In this age of technology, we have access to so many photos and images right at our fingertips it is all too easy to forget the vast majority are copyright protected.

As a crafter, and especially as a blogger, I have had to educate myself on what images are fair game and which ones I shouldn’t use in my crafting exploits and posts. While I am NOT a legal professional ( so don’t go taking this as legal advice),  I wanted to share with you a few ways to get started finding public domain images that can be used in your crafts.

There are some great stock photo sites out there like Life of Pix, Pixabay, Gratisography, and Hubspot, but especially when crafting I personally find one of the easiest places to start my image search is Google.

Did you know that Google will let you filter images by copyright?

They do!

It’s not enough to rely on completely, but it can be a great place to initially find images which might fit what you are looking for and have a good chance at being legal.

So if you are new to this world of thinking about copyright infringement here is a step by step on how to start your search.

Type in whatever you are searching for pictures of in google images. In my case I was looking for dinosaurs. Then click search.

Your screen should look like this and from here you click on the Tools tab.

From here select the usage rights drop down and select “labeled for reuse with modification.

This should narrow down your images greatly.

It is often not enough to just rely on this method alone and I always highly recommend clicking on REPUTABLE links to see if any terms and other conditions apply or if its is actually free to use (some require purchase).

Be sure to check the URL first because sometimes the images are linked to sites you probably don’t want to visit!

You may be wondering why go through the trouble if it is for my own home? Or aren’t “transformative” works allowed under copyright law?

But what I’ve found through my own research is copyright law is a very complex beast. While it is highly unlikely anyone will come after you for items you make for personal use and while courts have breathed new life into transformation allowances, in my experience it is always better to err on the side of caution.

Hopefully you found this post helpful especially if you never thought about how copyrights may effect your DIY projects. Now go have fun crafting!