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Copyright-Free means you don't have to pay or ask the photographer or artist for permission to use their work. However you should still give credit (attribution). In some cases, the photographer has asked you to give credit in a specific format (eg. with a link back to a website), so please follow the instructions. 

Creative Commons (CC) is a non-profit organization that has developed a set of licenses that allows content creators to control how their intellectual property (eg. art, photos, literature, video, websites) is shared and changed (eg. remixed). These licenses can be combined, eg. Attribution No Derivatives means that you can redistribute commercially and non-commercially as long as the image is not changed and the creator is given credit. 
For more information, see: http://creativecommons.org/about/licenses

Here is an excellent article about what permissions you need to have: https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/online-images/ 

Google Image Search

1. Go to Google and click on Images or go directly to http://images.google.com
2. Click on Advanced Image Search (beside the Search Images button).
3. In the top box enter your search term, eg. Flower.
4. For good quality images: pull down the Size box and select larger than 2 or 4 MP.
5. For copyright free images: under Usage Rights select Labeled for reuse with modification. 
   If you are planning to use this for commercial purposes, choose the commercial reuse with modification.
6. Continue to customize your search using the options along the left-hand side of the page.
7. Click on the desired image and then check on the website where it appears for copyright information!
   If it comes from Flickr, page down until you see the heading License and click on the details.

Other Places to Find Copyright-Free Images

NOTE: Not all sites are totally copyright free. Some have sections within the website. 

Also, a number of sites may ask for attribution - always double check! 

• Art Institute of Chicago - https://www.artic.edu/collection - 1,000s of images under CCo license  (Public Domain Dedication, no Copyright)
• Paris Musee - many of the digital images in their collection are now in the public domain.  http://parismuseescollections.paris.fr/en 

• Bing Images -  use search features to locate copy-right free images
• Creative Commons Search tool -  https://search.creativecommons.org/  - choose your search location and keywords
• Every Stock Photo - http://www.everystockphoto.com/ - is a search engine for public domain and Creative Commons licensed pictures.
• Flickr.com -   Enter your term in the search bar at the top. Select Advanced Search, Creative Commons, then once you pick your image, open original size or large size.  You can also search on Tags only. You can also directly search Commons.
• 4 Free Photos: https://www.4freephotos.com/  
• Freepik: https://www.freepik.com/  
• Free Reference Photos for Artists - this is a Facebook group with nature photos:  https://www.facebook.com/groups/1628011010653357/
• 500 Pix:  https://500px.com/creativecommons - this is the Creative Commons page of 500px.com. Not all the images are free for use.
• Getty Images -  https://www.gettyimages.ca/ - for most of images, watermark has been dropped and a footer appears at the bottom of the pic with credit.
• Icons for Everything -  https://thenounproject.com/ 
• Library of Congress -  https://www.loc.gov/free-to-use/ 
• MorgueFile.com - Perform your basic search, then refine by size. Check the accompanying licence to make sure of how you can use the picture. Not all are copyright-free.
• Open Clip-Art: https://openclipart.org  
• http://www.photosforclass.com/  - download attributed, Creative Commons photos for school 
• PhotoPin:  http://photopin.com/ - search creative Commons photos
• Picjumbo -  https://picjumbo.com/ - free stock photos
• Picsearch -  https://www.picsearch.com/ 
• Pixabay - http://pixabay.com/en/ - free images. Caution (don't use sponsored images on top line). If you aren't logged in, then you will be limited to certain images and sizes. 
• http://images.superfamous.com/ for some beautiful, royalty-free images (just give attribution) 
• Paint my Photo - https://www.pmp-art.com/ - a social network of copyright-free images uploaded by artists. Photos of artwork are called Artwork. Photos that you can paint are called Reference.
• Photo Pin -  http://photopin.com/ - Creative Commons photos
• Pic4Carto - http://projets.pavie.info/pic4carto/ - geolocated picture viewer (not necessarily copyright free). Also see Mapillary -  https://www.mapillary.com/
• Pond 5: https://www.pond5.com/free - includes historical photos
• Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/ - free stock photos 
• Public Domain Pictures -  https://www.publicdomainpictures.net/en/ 
• Republic Domain:  http://republicdomain.com/ 
• Stockio - http://www.stockio.com  - thosands of files for personal and commercial use without attribution 
• The Noun Project -  https://thenounproject.com/ 
• TinEye: http://labs.tineye.com - search by colours! Put the word "free" in the tag box to help find free images (double-check!)  
• Unsplash: https://unsplash.com/  
• Wellcome Collection: https://wellcomecollection.org CC licensed images from historical to contemporary. Good for science and history.
• Wikimedia Commons -  https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page - database of Creative Commons images, sounds and video clips

Specialized Image Searches

• Also:  http://labs.tineye.com/multicolr lets you search by colour
• Article on uses of Reverse Image Search: http://lifehacker.com/clever-uses-for-reverse-image-search-473032092?utm_campaign=socialflow_lifehacker_facebook&utm_source=lifehacker_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

BING (Microsoft)

Screenshot from http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2013/07/use-bing-to-find-public-domain-images.html#.UdwI6JwQPRs

To see how many times an image has been copied on the Internet, check out http://www.tineye.com.