I've been resource gathering for YEARS so now I am going to share my dragons hoard
Floorplanner. Design and furnish a house for you to use for having a consistent background in your comic or anything! Free, you need an account, easy to use, and you can save multiple houses.
Comparing Heights. Input the heights of characters to see what the different is between them. Great for keeping consistency. Free.
Magma. Draw online with friends in real time. Great for practice or hanging out. Free, paid plan available, account preferred.
Smithsonian Open Access. Loads of free images. Free.
SketchDaily. Lots of pose references, massive library, is set on a timer so you can practice quick figure drawing. Free.
SculptGL. A sculpting tool which I am yet to master, but you should be able to make whatever 3d object you like with it. free.
Pexels. Free stock images. And the search engine is actually pretty good at pulling up what you want.
Figurosity. Great pose references, diverse body types, lots of "how to draw" videos directly on the site, the models are 3d and you can rotate the angle, but you can't make custom poses or edit body proportions. Free, account option, paid plans available.
Line of Action. More drawing references, this one also has a focus on expressions, hands/feet, animals, landscapes. Free.
Animal Photo. You pose a 3d skull model and select an animal species, and they give you a bunch of photo references for that animal at that angle. Super handy. Free.
Height Weight Chart. You ever see an OC listed as having a certain weight but then they look Wildly different than the number suggests? Well here's a site to avoid that! It shows real people at different weights and heights to give you a better idea of what these abstract numbers all look like. Free to use.
since i’ve been using csp a lot more now i thought i’d make a post of the assets i use the most for ppl looking for good stuff!
general brushes:
Pen + Caspar Pen (かしペン+カスレかしペン) (my fav pen for sure)
Erase Along Edge (YOU NEEED THIS ERASER YOU NEED IT!!!)
Freehand Style Brush Set (フリーハンド風ブラシセット) (cant recommend this one highly enough, i use it for all my backgrounds)
Bong pen
OBONGBONG’S PEN
Halftones (スルスル塗れる5線刻みトーンブラシ)
A non-shin pen (しんでないペン)
SU-Cream Pencil
Noisy Ink Brush v2
Simple Retro Halftone Brushes
Smeared Paintbrush (べっとり絵筆)
A breather pen (一息ペン)
Aj’s Pencil Set
Watercolor set (수채화 세트)
T-marker Wind Brush Set (Tマーカー風ブラシセット)
Watercolor marker ▲ ■ and texture set (水彩マーカー●▲■とテクスチャーセット)
special effect and decorative brushes:
Tights Pen (タイツペン)
Glitch Brushes 2
(彩塵ブラシ(Prism Dust)
Hand-painted effect set No. 2 (手描き効果セットNo.2)
Oriental Emblem 11-20 (동양 문양 11-20) (this creator has so many amazing assets ive downloaded them all)
Ribon brushes (りぼんブラシ)
Lace Set レース セット
Ornate lace
Bramble
(rose-玫瑰叢)
Loose hand-painted sprinkle brush (ゆるゆる手描きのふりかけブラシ)
Bush pen (수풀 펜)
Fantasy Papers
Pearl Brush (真珠ブラシ)
gradient maps:
Gradient map set for hologram (홀로그램용 그라데이션 맵 세트)
Yunywave★ Gradient Set
cb gradients 3
ONG SET
3D:
The Only Perspective Grid You Need!
3d sketch head
Movable horse 1.8 A (可動のお馬 1.8a)
Sitting poses collection (便利かもしれない座りポーズ集)
misc:
Raiku RGB Shift
Hand-drawn Rags tool Set (手描きのボロ線ツールセット)
VHS action set
literally most things that people write off as just ‘textures’ to use in graphics are stolen & unsourced material created by artists or photographers NOT meant to be used as elements in projects without royalty payments. you can say ‘it’s just random tumblr posts they don’t care’ but you wouldn’t want someone to take your work and edit into their work so they can be praised for their beautiful style and creativity even if they just post it on social media w/o profit, would you?? so maybe if you browse pinterest or google images for pictures without finding the original source, you’re using images that you’re not allowed to use without realizing it.
you see it on here a lot especially in (i won’t link anything but i’m sure you know what i mean) those album track ‘aesthetics’ posts, au ‘aesthetic’ posts (you see these less in kpop, but where people use non-royalty free images to kinda craft a visual au), and even just rather typical graphics that have a lot of ‘texture’ elements. and texture packs too!! that’s often where the problem starts; people just collect images (often literal art), compile them in a folder w/o sources, then insist no one can repost those images w/o crediting the person who compiled them. what???
SO may i suggest some of my fave places you can get FREE, ROYALTY-FREE elements that are totally legal to use
creativemarket has 6 free high-quality resources (textures, brushes, fonts, etc), different every week! wow awesome i check it every week
search ‘freebie’ on behance. awesome stuff!!! lots of v nice templates textures and fonts
mockup zone freebies
unsplash: tons of very nice free photographs, not shitty stock photos
pexels: same idea. + they have an adobe plugin so you can get photos without closing your editor damn nice
pixelsquid is a super cool free program (again w a ps plugin that i love) with lottts of super cool hq 3d elements!
as to not make this too long: spoongraphics, lostandtaken (textures galore), pixeden, freebiesbug.
Horns are tough since they’re complex 3D shapes that often overlap. Until you’re comfortable with them I’d highly suggest always looking up ref pics of the type you want or try to buy a set so you can move them around to see how perspective distorts them.
Kissclipart and kissPNG - more vectors and clipart (often transparent!)
Getdrawings - simplistic images and drawing tutorials
Gumroad - photoshop brushes (and more)
Canva - needs login but has lots of templates
Library of Congress - historical posters and photos
NASA - you guessed it
Creative Commons - all kinds of stuff, homie
Even Adobe has some free images
There are so many ways to make moodboards, bookcovers, and icons without infringing copyright! As artists, authors, and other creatives, we need to be especially careful not to use someone else’s work and pass it off as our own.
Please add on if you know any more sites for free images <3