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The Best Online Vector Illustration Resources
June 4th, 2008 in Product Reviews
by: Matthew Griffin
It's not often that you find a web designer who's an amazing illustrator. It's generally the job of the web designer to take a lot of graphic details and form them into a cohesive unit. Still, web designers are often expected to do it all—it's just the nature of the job. That's why it's important to have a good list of resources for vector artwork to pull from when you need it. Well placed vector artwork can liven up a design and give it just the spark it needs to set it apart from the competition. Here are a few of the top sites for searching and downloading vector art.
1. iStockPhoto.com
iStockPhoto has grown tremendously in the last few years. It started as a user-contributed stock photo catalog and eventually grew to include video and vector artwork. Their selection is great and it's always growing because the iStockPhoto community is actually providing the artwork. Their prices are reasonable (though they've gone up recently). A full-size vector image costs $10. Not bad when you consider the quality of the work.
2. VectorStock.com
VectorStock is great because it specializes in vector images. Just like iStockPhoto, they get their images from a long list of independent artists. Anytime you're looking for icon sets, VectorStock is the place to start. Their list of icons sets seems endless. Also, they have a graduated price scale ranging from $1 for simple vector images to $10 for more complicated work. The search options on VectorStock could use some improvement; iStockPhoto definitely has them beat there. But overall VectorStock is a great site.
3. ShutterStock.com
ShutterStock is a lot like iStockPhoto in that it carries both stock photographs and stock illustrations. The size of their catalog easily competes with iStockPhoto and VectorStock but their pricing is based on a monthly subscription rather than a per-download scheme. Their subscriptions start at $249/mo. and go up. According to their sign-up page, $249/mo. gets you up to 25 downloads per day. That comes out to 750 downloads per month. If you're working for a large design company, ShutterStock could be pretty cost effective, but if you're an independent designer or work on a small team, iStockPhoto or VectorStock is the way to go.
I think this short list should give you a good place to start. Of course, there are other sites that provide similar services, but these three are way ahead of the pack.
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