Stock.xchng is one of the best “go to” places online for royalty-free images. The site has been around since 2001, allowing users to share quality images with the general public.

Some photographers/artists prefer to be alerted to the public use of their images and artwork. This is not a bad price to pay for the use of a high-quality image, in my opinion. When requested by the photographer, a notice will appear below the image such as the one below:

Standard restrictions apply and -user- must be notified and credited when using the photo for any public work.

If you download many images, how do you remember which of those images will require notice to the photographer? There are actually a couple of easy ways to handle this.

Separate the images

Downloaded images that need notification can be saved in their own folder. This is a simple and convenient method. However, splitting up a batch of images slated for one project can quickly become cumbersome when you would like to quickly browse through all the images.

Mark the images by name

A preferred method is marking the names of the images so that images needing notification stand out more. This is best demonstrated in “detail view” when browsing files on one’s computer. Try one of the two following methods for naming files when downloading:

Original file name: 249456_valentine_002.jpg

New file name: 249456_valentine_002_CREDIT.jpg

New file name: 249456_valentine_002-(_credit_).jpg

This method works just as well for photos requiring notification of public use and/or written credit for public use.

How do you remember to give credit for Stock.xchng images?