Finding Images: Citing Images

MLA Style (8th edition)

When creating a citation for an image for your Works Cited, you should use the following elements when possible:

• Artist or creator's name (last name first; skip this section if no artist or creator is listed)
• Title of the work, italicized
• Date created
• Medium (photograph, digital image, etc.)
• Website where you found the image, italicized
• URL of the website (do not include the http:// portion)
• Date accessed (viewed)

A sample citation from the ImageQuest database:

Penguins. Photograph. Britannica ImageQuest, Encyclopedia Britannica, 25 May 2016. quest.eb.com/search/149_2091418/1/149_2091418/cite. Accessed 6 Oct 2017.

Chicago Style (16th edition)

You may create a note for your illustrations when using Chicago Style.

• Figure number
• Artist or creator's name 
• Title or brief description, italicized
• Date created
• Medium (usually photograph or digital image)
• Website or database, in italics
• URL of website where the image was originally shown
• Date accessed

The citation will typically look like this:

Figure 1. John Smith, John, Statue of Liberty, 2012. Photograph.   http://www.statueofliberty.org (accessed July 4, 2017).

APA Style (6th edition)

Use the following elements when creating a reference in APA Style:

• Artist or creator's name (last name, first initial)
• Date image was created (in parentheses)
• Title or brief description, italicized followed by [Digital image] or [Photograph]
• URL of website where the image was originally retrieved

Smith, J. (2017, January 5). Statue of Liberty [Digital image]. Retrieved from www.statueofliberty.org