Graphic design software is mostly paid and requires high-performance computers in terms of RAM and processor to use all the features offered. Insiders trust their creative plans with leading manufacturers, primarily Adobe Illustrator, but there is an alternative to try it for novice designers and artists online.
The good news is that there are many tools for creating attractive images that will stand out on social networks, and many of them are free graphic editors for drawing.
Custom application selection Image
All authors want to create an image that will attract the attention of visitors to the site and make them click likes, and continue to watch the next wonderful author’s thing. Many users do not want to spend a lot of time or money creating these images, and they are in search of a compromise.
The secret to creating images of this type lies in the fact that the Internet has many free great templates and resources for graphic editors to draw images, icons, shapes, styles of text. The most important thing is to make the right choice. When testing and evaluating applications, there are several key criteria that they must meet:
- A graphic editor for drawing should be simple enough for designers with minimal knowledge about design and its tools.
- This program should be well suited for social media marketing. Some apps are awesome, but have too many features when all you have to do is create a good image for social advertising.
- These applications should be focused on simplicity so that you do not have to spend excruciating hours on the development of each individual schedule.
- They should have smoothness and speed of processing layouts.
- Must have professional design assets. There are many graphic editors for drawing, offering templates, but often not those that will help the author to represent his brand or project well.
- The application must be multi-purpose. It is always more practical to use one tool for several purposes, such as creating email banners, postcards, blog images.
The applications included in this review of graphic editors for drawing contain templates and tools for creating not only images on social networks. They are ideal for companies and individuals who want to present their brand with professional-grade images.
Canva Graphic Template Base
Over the 5 years since its launch, more than 10,000,000 people have used Canva to work with graphic design. With hundreds of templates, as well as dozens of fonts and text styles, Canva makes it easy to create unique, high-quality images that are great for posting on social networks or on a blog.
It doesn’t matter if the author has never created images in his life. Canva boasts a simple drag and drop interface that allows even a novice to get started quickly. Both beginners and professionals alike will benefit from Canva's rich resource library and professional templates that help effortlessly create eye-catching graphics, presentations and posters.
Start with Canva canvas size choices or set your own sizes, then create your own layout or choose its giant library. The free version of Canva provides a large database of images, icons, layouts, text styles and forms for use, allows you to upload your own graphics. The premium program plan offers even more resources for design.
After a template or layout is selected, you can use drag and drop elements, add or edit text, and configure basic settings such as font, color, image filters and opacity to create a project. Canva's graphics editor for drawing on a computer offers less settings and flexibility than some tools, especially compared to leading applications such as Photoshop, but this is offset by an intuitive interface and beautiful templates. It should be noted that, since Canva has more than 10,000,000 users, the author needs to make a little more effort to customize the design to stand out among other brands using Canva.
Canva Price: free for 8000 templates, 1 GB of storage and up to 10 team members, and from $ 9.95 per month for Canva for Work user with unlimited storage, access to 300,000 resources and templates, custom fonts and transparent backgrounds.
Minimalism and modern design Adobe Spark
For those seeking the perfect balance of minimalism and design tool strength, Adobe Spark is available. Here you can choose from dozens of professional templates sorted by industry category, type of design, for example, images on social networks and Facebook covers. By choosing a layout by size, authors can customize this template with the easy-to-use Spark tools.
The options for setting the image are minimal, but there are several basic filters that allow you to do this quickly and efficiently. This is a good graphic editor for drawing for Mac computers. Unlike many tools, Spark also allows you to easily change the design layout or even the entire template from one sidebar menu, so you do not need to return to the start page if you need to fix something.
If the author is looking for inspiration, Spark offers pre-formatted text styles and designs that can be viewed with just a few clicks of the mouse in the text menu. This is a great way to get a fresh look at design and refresh your social brand on social networks using the basic drawing tools of a raster graphics editor.
Spark also provides two other types of projects: pages and videos. With Pages, you can create a unique web page that is easy to share via a direct link. Video files are created using the basic video editing application, which works as versatile as the Spark graphic design tool. And you can start with a template that helps you find the perfect solution for presentations, advertising, and more.
Adobe Spark Pricing is a free editor for basic functions, starting at $ 9.99 per month for additional features such as downloading and placing a logo, corporate templates and tools, as well as applications for desktop computers and iOS.
Quickly add Pablo images
For many, being on social media is important because of the demands of employers, a personal brand, and even a career. And most people have more important things to do than create their own branding for images on social networks for hours, it’s easier to use proven tools, for example, Pablo Pricing. Built with the social media planning tool Buffer is as minimalistic as possible, making it easy to add nice, personalized graphics to social media posts.
Pablo has only a few functions and only one workflow. Choose a template or just an image for an empty template - all projects are free. One of three sizes is chosen on Pablo, each of which is especially suitable for Pinterest, Instagram or Facebook and Twitter. Image adjustment is limited: one of several filters is pre-selected to ensure the correct level of contrast between the image and the text for three text fields.
Pablo reflects them as “Title”, “Body Text” and “End”, but you can adjust the size and font to change the text as you wish. Add one custom logo or picture, and you're done. When the author finishes his image, he can either download it by placing buffers, or share directly with Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest or Instagram.
Pablo Pricing is a completely free tool.
Desygner Mobile Development
Many users consider Desygner the best of all similar mobile apps available for iOS and Android. Desygner produces graphics on par with Canva's quality, all with a phone.
Start with a template for the selected social network or from scratch. Then they create their own design using the Desygner image library. You can create your own collection of brand assets that can be easily stored in other Desygner designer assets.
Desygner does not save on features in its mobile application. Many menus allow you to hyper-configure the image and text, while they never become cumbersome to use on a small screen. You can open the list of layers to make a selection. Deselection and reordering of image elements are performed in a few clicks.
The Desygner web application works perfectly with side menus that help you select the right design elements and effects. The tool is simpler than Canva and offers fewer templates, images, and resources thanks to a free plan. In combination with the mobile application, Desygner is becoming an excellent universal tool for creating unique professional images on social networks.
Desygner is mostly used in the free version, and those who want more advanced features should pay between $ 6.95 for additional templates and resources, such as version control.
Bright, shiny Snappa images
Snappa goes all-in in design, creating its own software for bright, brilliant images that are made as quickly and easily as possible. Although this may make authors feel somewhat minimalistic if they are used to more complex applications, the service works well.
Snappa, like many similar programs, includes a complete library of templates. They pay more attention than in other applications to the quality of the background image. With a library of free layouts, you can choose the perfect background in just a few clicks, using either the application’s images or downloading your own.
Snappa offers a side effects panel to help you create the perfect picture effects for your post, whether it’s an eclipse or a background painting, to make white text pop up or to lighten the layout, to highlight dark text. However, it is important to note that although Snappa has a library of additional graphic elements and shapes, these functions are more limited compared to other applications.
Snappa is very advanced when it comes to text. It is easily edited from the sidebar with customizable font settings, size, alignment, line spacing, transparency and an additional shadow effect. Between the switched grid view and the easy-to-search tool for placing layers in the application, there is everything you need. Having created the perfect image on social networks, you can share the image and the accompanying message or put it in the queue in the Buffer for premium users, without leaving Snappa.
Unfortunately, the free software plan is more limited than that of similar programs, allowing the author only 5 shares or downloads per month, which is not enough for many brands. And also you cannot store custom designs in the Snappa free plan. However, a free plan is a good way to test the application and see if it suits the author.
Gravit Designer to create design from scratch
It has all the necessary controls and easily accessible effects, so you can create your own design without spending a lot of time. The tutorials tab in the main window of Designer also provides quick access to all knowledge and gives drawing lessons in a graphical editor, necessary for beginners to get started.
Although it is suitable for creating your own designs from scratch, it comes with a small library of templates pre-installed for applications such as blog posts and social networks. Start by choosing a canvas size template or determine your option. The application also offers a small library of forms, illustrations and icons, it is a convenient addition to the tool.
Gravit Designer has sync with Gravit Cloud, which is also free. Create a Gravit account, enable synchronization.
This is a completely free service.
Modern presentation with PowerPoint
Although most users find tools such as Keynote and PowerPoint to be strictly for presentation, they actually work well as a very simple but flexible graphic design tool for images on blogs and social networks.
In the presentation application, you can easily insert, crop and adjust photos, add and organize shapes, and add text. All this - with just a few clicks of the mouse in the program interface, with which many are probably already familiar. Then, when the work is finished, export the slide as a JPG or PNG image. The main advantage of using software for the presentation of graphic design is the ability to work quickly without worrying about the need to learn new software.
The online program also has fewer image editing tools than the PowerPoint desktop. For example, it cannot adjust the color or opacity of the image.
Regardless of whether the author wants to draw additional attention to the blog post that he shares, or wants to create a full-fledged advertising campaign under the Facebook brand, these graphic design applications will be very useful.
Multifunctional Inkscape Editor
This is a multi-functional editor, which is a true replacement for Illustrator.
Service features:
- Comprehensive toolkit.
- Excellent format support.
- Frequent updates.
- High performance.
- Free graphic editor in Russian.
The Inkscape open source vector graphics package is incredibly powerful and the best free alternative to Adobe Illustrator for professional and semi-professional illustrators, graphic designers, and web designers.
Along with standard drawing and form tools, for example, as in SVG-edit, Inkscape boasts a special spiral tool, a tool for creating patterns and clone arrangements, advanced features for manipulating objects, several filters, including bevels, textures, overlays, as well as some elegant fill settings.
Since this is an open source program, it can not only be used for free, but also edited, included in other software. The program is constantly updated with new features. The latest version has gradients, improved support for SVG2 and CSS3, and new motion effects.
The main file format is SVG, and Inkscape is also compatible with image editing software such as Gimp. The software uses SVG scalable vector graphics as an output format. The program has many tutorials to get started, and is quite capable of creating vector graphics for branding, logos, web graphics and advertising. However, some users complain that it works slowly, although it depends more on which device and operating system they use.
Thin Vector Vectr Tool
Vectr Editor is a free graphic design program for creating beautiful vector graphics that are both elegant and easy to use. Designers at any level can immediately get to work without any tedious training procedure.
Another great cross-platform option, Vectr, synchronizes projects in real time, so you can start designing your home in a web browser on your computer, and then continue on your iPad. Whether the author is working on website design mockups, brand logos, presentations, brochures, posters and more, his designs will look crisp regardless of size.
Vectr is intuitive to use and an excellent choice for beginners or for those who need to create simple graphics with a minimum of fuss, easily and for free.There is a search for software tutorials. The developer posted 30 courses on his website.
The software can be used online or via download. Work is also automatically saved and synchronized. Developers offer real-time sharing, allowing users to send documents for collaboration.
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