What a great thread! It'd excellent to find other artists here!
Just a general warning to budding artists: Be careful when copying photos you find online or in books/magazines. Especially places like google's image search. Most of them are copyrighted.
What this means is that it is totally okay to draw/copy the image to learn from! Nothing wrong with that. But, when you
publish the image, you can be infringing on the other person's copyright, even if you give them credit. When it comes to the internet,
posting the image anywhere in public is considered publishing! Even here on BYC. So please be careful. Copying the images that belong to other people and then posting them can also be disrespectful, too.
So what can you do? Well the great thing about the internet is that it is full of resources! Here are a few:
Go to Flickr.com and use their 'advanced search' option. At the bottom you will see options for Creative Commons images. These are images that people share willingly and are saying, "Yes you are allowed to use them in this way!". Check off the option to search for "Creative Commons" images only and then also check "Find content to modify, adapt, or build upon". Search away and find all sorts of great photos you can use without the risk of infringing on someone's rights or making them mad!
Go to deviantart.com .. on the left column, click on 'resources and stock images'. There are now many categories on the left column that you can select from and search in!! These are all resources and images that people are sharing with you so that you can create art with them. Some have specific requirements, so under each image that you want to use, read the description to check if there are any rules or not. There are thousands and thousands of images here!!
Go to
http://www.wetcanvas.com/RefLib/ ... this is a library where people have uploaded photos JUST for artist to use as reference! How cool is that! Some request that you credit the original photographer.
Notice that some creative commons images request that you give credit to the original photographer/artist. This is a fair and polite thing to do.
I hope this helps someone!
