Stock images are photographs, illustrations, computer generated images, and film footage. Many companies sell these images for personal and commercial use. Some stock image companies have collections of amazing pictures with over a million pieces. Some are so valuable and delicate that they are housed in a cave 200 ft. below the earth in Iron Mountain in Pennsylvania, where they are refrigerated…now that’s what I would call some cool images! 
Finding Stock Images on Online Sites
Most sites offer a search tool to make finding particular images under a certain category quick and easy. For instance, you can search under photographer, number of people in picture, or angle from above or below.
There are an endless variety of categories of images to search. Each image is labeled with a number of tags, which enable that image to show up when a customer searches using the words in each tag. On the Stock Image Source, we have played the role of picture hunter and collected some examples of images from a number of popular categories: cartoon pictures, pictures of animals, lion pictures, product photography, money images, and glamour images. Follow these links to see the sample images, which you can then purchase from the sites that are selling them.
Buying Images
Before buying or selling an image on one of these sites, it is important to understand two terms so you can determine how you want to purchase the piece of art. You will find these terms used on each site, so they are important to understand.
Rights Managed (RM): Rights and fees will be calculated for each project, which is determined by how you want to use the image.
Royalty-Free (RF): For a one-time flat price images can be used an unlimited number of times.
Owners of Stock Image Sites
There are many sites on which to buy art. The major stock image sites are owned by individuals or corporations. For instance, Bill Gates founded Corbis in 1989 because he believed people would put up digital artwork in their homes, while Getty Images is owned by a large corporation.
In conclusion, if you are looking for pictures to buy or sell, you don’t need to visit a bunch of photography studios; instead, you can search for stock images online. You can view most images on these sites before choosing those that fit your needs. You can show them to others if you need to before purchasing, and some sites offer a return policy if you decide the image isn’t exactly what you want.
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