Where can I find orchid pictures that I can use?

[Laelia purpurata]

Thank you everyone for your helpful advise. I will definitely be posting pictures of the actual plants, and your suggestions to put a link in for the flower pictures sounds like the easiest way at this point.

And thanks too for the information on Creative Commons licensed photos, maybe I'll look into that too and just see how easy it will be.

You've all been a great help. Thanks for being willing share your advise.

[BikerDoc5968]

You are welcome to use anything on my Photobucket site... may not be much help since I don't know what you are looking for... the link is under my name

[ronaldhanko]

Originally Posted by stefpix

I am all for copyright enforcement, just saying it is not worth doing paperwork to earn some pennies. I post a lot of my photos online, now i put a watermark with my credit in the lower corner. It can always cropped out or photoshopped out. Sometimes m photos have appeared here and there and I always appreciated people that asked me. In this day and age photographs have became so available that the value really decreased. I feel these days a photographer makes money for something commissioned rather than selling through an archive. Or selling prints as artwork...

It is always best to ask.
But what would you really do or want if a stranger asked to use a photo that you took for an ebay listing?

In a listing probably I would use my photos, if i have no blooms i would put a link to IOSPE or some Wikipedia page which display the blooms
or i would consider [but unlikely do] find some generic photo with multiple blooms and crop one out so the composition/ lighting of the original photo are non existant anymore.

Well that whole issue of the Obama "Change" poster by Shepard Farey that took some generic news photo cropped Obama out and made an iconic image... ?

It's not a matter of pennies, it's a matter of using someone else's property without even asking.

[stefpix]

I meant it from the other point of you. Not from the user [abuser] but from the photographer point of view.
Asking is always the best way.
But would you let a stranger use pictures you took for some listing on ebay?
would you charge for that?

Some NY Time blog page writer wanted to use one of my photos for a art review and he said there was no budget. I asked to ask the editor if there was some way to bill a small fee.

I could not let the NY Times use photos for free.
But if it was some small blogger or zine probably I would have said it was ok.

Regarding ebay listings I do not think it is even worth to spend too much time, unless it is a big nursery that keeps using the same photo every week with new listings.

That is what I meant... Is it worth to spend time and energy because one person used a photo once on some ebay listing?

Anyway another argument for growing species: probably a lot easier to find public domain photos if you want to use them for a listing!

[BikerDoc5968]

Not to go off the deep end here... I think it is safe to say, in general, all of us are proud of the plants we grow and demonstrate this pride with the pictures we post. Whether we are "point and shoot" photographers or "professional" types, our pictures represent a piece of each one of us. It is only respectful and "politically correct" to show courtesy to the owner of that work, otherwise it is theft as Ron said. I don't copyright any of my pictures and really am not interested in compensation since I don't believe they are worthy of that level of recognition; that I receive the wonderful remarks is gratification enough for me. So go ahead and if there is something of mine you want to use, be my guest.... I would enjoy asking permission and a small caption credit would be nice, too.

[stefpix]

Yes I agree with BikerDoc. It is always good to ask as an matter of ethics and courtesy if you use someone's photo.

As an ebay example, I am wonmdering about Larry's Orchids. I bought from him and I got good plants. I do not remember seeing photos of the actual plants on his listings and I doubt the photos used were takien by him or an associate. where do those images come from? are those public domain?

[lambelkip]

Larry's Orchids gets photographs from various sites on the internet. I don't know if he asked permission for any of them.