Research Guides: Open Educational Resources: Images, Video & Audio for OERs

Adding Media to Your OER

Use openly licensed images, audio, and video to enrich your course while keeping materials free for students.

Start with trusted sources like Openverse and Wikimedia Commons, and always check license terms and attribution requirements (use TASL: Title, Author, Source, License).

Best Bets

Openverse
Search 800M+ openly licensed and public-domain images and audio from sites such as Flickr, Google Images, YouTube, and others.
Wikimedia Commons
All the media files at this site are in the public domain or have a Creative Commons license.
Unsplash
Offers a large library of high-resolution photos free to use for commercial and non-commercial projects under the Unsplash License (attribution appreciated; review license terms for restrictions).
Google Advanced Search
Google Advanced Search has a "narrow results" option to limit by usage rights.

Images

Flickr | Creative Commons
Search for photos by a specific Creative Commons license by clicking on the "Find More" link associated with each license or use the "Advanced Search" option and select the Creative Commons search box.
Pixabay
Contains millions of free images usable without required attribution.
OpenClipArt
All the clip art in this collection is in the public domain, and can be used or modified freely.

Video

YouTube | Creative Commons
To find videos with CC licenses, do a search and then use the "Filter" function to select "Creative Commons."
Vimeo | Creative Commons
Vimeo allows you to browse videos by CC license, or you can search for videos by keyword and then use the "Advanced Filters" to select the type of license.
Internet Archive | Stock Footage Collections
All videos in this collection have some type of Creative Commons license or are in the public domain.

Audio

ccMixter
Discovery site for Creative Commons–licensed music. Searchable by style, mood, and more
SoundBible
Thousands of free sound effects in WAV/MP3, with each file labeled for its license (e.g., CC Attribution 3.0 or Public Domain).
Freesound
A collaborative database of Creative Commons–licensed audio snippets, samples, and field recordings that you can search or browse.

Open Educational Resources

This OER guide is for EMU faculty and lecturers who want to find, adopt, adapt, or create no-cost, openly licensed course materials.

Adding Media to Your OER

Best Bets

Images

Video

Audio