This week I have made a Facebook page banner, Facebook event banners, Instagram graphics, an email header, a photo collage, a flyer that I needed in printable PDF as well as JPEG formats... And I did it all without an image editing program.

For a few years now, I have been using a website, www.Canva.com along with my other arsenal of image editing and design tools. Whether you have the Adobe Creative Suite with programs like Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign... or you are using Paint or Gimp, or you have no image editing program at all, I am confident that Canva is a great tool for anyone at any level of graphic design skill.

Canva Is free to use, and grants access to free stock images as well as paid stock images, and Canva also offers paid upgrades. When you first go to Canva, it prompts you to begin a project using one of their templates. They provide what seems like endless templates, all varying types of marketing pieces and purposes. Their categories include print design, social media, documents, personal and education, events, and ads...  From exactly sized templates for Instagram posts,  Facebook covers, YouTube channel covers, and Twitter headers, to print design pieces such as business cards, posters, flyers, and invitations... Whatever you are designing, Canva has many of options to help you along.

CLICK THE VIDEO BELOW to watch a brief TOUR & TUTORIAL at CANVA.COM:

CLICK "Create a Design" to try one yourself...

Begin by selecting a template - you can either begin with a pre-designed template, or you can begin with the blank canvas. No matter the option you choose, Canva allows you to insert different elements, such as shapes, illustrations, photographs, collage / grid layouts, charts, lines / break-lines, "frames" (shapes to contain your photographs and images, such as circles), icons, photographs, backgrounds, typography layouts... and if you can't find exactly what you want, you can upload your own graphics, your own photographs, and of course your own logo, to incorporate in your design! Once elements are part of your design, you can adjust image/photo scale, position, rotation, filters (like Instagram), adjustments (such as brightness, contrast, saturation, etc.), crop, flip (mirror image horizontally or vertically), and transparency. And text elements have many familiar adjustments too, such as font family, color, and letter & line spacing, to name a few.

When your design is finished, you simply select the download arrow, and it will suggest a variety of options for download format, such as PNG, JPG, PDF standard, PDF print, or animation (MP4/GIF).

For ease of access, you can connect your Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube accounts for direct access to your custom photos, images, and videos.

Looking for a little more? Canva also offers a "Brand Kit" section where you can define your go-to brand colors, fonts, and various log formats, and they also have "Design School", which shares various educational presentations to help you get your footing in both Canva and graphic design in general. And though I've never used it, I'm now feeling really tempted to check out their Canva For Work Bundle, which unlocks awesome tools such as Animation Pro, Organization Pro, Brand Kit, Font Pro, Magic Resize, Images Pro, and Transparent Background!

If you haven't heard of Canva, or have yet to take the time to try it,
I encourage you to experiment a little! Tag me if you share any Canva Creations!

Special thanks to Adam Stultz of Digital Consulting Media for the excellent video tutorial - he designed this video using only screen captures and my audio. Contact him for all of your video and animated needs! 

Produced and Animated by Adam Stultz of Digital Consulting LLC
www.digitalconsultingllc.com