A Little Perspective…

As the old saying goes, “You get what you pay for!” Of course, that’s not always the case. Sometimes you pay for something and end up getting ripped off. Other times, you find ‘gold’ at no out-of-pocket cost to you–it’s a gift. We’ve all had those experiences, good and bad. Hopefully, everything evens out in the end.

It’s no different with Christmas clip art as with any other commodity, you generally get what you pay for. There are numerous Christmas clip art sites on the Web, but they seem to fall into one of 3 categories:

• They are all free — You may find some ‘gold’ while prospecting through all those images, but too many are usually of lower quality in design and resolution (what I’ll call ‘tin’).
• Some are free, and some are not — It’s simple, the ‘tin’ is free, but the ‘gold’ isn’t. It’s an effective hook because they ALWAYS show you the ‘gold’.
• Nothing is free — You’re paying for all the ‘gold’, ‘gold ore’, ‘silver’ and ‘tin’! (Please do not steal clip art!)

Now I realize that what I just stated isn’t a perfect analogy, but you get the point. There’s another old saying that also comes into play, ‘One man’s trash is another man’s treasure’. When my daughters were younger, their tastes in jewelry and clothing often cracked me up; it was gaudy and outlandish (in my opinion). However, I would never convey that to them. They thought they were beautiful, and they WERE (outlandish getup or not)! It all came down to a matter of personal taste–What they saw in that stuff, not me.

Now, you might be asking, “What did you mean by ‘gold ore’?” These are images that, with a little refining (resizing, reformatting, cropping, etc.) and targeted application, you finally get your hoped-for results.

Going For the ‘Gold’!

Before you do anything, you must first remember that the ‘best and beautiful’ usually comes at a cost, and that includes cash! Please don’t expect something for nothing. Others have invested their own time and money.

Now the process is pretty simple, you need to search for it. No, I’m not trying to be coy. You can easily find Christmas clip art, but to find a ‘great’ gallery, it either falls into your lap (rarely) or you search for it. Here are a few tips:

• Be as specific as possible and place your search terms in quotes. For instance, “nativity clip art” might work better for you than just entering ‘Christmas clip art’. If you search for “great christmas clip art”, expect to get a ton of results. You don’t expect people to market “hideous Christmas clip art”, do you? -BTW, I just did a search on that phrase and Google found no results! (thankfully)-
• Look for ‘public domain’ or ‘royalty-free’ clip art, which typically means that you can use it as much as you want with only a one-time fee. Please read the licensing agreement that should accompany the clip art. You generally cannot resell it!
• And finally, check the file formats before you buy. Most should come as JPG/JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP, or a combination of these, which will satisfy nearly all applications with a little editing. Vector and layer formats such as EPS, PSD, and WMF are not as widely accepted as the other formats and normally require more specialized editing software.

That’s basically it! So go for the gold for a great image-filled holiday season!

To discover 3 FREE graphics editing tools and the ultimate Christmas clipart gallery I’ve ever found, visit ‘Christmas Clip Art and Free Graphics Tools’ (http://www.squidoo.com/christmas-clip-art). And have a very Merry Christmas!

Copyright (c) 2009 by Y.K. Cornelius. Reprints of Entire Article Granted.

Editable USA and Canada PowerPoint and Illustrator Royalty Free Clip Art Maps

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