Library: PAPD321: Costume Design II: Finding Images

Looking for images and/or inspiration?

Explore the museum, archive, and digital collections on this page to discover images to use in design and course assignments!

Be sure to always cite and provide accurate/full attribution for any image you use.

Searching For Images & Videos

New York Public Library Photography Collections:

The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Photography Collection
The Billy Rose Theatre Division (Some items may be restricted to on-site use.)

Historic Black Hills Studios: Accessible images of the Spearfish, South Dakota Black Hills Passion Play production history

South Dakota State Historical Society Photograph Collection

British Library Images Collection

Library of Congress Photographs & Prints Collection

Google Arts & Culture

Open Verse: All Openverse content is under a Creative Commons license or is in the public domain

Flickr: Images Searchable by Date & Location (Limit to Creative Commons License)

Kanopy This link opens in a new window
Wide variety of educational films and documentaries.
Documentaries, movies viewed in the classroom up to three times are FREE, no charge to Pace! For instance, if Prof. John shows, To Educate a Girl: Empowering Women and Girls in the Developing World to his Sociology class in the classroom three times for the fall semester and shows a different film in the spring semester, there’s no charge because it was shown only three times during the academic year. However, if Prof. John decides to show it again in his spring class, then the fourth viewing triggers a purchase by Pace University.
Likewise, classes that are online will trigger a higher percentage of purchase since the fourth viewing by students in a class constitutes a purchase. This will be seen where certain documentaries or movies formulate the core part of the course that students must access.
Please note that watching films during class time keeps costs down and capitalizes on the three free movies in class.
Faculty, staff, students can view films at their leisure for free, i.e. no additional costs to Pace since the probability of a large segment of the population viewing the same movie may be low.
When the budget threshold is reached, Kanopy will notify the Library per faculty request and arrangement may be made if feasible.
National Theatre Collection This link opens in a new window
Features videos of performances from the UK's National Theatre, as well as additional materials such as prompt scripts and costume designs.

New York Public Library of Performing Arts, Theatre on Film & Tape Archive: Since 1970, the Theatre on Film and Tape Archive (TOFT) has preserved live theatrical productions and documented the creative contributions of distinguished artists and legendary figures of the theatre.

Moving Image Archive

Copyright: Accessing & Using Images

Just because you find an image online does not mean that it is free to use.

When using an image in your work, make sure it has a stated license (for example Creative Commons and Public Domain) or see if the item is covered under Fair Use.

Remember: you must also always cite an image, just as you would a work in print.

Creative Commons helps people to share their works with the world.

Creative Commons licenses are a standardized way to give others permission to share and use a piece of work. Learn more with the Creative Commons Flyer.

Depending upon when a work was created, it might be in the Public Domain.

What does it mean when a work is in Public Domain? Essentially, it means that the material in question is no longer under copyright because the copyright date has expired. This means you can reproduce the material without paying royalties and that it's generally free for you to use.

Copyright Term and the Public Domain, a guide to copyright duration created by Peter Hirtle at Cornell University, is a comprehensive and useful resource for researching a work's copyright status. You can also use the Copyright Slider from the American Library Association for quick reference for figuring out the rights and permissions for material that you are using.

As a general rule, works registered or published in the U.S. before 1927 are in the public domain.

January 1 of each year is "Public Domain Day" . Jennifer Jenkin's, Director of Duke University's Center for Study of the Public Domain published a great article about works entering the public domain in 2022. The author also makes a passionate presentation about the cons of the current length of copyright and why the public domain is so important.