Yes, we all know about searching for images on Google… so what makes this special enough to be in our top three? The answer to that question is… our favorite reverse image search app, and this feature can be invaluable in more ways than one.
When clients hire us to do a design for them, be it web or print, they sometimes come to us with images they have found and would like to use. Occasionally those images are not high enough resolution to produce a quality end product. If the client has taken the photos themselves we will simply ask them provide a higher resolution version, but if they found it online and don’t know where the image originated we can utilize reverse image search to find it. This works shockingly well! Once we have found the original image we can get it in a higher resolution format to ensure our client is receiving the quality design they expect.
Copyright also comes into play for graphic design and it is something to be taken seriously. We can’t just use any image our clients bring to us… sometimes those images are someone else’s intellectual property and we must pay for the use through stock photo sites, or directly to the artist (or otherwise get permission). It is difficult to do that if you have no idea where the image came from. With reverse image search you can easily find the source of images you would like to use to ensure you are using them legally.
Creative people on the World Wide Web, or even people who share photos on social media sites, will undoubtedly be faced with copyright issues of their own at one point or another. Reverse image search can be used to find out if other people are using your art/images without your permission. This is important to know because the risk of someone stealing an image from your website and using it to profit is actually quite high. Most artists and designers I know who maintain a strong web presence do a monthly reverse image search to combat this issue.
Google has made this feature self explanatory to even the most inexperienced users and can be easily done from your Mac or PC using the Google Chrome browser.
Through the Chrome app for Smartphones has not yet integrated this feature there are apps available for both Android and Apple IOS that work with Google to do reverse image searches. Both function in the same way the reverse image search works on the browser, and are quite easy to figure out.

