Although graphics can take longer to prepare, they can necessary for explaining certain difficult concepts and help facilitate learning.
If you are not creating your own images (i.e. a graph, chart, or drawing) and are looking for images online, you need to carefully consider the copyright implications. You should never assume that images found online are free to use, many are in copyright. If you would like to use an image you found online in your research or teaching, you should do one of the following:
The following section details some online image repositories where you can find images that are free to use. Many have copyrighted content within as well, so always double check the rights information before using images in your work! Please note that for some of these sites you have to specify you are searching for Creative Commons and Public Domain Images.
Beware of image licensing sites, like Shutterstock or Adam, while there may be a Fair Use case for using images from these sites, the fact that they are available to license will weigh in favor of any use not being considered “fair”.
By filtering the "Usage Rights" in a Google Image search, you can see images that allow for reuse. If you are not planning on making money from or otherwise selling your poster presentation, you can select "Labeled for noncommercial reuse" to get the most results.
Wikimedia Commons is a media file repository making available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content (images, sound and video clips) to everyone, in their own language.
The National Library of Medicine's Digital Collections allow you to search for historical medical images. This resources allows you to refine your search by copyright status, and uses MeSH terminology for searching. The Images from the History of Medicine Collection (IHM) is a great collection if you are looking for vintage Chinese medicine art. These may be under copyright, so make sure to check!
The Wellcome Collection is a free museum and library that includes a huge online digital collection. Most of the resources have Creative Commons licenses, and are free to use as long as you provide attribution to the Wellcome Collection.
Flickr allows you to filter search results by license.
Some images in institutional collections, like the National Library of Medicine's History of Medicine archive, may have unclear licensing terms. You may see the license, "No Known Copyright Restrictions." In these cases, the institution believes the image to be in the public domain. For images from NLM's History of Medicine collection, they ask that if you use an image, to use the following credit: “Courtesy of the U.S. National Library of Medicine, Bethesda, Maryland.”