What is clipart: 6 Uses, and where to get free clipart

The term clipart is one that’s very common among designers, and it’s used to refer to an electronic graphic or image. Clipart, illustrations, and pictures now come in different varieties, and they are also applied in so many ways today. Among the common uses of clip art include desktop publishing, scrapbooking, printed publications, advertising, and flyers.

But what exactly is clip art? They are basically collections of images, mostly pre-made images that are used to support or illustrate different types of information. The information can be electronic or for printing. Regardless of the type of information, it will most likely require some form of computer graphics. These graphics come in many types and categories, including borders, sketches, photo clips, backgrounds, and cartoons.

A collective name for these computer graphics is what we refer to as clip art. Clip arts come in different categories and file types, but the most common of these categories and file types are Vector and Bitmap. Another thing to note is that they usually have licenses, which may vary depending on the source.

There are so many things to know about clipart, and you’ll find all the useful information as you read on. Among what we’d cover in this article include the uses of clip art, how you can get royalty-free clip art, and a comparison of clip art and vector.

Brief history of clipart

We all know clip art to be that simple and cool digital art illustration that we run to whenever we need some form of graphic on our project. However, what many don’t know is that clip art has been around for many years now, even before the era of computer technology.

The word clip art was derived from cutting out images from different prints and using the cut-out pieces in new publications or projects. It was basically a form of collage, as many would say. This was a very common practice, and it was specially applied in books for people to buy and read. The amazing thing is that most of these books were going to be clipped and used again in different ways.

An example of a popular clip art book is the “Dover Clip Art Series,” and these books are still being sold in many stores today, which is just amazing. After a while, a huge milestone got everyone surprised, and this was the success of the Apple Macintosh, which introduced personal computers. This was when the true excitement actually started.

Here’s an overview of some events that transpired:

  • The first professional library for clip art was introduced in 1983
  • The invention of desktop publishing in 1984 made it possible for users to be able to use clip art technology in many ways.
  • In 1986, and even after, the need for clip art became higher, and this was primarily due to the massive need that desktop publishing created. Also, MacPaint created the ability for users to use and edit this clip art, which was a great innovation.
  • Microsoft Word in 1996 then introduced clip art in their package, although their support for these files ended in 2014.

It’s worth noting that there are so many other companies that played key roles in the development of clip art. As we suggested earlier, clip art started out as physical cuts of printed materials, but with the development of computer technology, and after they became affordable, these manual methods evolved and became fully electronic.

Today, there’s no need to cut out materials anymore. Despite the evolution of clipart, the name remained, even though it’s majorly computer graphics rather than cut-out prints.

What is the clipart file format?

Clip art is mostly available in two different forms: bitmap and vector. Bitmap images are applied in so many ways, and they mostly cover file formats like Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) and Graphics Interchange Format (GIF). The format has a fixed resolution and mostly have a rectangular shape. The images can be coloured, or with black and white pixels.

Vector files are the second clip art format, and they basically utilize mathematical formulas to displace image lines, colours, and shapes. The interesting thing about this format is that its possible to scale them to different sizes and still maintain the quality of the image. Vectors have a better quality compared to bitmap file formats. However, to edit and publish this clip art format, you may need special software.

This is just an overview of the two file formats. Let us now go deeper into each of them.

Bitmap format clipart

Bitmap files have multiple pixels, and they can be black and white or colored. It’s usually called a rasterized fine format, and a key thing about this format is that it comes in only one size. Trying to alter the size of the bitmap file will only pixelate the image. Bitmap format mostly comes in GIF, PNG, and JPEG files.

If you have a 200 x 200 px bitmap image, and you try to stretch it out on a page, you won’t be impressed at the result you’ll get as it will appear to have reduced quality.

Vector format clipart

This is a completely different and unique file format, and the unique thing about the format is that filling pixels with different colors is not applied. The format is mostly created with the aid of geometric modeling, and this simply implies the use of lines in different ways.

The lines, points, polygons, and curves are mostly drafted from different data rather than pixels, and this is the main reason why size is not a key thing for them. Therefore, if you have a 200 x 200 px clip art and you stretch it out, you can be sure that it will still look incredible. Another interesting thing about this clip art is that they come in different file formats, which can be Adobe EPS or SVG file formats.

What is clipart used for?

We have been able to cover what clip art is, its history, and the different file formats it comes in, and you might be wondering how you can use clipart. The next thing we’ll talk about is clipart usage.

If you are a designer, or you’re aspiring to become a designer, and you are wondering how you can use clipart, here are some of the common ways that you can use them:

1.      Presentations

Regardless of the type of presentation, one of the common ways that you can use clipart is for various types of presentations. With clipart, you can easily support the information that’s included in the presentation. It will also help you to lay more emphasis on different points and easily explain different terms. If you want to make your presentation more enjoyable, you might want to consider using clipart to achieve this.

What is clipart: 6 Uses, and where to get free clipart

2.      Infographics

People use infographics for different reasons, and these infographics are usually used for so many reasons. A common thing with infographics is that they also include different clipart, and the aim is to make them easily understandable. If you plan to make an infographic for any reason at all, using clipart will come in handy for you in many ways.

What is clipart: 6 Uses, and where to get free clipart

3.      Books and Magazines

Clipart makes it a lot easier for readers to navigate through books and magazines. It also increases the aesthetic of these magazines and books.

What is clipart: 6 Uses, and where to get free clipart

4.      Icons for Mobile Apps

One of the most common ways that people use clipart is as icons for mobile apps. If you’re a developer, you’ll undoubtedly get to that point where you need to create a design for your icon. What you need to achieve this is clipart, and there are different types that you can consider using.

What is clipart: 6 Uses, and where to get free clipart

5.      Branding

Another instance where clipart will come in really handy for you is when you use them for branding purposes. You can use clipart for your business logo or for any other fancy purpose. It could be for use as a character that perfectly represents your business or other branding strategy.

6.      Seasonal Occasions

The last use we’ll show you is for seasonal occasions. You can use clipart for banners, invitations, flyers, postcards, and for other similar uses. You can also use them for different types of cards or on any special occasion.

Royalty-free or Public domain clipart

This is a bit of a complicated question as clipart can be both, depending on different factors. Clipart can be royalty-free, and it can also be public domain. It’s always best to confirm rather than make unnecessary assumptions.

Royalty-Free

This basically means that you can make use of the clipart, even without paying a dime. However, there are a few limitations that may come with using royalty-free clipart. For example, you may only be able to use the clipart for education, non-profit, and personal uses and may not be able to use them for business or commercial purposes. For these commercial uses, you may need to obtain a full license before you can use the clipart for such purposes.  

Public Domain

In this instance, the rights of creation or clipart are waived, inapplicable, expired, or fortified. This implies that there is no intellectual property right to the clipart, and as such, you can freely use them as it pleases you.

How to get royalty free clipart

We have been able to cover basically everything that you should know about clipart, from what they are, to the different formats available, how you can use them, and the difference between royalty-free clipart and clipart from the public domain.

With this, you might be wondering how you can get royalty-free clipart to use for your project. Continue reading to find out how:

illustAC

What are clipart: 6 Uses, and where to get free Clipart

Our favourite place to get all the royalty-free clipart that you want, regardless of what you want it to be, we recommend checking the options available on illustAC. This is a platform where you’ll find different creations from some of the best artists in different parts of the world.

The amazing thing is that you can use all the clipart that you find on this platform for both personal and commercial uses. Rest assured that you won’t run short of clipart as there are different contributors that constantly add new clipart on a daily basis.

On illustAC, you’ll find different clipart available in both bitmap file format and vector file formats as well. Therefore, you can download the images on illustAC as PNG, JPEG, GIF, EPS, and so many other file formats.

VectorStock

What are clipart: 6 Uses, and where to get free clipart

VectorStock is a professional stock agency and one of the best Stock Clipart Websites. Designed specifically to showcase the best images, graphics, icons, and illustrations of Vector only, they are all royalty-free and available for download at surprisingly low prices. The file can be downloaded as a zipped EPS archive. After decompressing, you will need vector editing software such as Adobe Illustrator.

Their goal is to provide the best vector at the best price. Represents only vector files, not bitmap images (such as digital photographs). Top graphic designers and illustrators around the world are contributing to the ever-growing vector library.

Conclusion

These are some of the most important things to know about clipart. In this article, we have been able to cover the most important things to know about clipart. This includes their history and how they came to be, the different formats in which they are available, the common ways people use them, and most of all is, the different places where you can get clipart from.

Today, there are so many different websites and platforms to get these computer graphics from, but one of the most common places to get them from is illustAC, and you can be sure that you’ll get the exact thing you are looking for.

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