11 Quality Free Creative Resources for Your Blog or Biz

With so much content on the web, it is important for your brand to look coherent and standout from the crowd. Selecting beautiful photography, graphics and fonts is essential when building a blog or business website. Many creative resources, like good stock photography, can be expensive, but in the last few years. There are lot of different websites that have amazing and free photography, fonts and graphics. Keep on reading to learn about my favorite quality free resources for my business.

PHOTOGRAPHY

Always be aware of the type of license any stock photo you use has attached to it. Many use Creative Commons Licensing. Remember, never use a photo that you do not have permission to use – it could result in big trouble for you.

1 | Negative Space – Sign up for their email list and get notified when new photos arrive on the site each week. There is a large variety of high quality photos ranging from travel to food to lifestyle that can all be used without copyright restriction.

2 | Pexels – This site has a great selection of free stock photos (over 3,800) that can be downloaded for personal and commercial use. They spell out their license agreement out very clearly, which I appreciate, because it can get confusing. How fun is this cupcake photo!?!

3 | Unsplash – I’ve been receiving Unsplash’s photo email every 10 days and I always find myself downloading a photo or two. Like Negative Space and Pexel, Unsplash is licensed under Creative Commons Zero, which means you can use the images without restriction.

4 | Death to the Stock Photo – I have been on Death to the Stock Photo’s list since they began in 2014 and I love getting their beautiful images in my inbox. If you haven’t signed up, do it now so you too can receive 10 images in your inbox each month. Death to the Stock Photo was started by two photographers,David Sherry and Allie Lehman from The Wonder Jam design studio. (She talks all about Death to the Stock Photo on the Creating Your Own Path podcast, so be sure take a listen.) These photos have a different type of license, so be sure to check it out.

5 | Stock Gallery – Looking for beautiful lifestyle photos that not everyone is using? Then check out the ColorStockGallery. It is a paid service, but at $19 a month, it’s a total deal. There are over 1,400 photos to choose from. Don’t forgot to sign up for the newsletter for free monthly stock photos!

GRAPHICS

6 | Creative Market – This is my go to site for reasonably priced fonts, vector graphics, WordPress themes and more. My favorite thing about Creative Market are the six free downloads available each week. Sign up for an account so you can download your favorites each week.

7 | Vecteezy – Every once in a while, I am in need of a vector graphic for a project and Vecteezy is were I start. It’s great for seasonal vectors, like pumpkins and ghosts for Halloween.

8 | Subtle Patterns – If you are looking for a simple, subtle background for a website or design project, don’t miss Subtle Patterns. There are over 400 different patterns to download load in png format so you can easily add them to your projects.

FONTS

9 | Lost Type Co-Op – Looking for a cool font? Check out Lost Type Co-Op. They have created blogger favorites like Lavanderia, Homestead and Wisdom Script. While you can technically download their beautiful fonts for free, I recommend paying something, especially if you plan to use it for a logo or other widely distributed piece.

COLOR

10 | Design Seeds – This site has been one of my favorites since graduate school. If you are looking for a color palette or inspiration for a project, Design Seeds is a great place to start.

11 | COLOURlovers – Once you have your palette pieced out, I turn to COLOURlovers to perfect it. You can enter in your color values and make tweaks to your colors. COLOURlovers is another great place to go for inspiration.

Bonus

BONUS | Makerbook – Bookmark this site right away! While I have given you 10 resources, Makerbook is a directory of even more free resources for creatives. They have everything from photos to fonts to video and audio.

Incorporating some of these fantastic free resources into your blog or biz website will help make you standout from the crowd. You can also use these images for social media posts, newsletters and more. Do you have a favorite creative resource that I didn’t mention? Be sure to share it in the comments!

Have you followed me on Instagram? Follow @katiewilliamsen for a daily does of inspiration, #ladybossbiztip and more!