# Image chain and licenses Order: Wikimedia Commons, Openverse, DuckDuckGo images, Bing images, licensed stock APIs last. ## Commons `GET https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/api.php` with `action=query`, `generator=search`, `gsrsearch` set to the query, `gsrnamespace=6`, `prop=imageinfo`, `iiprop=url|size|mime|extmetadata`, `format=json`. Creator is `extmetadata.Artist.value` stripped of HTML; license short name is `extmetadata.LicenseShortName.value`; license URL is `extmetadata.LicenseUrl.value`. All three are computable per file; missing license means the file is unusable. ## Openverse `GET https://api.openverse.org/v1/images/` with `q`. Read creator, license, and the direct foreign URL per result. ## Fallbacks DuckDuckGo and Bing image pages parse like their web variants and return thumbnail URLs; treat licenses as unknown and prefer them only for non-published working material. Stock APIs come last and only with a configured key; their license terms ride with the file record. ## Rules Download bytes locally for every published image. Record creator, source page URL, direct file URL, and license per file. Render the required credit line under each published figure. Never hotlink random web images into a deliverable.