Today’s post covers tools that allow for a little more design freedom. Both sets of tools are easy-to-use and enable newbies to jump right in but today’s provide more advanced design options to make newbies and veterans of the design world happy.
Yesterday, I likened those tools to baking pre-made frozen cookie dough. These tools are more like baking cookies from scratch. Either way you can get the job done and even experienced bakers sometimes like to use quick solutions.
Best Software for Those Who Like Design Options
Pablo and Spark are great for people who like to know what looks good but don’t want to be troubled by a lot of options. If you love to design and want something more robust, take a look at these options:
Canva
Canva has two versions. The “free” version of Canva and Canva for Work, which we’ll get to in a bit. Canva allows you to create stunning designs by using their templates or creating your own. You can also upload images or use theirs. One of the things that makes this software so easy is that it allows you to select the appropriate size for what you’re designing. Want to create a Twitter post? No problem. How about a Facebook cover? Easy. No more searching the internet to find the right size for each platform you’re creating for. It’s important to note, Canva is free to use but there is a charge associated with certain templates and photos.
Canva for Work offers the same capabilities as Canva but also a few more. Here’s why a lot of marketers and designers choose the work (paid) version instead of the free one. That middle highlighted feature can save you a lot of time when you’re creating images for multiple platforms.
Adobe Creative Suite
Adobe Creative Suite is what most designers use and it’s an umbrella term that encompasses InDesign and Photoshop as well as many other software tools. It’s not cheap but it is robust and the Adobe Cloud pricing allows you to select the software you need or bundle multiple tools and pay monthly.
Best Software for Specific Needs
Piktochart
Piktochart is ideal for chambers that want to take stats and data and create memorable images and infographics from them. It allows you to produce engaging graphical depictions of your data without hiring a designer.
Picbow
Picbow helps you create collages of images through easy-to-use templates. This can be ideal when you have several pictures you want to share, like in the case of an event, or if you can’t decide which one is best for your chamber holiday card.
Background Eraser
Ever have the perfect shot but a not so perfect background? Or maybe you need to take a logo that has a background color you don’t want. Enter Background Eraser. This mobile app for Apple and Android can quickly give you just the image you want and none of the background “noise.” PicMonkey, mentioned in yesterday’s blog, features a background eraser too.
WordSwag
Add text to your images with WordSwag. This fun app for Apple and Android has quotes, jokes and text layouts.
Most of these tools are inexpensive, or free, and are very easy to learn. Just visit their site and begin experimenting. You’ll be impressed with the designs you create and how your audience responds to them.
By Christina R. Green with help from Norma Davey