This page brings together our best resources for finding articles to enrich your study of Visual Communications, with a special subcategory for Image databases. 

Design

• Design and Applied Arts Index (DAAI)
  DAAI is the major source for design, including visual communication and graphic design. This is a Proquest Database and can be searched alongside Art Bibliographies modern if you search for the ProQuest Research Library: The Arts database.
  Tutorial
• Art full text (H.W. Wilson) (EBSCO)
  Covers major art fields including fashion, photography and design. Because it is an EBSCO database it can be searched in conjunction with Academic Search Complete. Just click the 'choose databases' link next to the search pane to combine EBSCO databases together.
• Art Bibliographies Modern
  Art Abstracts covers major art fields including fashion, photography and design. This is a Proquest Database and can be searched alongside DAAI if you search for the ProQuest Research Library: The Arts database.
• DesignInform
  DesignInform is quite specialized, offering a focused collection of full text and indexed articles from commercial art journals from the early 20th century. Of particular interest is the full text holding of the journals Commercial Art, Studio and the Craftsman - which offer briliiant period insight into poster design, the Arts and Crafts movement, early photography, as well as contemporary analysis of art movements from the period, such as cubism, futurism, and impressionism. 

Multidisciplinary

• JSTOR
  JSTOR is the primary database for design research. It spans many disciplines, primarily in the humanities and social sciences.
  JSTOR Tutorial
• Expanded Academic ASAP
  covers a wide range of subjects including design. All full text content also.
• Academic Search Premier
  covers a wide range of subjects including design and some fashion content. Because it is an EBSCO database it can be searched in conjunction with Art Bibliographies Modern. Just click the 'choose databases' link next to the search pane to combine EBSCO databases together.
  Academic Search Premier Tutorial
• Proquest Discovery
  This is Proquest Arts combined with other super databases, making for a formidably massive collection. Good for the intersection of graphic design with other fields like business, or if you are wanting PHD theses and/or news alongside journal article hits.
  Tutorial

Business

• Business Source Premier
  Useful if you are looking for articles about the advertising industry. Because it is an EBSCO database it can be searched in conjunction with Academic Search Premier and/or Art Full Text . Just click the 'choose databases' link next to the search pane to combine EBSCO databases together
  ABI Inform Global
  Useful if you are looking for articles about the advertising industry. This is the Business arm of the Proquest Discovery database.

Images

• Academic Search Complete - Tick the 'image quick view' box before searching to return only matches that contain diagrams or illustrations
• Ad*Access
  Images and database information for over 7,000 advertisements printed in U.S. and Canadian newspapers and magazines between 1911 and 1955.
• Advertising in America: 1850 - 1920
  Over 9,000 images, with database information, relating to the early history of advertising in the United States.
• ArtStor -  Is a purely image database. It doesn't contain animation cells but does contain art and design content that may inspire you.
• Compfight - A search engine for visual inspiration and free stock photos for the advertising community including images of creative commons and public domain.
• Britannica Image Quest - Is a mighty database containing an enormous resource of images you can reuse in your assignments. It contains pictures from Getty, The British Museum, the Encyclopedia Britannica and many more.
• Proquest Discovery - Is the best superdatabase for design, and has an image restriction feature available from advanced search under 'figures and tables'. It has a 'save to presentation' option also.
  Tutorial
• Tineye - Is a reverse image search engine built by Idée currently in beta. Give it an image and it will tell you where the image appears on the web.