF to a wide audience it could be. PDFs made with OpenOffice seem to open with any system. If you write a large document with Word or any other word processor and then transfer it onto OpenOffice.org in my experience it will require quite a bit of editing to get it all to hang together properly. It's better to create it in Open Office to begin with and use the built in PDF Maker to produce your finished eBook or document. This is the one I use myself and it has many more great features I don't have space to describe here - and the price could not be better! http://www.openoffice.org/Return to top *************************************************************************** A note about putting graphics into PDF files to send them in emails:- I know people do this all the time but I don't know why they bother, particularly as the conversion usually causes a quality loss. In many cases you don't need to put a picture in a PDF to send it in an email. A .jpg file for instance, travels perfectly well as an attachment and is easy to handle when received. For Internet graphics I prefer the .png (portable network graphics) format though the file size may be a little larger than .jpg files. Adjusting the size and resolution of pictures can be dificult and I have found printing them at the right size can be a real challange. One of the best programs for a quick solution to resizing and printing picture files is the Ultimate Paint program described in the next section. *************************************************************************** Graphics Programs Ultimate
Paint is a full-featured 32-bit
Windows graphics program for image creation, viewing and manipulation.
You can download different versions, see what extras UP gives
you compared to other paint programs, take a look at its cool plug-in
effects, register the trial version and browse the tutorials.
************************************************* Return to http://www.MyCoverGraphicsKit.com ****************************************************Please
note: The advice
on any and all parts of this site is offered in the spirit of friendly
assistance only and should at no time be taken as professional advice
of the type that would normally be paid for. Though great care has been
taken in all aspects of compiling this information, no responsibility
whatsoever is taken by the author for the accuracy of statements or
casual claims made. If advice is required where financial matters are
concerned an appropriate professional should be consulted.
|
