Unsplash API - Access specific photo by id

Question

I want to access a specific photo via the Unsplash API and a given photo ID. Unfortunately my approaches didn't succeed and it seems that no other person on google tried it yet.

Prerequisite

• Register at unsplash developers to get your access key.

Unsplash API Documentation

As stated here:

Endpoint: https://api.unsplash.com/

GET /photos/:id

Provide as a parameter the photo's id as well as your access key:

• Example photo: https://unsplash.com/photos/nDV6ahWLvEg
  • Last part is the photo id (I assume, based on readings I did): nDV6ahWLvEg
• Provide your access key as client_id, e.g. 123123123123

My full GET string:

https://api.unsplash.com/photos/:id?id=nDV6ahWLvEg&client_id=123123123123

Error Response

I always get an 404 - Couldn't find photo. Authorization works, tried this with other unsplash endpoints. Tried to access it via python ´request` package and Insomnia (REST Client), both the same error. Tried also the "collections endpoint" who also needs an id (collection id) - error 404.

I assume that I do something wrong with the :id ? id = ...

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Has anybody an idea? Thanks.

Answer 1

RESTful API can make use of different types of parameters, e.g.

• Query parameters: they appear at the end of the URL after the question mark
• Path parameters: they are added in the path of an endpoint just before the question mark

The Unsplash API makes use of both types of parameters. client_id is a query parameter while id is a path parameter. You can recognize this by the colon (:) used in the documentation (/photos/:id).

Thus you must replace :id with the actual photo id. You request looks then like:

https://api.unsplash.com/photos/nDV6ahWLvEg?client_id=YOUR_ACCESS_KEY