A Useful Guide to Free Photos, Media & More

CREATIVE MARKET

CREATIVE MARKET

www.CreativeMarket.com

Another one of my "Go-To" sites is Creative Market, which is a platform for "handcrafted, mousemade design content from independent creatives around the world."

All content is for sale, but you can make a free account and every Monday, enjoy six FREE downloads! These downloads vary from illustrations to photographs to code snippets to entire website themes.

How cool is that?

Of course, this free incentive leads to purchases, but they're often inexpensive. They're also gorgeous. The artists, artisans and coders who sell their content through Creative Market are vetted by the company, and the outlet enables the creatives to make money doing what they're passionate about—art.

I put an alert on my Google Calendar so every Monday morning, I get an email with the link to https://creativemarket.com/free-goods. I stash these items in my Google Drive, in a folder I've named STOCK IMAGES & MEDIA. When I need an item, I can browse my Google Drive folder. If I'm working with someone, I can share the Google Drive folder with them, and they can access images on their own.

By creating a good habit of checking the website every week for the past few years, I've accumulated an extensive library of stock images. These are at my fingertips.

One problem with this is I can spend a bit of time browsing and organizing my "Stash" instead of working. Sometimes, I suppose, I use the excuse of organizing when I'm looking to avoid a task. It's more fun to look at nice objects and covet my hoard than it is to get to work.

Creative Market boasts 2 million members and its sellers can earn 70 percent on each sale. Also, Creative Market does not put a cap on how many items someone can sell or the price. If you're a creative, there's nothing to lose in letting Creative Market help promote your work, and since you know the value of your work you can keep control over product prices and change them at anytime.

I like companies that help facilitate the movement of goods between creative maker and customer, and I especially like the Free Monday concept.