Not all graphics design tools are created equal.
So in this post, find out which Canva tools to get well acquainted with to create amazing social media marketing graphics for your business.
In today’s day and age, creating graphics for your business has never been easier.
Although with the readily available graphics tools on design sites like Canva, it could also be easy to get confused about what tools are best for you to utilize.
So let’s narrow it down to the best and most effective Canva tools you should apply to create stunning visuals for your social media posts.
First things first, determine what the purpose of your post is.
Do you have a specific image of your product or service you want to feature? Or do you have information you want to post about that needs a graphic to accompany it?
There are multiple types of graphics you can make for social media posting. It could be:
- a product feature,
- an announcement of maybe a sale or event,
- an interactive poll,
- motivational or quote graphics,
- infographics,
- greetings
…and the like.
Of course, depending on the type of graphics you’re making, you’ll be using a different combination of tools to create your design.
Having said that, here are the Canva tools that will help you create unique and stunning visuals.
1. Adjustments
Let’s say your post is image-based and you want to feature a picture of a product or service, and upload the said image into Canva.
Right off the bat, you can enhance your image by color-correcting it.
You can then change the values in the adjustment tool to change your picture’s brightness, contrast, saturation, and the like.
This is one of Canva’s best features that a lot of users skip through but it can make a world of a difference on pictures that may need a bit of touch-up from poor lighting.
Now the edit tool applies to both image and video.
So if you do have a video you want to make similar adjustments, you can adjust it like you would to a regular image.
2. Background Removal
Just like the adjustment tool, this Canva tool applies to both still images and videos.
Make sure your image or video is loaded into and selected in your canvas, click on edit image, and hit Background Remover.
This removes backgrounds on most images or videos leaving just your subject in the canvas.
The background removal tool instantly makes it possible to set whatever you like as your subject’s background.
3. Shadow Tool
This tool serves as an assistant to the background removal tool.
The shadow tool turns this into this and this can turn into this.
Shadows are amazing at bringing subjects to life and adding dimension to your design.
To add a shadow to an image simply click on the Edit photo button, look for shadows, and select it.
After this, you can leave the shadow as is or adjust its color opacity blur among other options. If you want to better highlight your products using Canva, read this tutorial next.
4. Text Effects
Moving on to non-image-based graphic tools, we have the text tool.
This tool has everything you need to make sure the wording on your graphics is always SEEN.
Background too noisy? Add a solid color background to your text.
Is your image relatively dark? Might be perfect to add a glow to your text.
Aside from these and other effects, you can also add a curve to your wording to add to your graphics’ playfulness.
And when done right, it shows your viewer exactly where to start reading.
5. Mockup Tool
This is a tool you definitely shouldn’t sleep on.
With just a screenshot image or video of your website on either your phone or computer…
…you can create realistic mockups of your page on phones, laptops, or computer screens.
Unlocking the ability for us to make graphics like this and this.
As well as a few options to add images to apparel, packaging, prints, and the like.
This will help with product mockups if you don’t have actual product images available yet.
If you want to have professional digital marketers handle all aspects of your business’s digital marketing, including your social media graphics, get your free proposal today.
6. Animated Elements
Elements that compliment your visual branding are the essential finishing touches to a polished design.
Animated elements add movement to that polished design and make it more eye-catching.
By simply typing in a keyword in the element’s search bar and clicking on the settings icon…
…you can be shown exclusively animated options of the elements you want to add to your design.
7. Pre-set Animations
And we can’t end a post about powerful Canva tools without mentioning pre-set animations.
The sheer magic of being able to turn a still graphic into a moving one at the click of a button…
…is one you can absolutely use to your advantage by posting a GIF or video instead of a plain image.
By simply clicking on animate, you can choose among a variety of animation styles that fit your graphic best.
This tool can turn something like this into this…
…and upgrade something like this into this.
If you want to learn more about how to use Canva for video editing, then read this post next.
Now that you’re familiar with the most powerful Canva tools for creating effective and stunning graphics, what designs will you make next?
