Skip to main content

Finding an unrestricted image to use is simpler with new Creative Commons search

creative commons new advanced search 21958495  holding laptop mouse
Karuna EM / 123RF
Searching for images with a creative commons license may soon be a much simpler task. On Tuesday, the non-profit Creative Commons launched a new beta version of an advanced image search platform.

Nearly 600,000 people use the organization’s current tool every month, but the system lacked an advanced search option to filter those results. Now, the beta version of the search upgrade allows users to narrow their searches by the type of institution releasing the images, as well as image titles, creators, and tags. The new options mean users can choose to search only museum archives instead of Creative Commons licenses from platforms like Flickr and 500px or to search for an image by a particular photographer.

More: New plug-in targets stereotyped search results to encourage more female engineers

“There is no ‘front door’ to the commons, and the tools people need to curate, share, and remix works aren’t yet available,” CEO Ryan Merkley wrote. “We want to make the commons more usable, and this is our next step in that direction.”

Along with the search filters, the new platform adds a social element — users can create lists and share them on social media. Users can also tag and mark images as favorites, as well as saving searches to return to later.

Giving credit to those image’s creators also gets a bit simpler with the upgrade — the new search offers a one-click option that formats the details to copy and paste the credits.

The beta launch includes a small portion of the organization’s directory with images from Flickr, 500px, the Rijksmuseum, the New York Public Library, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. That “small portion,” however, already includes about 10 million works.

The search upgrade is currently only in beta — the organization is asking for feedback on the new features to continue to hone the system before an official launch. As the system is refined, the organization says they expect to add more media sources to the search, as well as types of media beyond photographs, such as music, and additional features.

Editors' Recommendations

Hillary K. Grigonis
Hillary never planned on becoming a photographer—and then she was handed a camera at her first writing job and she's been…
Fujifilm’s successor to the wildly popular X100V has just landed
fujifilm unveils x100v successor x100vi

FUJIFILM X100VI Promotional Video/ FUJIFILM

Fujifilm has finally unveiled the successor to its super-popular X100V camera.

Read more
How to download Instagram photos for free
Instagram app running on the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5.

Instagram is amazing, and many of us use it as a record of our lives — uploading the best bits of our trips, adventures, and notable moments. But sometimes you can lose the original files of those moments, leaving the Instagram copy as the only available one . While you may be happy to leave it up there, it's a lot more convenient to have another version of it downloaded onto your phone or computer. While downloading directly from Instagram can be tricky, there are ways around it. Here are a few easy ways to download Instagram photos.

Read more
Astronaut captures stunning images of a snowy Grand Canyon
A snow-covered Grand Canyon seen from space.

In the final days of his six-month stint aboard the International Space Station (ISS), Danish astronaut Andreas Mogensen took some time out of his science work to snap some striking photos of a snow-covered Grand Canyon.

The images were captured from the station in recent days as it orbited Earth at an altitude of around 250 miles.

Read more