I subscribe to Research Buzz which is a mailing list analyzing new web offerings and this week editor Tara Calishain mentioned a new image database:

"National Geographic has unveiled a collection of
thousands of digital images at http://www.ngsimages.com/ .
There's a log-in box on the front page but you can search
and view images without registration of any sort. "

"The search box is on the front page allows for a simple
keyword search; an advanced search link underneath allows
you to search by image orientation (portrait, landscape,
etc.) category (including animals, adventure, concept,
natural history, and world culture), media type (color,
black and white, or duotone), and license status. You can
also specify the number of results you want per page (the
default is nine.)" - Tara Calishain, Research Buzz (http://www.researchbuzz.com/)

I searched for Caesar and got 0 hits. I searched for gladiator and got 0 hits. I searched for chariot and got 0 hits. I even searched for Pompeii and got 0 hits. Finally I searched for Roman and got five pages of results - mostly the typical Colosseum, aqueducts, and forum ruins type shots although there was an interesting shot of an ancient Roman wall carving, probably from Leptis Magna, in the Castello courtyard of Tripoli, Libya. I would have preferred a closeup however. Keywords seem to be mostly geographic location rather than specific subject although I saw some of the Egyptian shots referred to sarcophagus, etc.

Pricing seems pretty steep from my inexperienced perspective. I priced out a 1/2 page size high resolution image for a textbook cover with expected sales of 10,000 and it cost over $800 (US).

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