Free Clip Art

Free Clip Art and Drawing Tools

A few years ago, you'd have to spend hundreds of dollars on a graphics editor and clip art package. But now there are plenty of good sources for free clip art and even drawing tools. Here are some of my favorite sources:

• FunDraw is a free web-based drawing tool, as well as a great free clip art library. And since this time of year is the big clip art season (Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas) I suggest you check it out. FunDraw is also useful for creating custom gifts. You can draw something yourself (or use the free clip art and add text), and with a few clicks it can be transferred to a shirt, mug, mousepad, or greeting card.
• Daily Clip Art is a free clip art site with images related to animals, flowers, food, music, sports, weddings and other categories. You can browse the website or sign up to receive a new clip art image daily, that can be used in your web site, schoolwork, presentations, and other projects.
• Inkscape is a free image editing and drawing program, with many of the features found in Adobe Illustrator and CorelDraw. Inkscape is open source, which means the program and the source code are freely available, and it is supported by a community of volunteer programmers. Inkscape supports many advanced SVG (scalable vector graphic) features, such as markers, clones, and alpha blending. Because its native output is the open source SVG format, files created with Inkscape can be shared with other standards-compliant image editors. And Inkscape doesn't care what kind of computer you have, with versions available for Windows (2000/2003/XP), Mac OSX, Linux, FreeBSD and other Unix-y platforms.
• The Open Clip Art Library is a library of user-contributed public domain clip art that can be freely used. There are over 7000 images available now, and artists are encouraged to upload their own images as well.

Free Stock Photos

If you don't find the image you're looking for, try an image search engine such as Google Image Search. If you're looking for free stock photos, try stock.xchng or FreeStockPhotos.com.

Just be aware that some of the images you find at these sites have copyright restrictions. Do you have a favorite site for free clip art, stock photos, or drawing tools? Post a comment below.