been gone, need help

[Anamacha]

yeah, okay, I've been gone a while, like a lot longer than I had intended on being gone. For some reason the board here has been REALLY slow on my machine ... it's not a whole lot better, but I am once again going to make an effort to come back.

Anyway, I wanted to ask -- when you need a specific image to use in a project you're doing, where do you go to get it? I've been using images.google.com with some limited success.

What I'm doing is this: I've got some poetry that I've written. I want to put it together with some art, modify the lot of it, make a cohesive whole, and sell the finished result.

So I read the poems again, and I get a vision in my head of what I'd like it to look like. Then I go out and I try to find things that match that vision to a greater or lesser degree. Trouble is, I'm spending way too much time looking for things and not enough time CREATING them.

Any ideas?[/b]

 

[kiwi]

Hi,good to have you back



The thing with images is generally they are free,but if you want to use them commercially then most sites want a fee,which is fair enough.My advice would be borrow a camera or create some of what you need in PS or make a montage which is distinctly different from the original images and then the copyright rules are different.


Stu.

 

[Anamacha]

yeah, it's good to be back ,... I wonder how long THIS will last, eh? I keep coming back, though, so there must be something right here.

ooo, good point. Thanks for the copyright reminder, too. (damn! ) Thanks forhte suggestion I go take my OWN pix ... I was hoping to not get off my lazy butt, but you know ,... one does what one has to do. Too bad my cam is broke

 

[ljiljana]

Welcome back Anamacha

 

[AppleCider]

Welcome back, Anamacha!

Yeah, I've tried the thing of having a vision in my head, and trying to find images to match. I've found that very rarely works.

What I do now is, get a general "feeling" of what I want, then start browsing. And, in most cases, altering the image(s) to suit the mood I'm looking for...lots of possibilities!

Romantic feeling? Almost anything other than pipes or such can work, as long as you do the colors, maybe some motion blur, etc. etc. You're experienced enoughto know what I mean! Maybe a monocrome color.

Excitement, movement, brooding, sadness, hope, are things that a lot of images can convey. I found that if I browse, something completely unexpected will strike me...hey, if I do this it will work, and will be unusual.

Some good free image sites:

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1086397,00.html
http://www.freefoto.com/index.jsp
http://art.net/~jeremy/photo/public_texture/index.html
http://www.sxc.hu/
http://www.stock.b-man.dk/

I also heartily agree with Stu's suggestion about taking your own photos...nothing beats that if you have something very specific in mind.

 

[tranquil222]

HTTP://WWW.ISTOCKPHOTO.COM is the best i've found

 

[Anamacha]

HTTP://WWW.ISTOCKPHOTO.COM is the best i've found

is it free? Mesa po' fo'ks a-heah.

AC, thanks for the wecome back and the broadening of the vision.

Some feelings are easier to work with than others ... romance, for example, alows one to use images like roses, tulips, pianos, violins, candles, couples looking longingly into each others' eyes, and so on.

But for the same of argument, and my own edification, let's work with one a bit more difficult. Take loneliness, for example. Here's teh poem I was trying to work with:

Bar Scene I

Frosty mint pizza
faced girls
walk twoard me
& then away
no glances lost
'tween the two of us

Subhuman random noise
is victorious
over thoughts
& especially speech
yet somehow
speech goes on

& then its over
for the night
or the morning
whatever it is
its dark outside
all the same
anyway;

all cats are black
at night


2.05a 29 March 1991

(c) 1991 John Onorato. All Rights Reserved.

I scrawled that in a bar, I believe, on a series of bar napkins. It has a sister poem that I was going to pair with it on the same page.

Now, after reading that poem, what images does that evoke for you? What sorts of visulas would you put with the poem, to complement it? I was thkning of an empty bar in a reversed L shape, the short end near the camera and the bottom of the page. Perhaps a few bar stools along the right edge, maybe a clock and a few other things in there.

That's a pretty specific image, now, and when I looked through all bloody 800 some odd images in Google that matched 'bar scene,' I found maybe TWO that I MIGHT be able to use.

There's gotta be an easier way, and I think you've got a good hold on it, AC. But where to start with this poem?

 

[C9Mouse]

I wrote some poems a while back, when I first started writing short stories. I was fortunate to have a few of them get published (which is why I started my own personal writing site). I would say your poem invokes (for me anyway) a still, wet night with a figure (the black cat perhaps?) under a lone street light.

I stopped writing poems because it was starting to freak me out - or I should say, I was starting to freak myself out (lol). It was after the last poem I wrote, Epitaph, which won our local Tri-Cities Literary award, that I quit. Epitaph, like one I wrote before it (Dungeon of Self), were extremely deep and dark. I believe a person shouldn't lean too far out over the abyss. It's pretty dark down there. You might slip.

Anyway, that is the image that comes to my mind. And welcome back. Good to have another writer around.

 

[C9Mouse]

Here are some sites for royalty free images:

http://www.deviantart.com

http://stock.diwiesign.com/main.htm

http://www.morguefile.com

http://www.bluevertigo.com.ar/bluevertigo.htm

http://www.freeimages.co.uk/galleries.htm

http://stock.reh3.com/

http://stock.b-man.dk/main.asp

http://www.sxc.hu/index.phtml

http://www.ppdigital.com/

http://www.stockbyte.com

http://www.picturecd.com

http://www.istockphoto.com

http://www.freeimages.com


Hope this helps ....

 

[Anamacha]

Thanks for all the sites, Spark. Much appreciated. Is there somewhere I can go on the 'net to read your stuff? I don't recall seeing it when I was on your site -- looking at your illustrations, don'tchaknow.

I stopped reading Tarot for much the same reason that you stopped writing poetry -- I was starting to freak myself out with how accurate I was being. The writing is a different story, though; I'm sure I'm paraphrasing someone somewhere when I say "I write to live, and I live to write." Time was when I used to write 405 poems a DAY; now I'm lucky to get that many out in a month, but ...

Doing art and PS stuff is a different story, but I hope to get into the same place with that soon enough.



Anam

 

[C9Mouse]

Your welcome. Those are all the sites I've found for finding royalty and commercial images.

My portfolio site is for my garphic design work. I have no web site for my writing. Spark is the name of my mascot.

I have a question. You say, "Doing art and PS stuff is a different story, but I hope to get into the same place with that soon enough."

I notice you are a member of the NAPP. I understand it costs a bit to belong to that club, so I am curious why you would spend all that money to belong to the NAPP but only dabble in Photoshop?

 

[Anamacha]

You have no website for your writing? In a previous message, though, you said:

I wrote some poems a while back, when I first started writing short stories. I was fortunate to have a few of them get published (which is why I started my own personal writing site).

So ... what's the deal?

I pay for NAPP to get me motivated, in part (it's $99 a year, btw). I get cool benefits through them, access to their website with a bunch of member-only stuff, and a nifty magazine.

Part of the reason why I only "play" in PS is that I'm scared to death of it -- or more accurately I am scared of my own success. It's a long tragic story (not fully worked out in my head yet) that I don't want to get into now for fear of boring people. If you're interested, then please tag me privately.

Anyway, I'm not sure I'm fully right in the head. Right now, anyway, if I ever was in teh first place. [stuned]

 

[Rich]

Welcome back Anam!

I've been gone myself for some time.

 

[C9Mouse]

Sorry, I must be suffering from some major brain farts here ..... allow me to rephrase that:

I WILL HAVE a website for my writing soon. (ahem ..... slinks away quietly ......)

 

[Anamacha]

Welcome back Anam!

I've been gone myself for some time.

thanks a lot, Rich ... what's YOUR excuse for having been gone? <grin>


And no prob about the bran farts, Mouse .. ahppens to the best of us. I just wanna know when the real thing is up

 

[C9Mouse]

It was just a mistake.