Sometimes just refreshing your imagery on your site will give it a fresh new look and feel without a huge outlay in costs.
If you are looking to refresh your site or start a new website, here are some great resources that can help and with minimal spend.
Shutterstock.com
This is a premium web resource / library of rich images. There is an option to sign up and obtain 10 free images but any more you will have to purchase. Shutterstock is the most popular global resource for photos and illustrations.
Plus points
- Select multiple sizes on download and set dimensions prior download
- A lot of the images are premium and therefore not seen on many websites
- The largest database of images
Negative points
- Subscriptions are higher than most platforms
- Some of the images are free elsewhere, so always check before purchasing.
Pixabay.com
This is a royalty-free image library where the only ask is to either sign up for a free account if you are using the largest dimensions, of the option to supply a tip to the photographer. These images can be used anywhere and the library is updated weekly with new images.
Plus points
- Free images
- Select multiple sizes on download
Negative points
- Images are seen on a lot of websites
- Search doesn’t always give you the best results, you may need to hone more on generic search terms
Freepik.com
There is a premium license cost of £9.99 per month to download their pro images and definitely worthwhile but there are alot of images, again royalty free, that you can use and the library is extensive. There is a huge amount of images to choose from.
Plus points
- Free images
- Images are less seen on other sites
- Cheap monthly plan
Negative points
- Images are all in hi res format. (huge files) that will need reformatting for web
- A lot of the good images are within their premium plan
PRO TIP: Always remember that to reduce the dimensions to your images before loading onto your site at at 72 DPI to ensure performance is not compromised.
About the Author
Stewart Vallely is the founder and creator of DESIGN BUILD WORK, he has a passion for online presence and impacting user experience. He has built up a huge amount of experience and knowledge over the last 14 years of designing award winning websites.
