by Chinthaka Samaraweera | Mar 2, 2019 | Become Your Own Boss, Graphic Design, Graphic Design Website
Today, having just a website is not sufficient to attract users to it. A website should be contained with attractive visuals and attention-grabbing unique content for that. Therefore a graphic designer plays an important job role in enhancing the website’s outlook by creating appealing visual contents. To design such contents, you will want computer graphic design software. If you are a beginner in the Graphic Design field, here are some essential best graphic design software list for you. First of all, I should say that Adobe Creative Suite is the industry standard.
10 Best computer graphics software list
Below I have shared 10 reputable computer graphics software list providers, and their recommended you to create your graphic design requirement.
- Adobe Photoshop
- GIMP
- Adobe LightRoom
- Illustrator
- CorelDraw
- Inkscape
- Adobe Indesign
- Topaz Studio
- Adobe XD
- Autodesk 3ds Max
Even though you are a newbie to this field, you can create quality images with Photoshop. Multiple images can be easily combined with this tool. You can also remove unnecessary parts in your image. It also consists of Blemish Removal which can be used to remove any dirt or spot from your image. Photoshop is mainly developed for image manipulation, resizing and touching up. It has basic features such as rotating, cropping, flipping, straightening, channel mixing, clone stamp tool, and perspective correction. Colors of the image can be enhanced by its slide controls. It supports of RAW format. Your edited image can be shared through websites such as Twitter, Revel, Tumblr, Facebook and more.
It can be installed on both Mac and Windows operating systems.Accounting my graphic design software list Photoshop is one of my favorite graphic design software.
There can be found some advantages of Photoshop. They are the capability of smooth video editing, an effective crop tool, and higher performance. No perpetual license, less user-friendly interface and the lack of progress bar visibility for some tools are the disadvantages of Photoshop.
However, it is a good designing tool for newbies.
In addition, I think you need to know the Best Photoshop tutorials channels on YouTube.
GIMP is the best alternative software for Photoshop. This is perfect not only for graphic designers but also for photographers. It has highly improved photo manipulation tool. You can create very clear visual contents using this software. You can customize the interface as you want. Due to its full-screen mode interface, you can do the viewing and editing the image all at once. Though GIMP does not consist of a wide range of features, you can have a great experience with the existing features. It works on OS X, Windows, and GNU/Linux and other Operating Systems. Due to its cross-compatibility nature, there is a strong support community for GIMP. It is open source and consists of many customization options as well as third-party plugins.
GIMP is totally free. Apart from that advantage, there can be found some other advantages also. They are ease in use, bright and modern interface and single window usage.
There are a few bugs in GIMP. In the initial phase, users have to face difficulties with Cintiq tablets. They are the disadvantages of GIMP.
If you love photography, then this will the perfect tool for you. This is a cloud-based service. You can edit your photos on your desktop, mobile or the web and share them across desktop, mobile as well as the web. When you edit the image on one device, all the changes you did are applied automatically everywhere else.
The smarter organization is one of the key features of Lightroom. Machine learning ML is used for that. People and other objects in a photo are recognized and then searchable keywords are automatically applied by ML.
Its interface is easy-to-use. You can back up your original and edited photos to the cloud
Illustrator is the best tool for creating logos, icons, sketches, and typography or even complex artworks for mobile or videos, using vector art. You can draw pixel-perfect shapes. Due to this drawing capability, you can design graphics with seamless alignments. Illustrator has inbuilt plugins. Using these plugins you can create an attractive web page. Though some plugins are developed for earlier versions of Adobe Illustrator, new versions consist of a set of new features such as Creative Cloud. Therefore it has become a perfect graphic design software for designers. You can use Ai on Windows as well as on Mac as the result of being part of Creative Cloud.
Amazing touch-type tool and simple free transform tool are some advantages of Illustrator. But its price is high.
Are you a web designer and searching for a graphics editor to create your visual contents for your website? If so, then this will be the ideal vector graphics editor for your tasks. CorelDraw is one of the most famous industry standard editors nowadays. It has several cool useful functions. Other vector editors cannot compete with CorelDraw’s ease of use. You can have full control over the tools. So the results are fast and dynamic. Its X5 and above versions have an inbuilt organizer called “Corel CONNECT”.
You can position objects according to your necessity using the alignment guide. It can efficiently work with big files in Corel Photo-Paint. This feature is a significant feature of CorelDraw. Apps such as Bitstream Font Navigator, Barcode wizard, Duplexing wizard and etc. are supported by CorelDraw.
You can find many helpful training videos on the internet regarding CorelDraw. But it is difficult to learn the tools for beginners. It does not work on Mac.
This software is an alternative to Adobe Illustrator. If you love vector arts or use SVG file format, then this will be the perfect professional software for you. It can be installed on Windows, Mac, and Linux also. This is not only ideal for beginners but also for professionals for designing vector images. Inkscape can be easily used for making artworks, coloring, and sketching. It has a Ghostscript extension. Using this extension, .eps files can be easily read.
You can move screen pixels using keys. Apart from that, you can edit the clones on the canvas. Gradients also can be edited. You can fill the Paint-bucket with one click.
Inkscape is free. You can find infinite filters and new effect tools in Inkscape. But it is very slow.
If you want to create layouts for online magazines, printed books or brochures, then this will be the perfect software for your need. You can design layouts for desktop as well as for mobile devices using this tool. You can easily combine text and graphics. Indesign is mainly focused on web and print publishing.
You can easily drag and drop isolated layers and resize images with its great flexibility. A Desktop app for Mac and PC is available. You can access it by being a user of its Creative Cloud. A comparison app called “Comp CC” is also available for tablets and smartphones.
Services like Typekit and Behance are also available for you. Using these services, you can link your workflow among designing, photography, web or app development and videos. All your work can be shared and synchronized between the desktop and your mobile devices with Adobe Creative Sync. Therefore your work will be efficient and productive.
You can receive the latest updates after becoming a member. Indesign is perfect for beginners because of its lower learning curve.
Topaz Studio is an image editor for photographers. It is simple and easy to use but fast, flexible and powerful. You can freely download it and use as a plugin or a host editor. It comes with opacity slider, 10 free adjustments, blending modes and comprehensive masking functionalities. You can install it on Windows or Mac.
Adobe XD is mainly for UX designing and a vector-based tool. You can freely download it. Elements are automatically resized for different screens. You can switch easily from Design mode to Prototype in one click. And then you can create interactive prototypes using your wireframes by dragging them between artboards.
You can see the changes done on the fly, on your phone. Not only that but also you can securely share auto-saved cloud documents with others from anywhere in the world. Offline editing is also available.
Plugins are also available. You can enhance your experience with these plugins. Further Adobe XD can be integrated with other apps such as Photoshop, After Effects, Illustrator, JIRA, Slack and Microsoft Teams.
Adobe XD works on Windows and Mac.
Best features of Adobe XD are responsive resize, auto-animate, voice prototyping and plugins, and app integration.
Autodesk 3ds Max is formerly known as 3D Studio and 3D Studio Max. You can create 3d animations, images, models and games. Due to its easy, robust modeling, high-end rendering, efficient 3D animation, and flexible interoperability, it is perfect for your 3D designing. Arnold features, fluid simulation, open shading language and Shape Boolean Object are newly available with 3ds Max.
Best free online graphic design software
So would you like to know about the best free graphic design software around to make it as a graphic designer? Here we’ve found the best of the best visual graphic design software list.
It is important to have the knowledge to select the ideal graphic design software for your designing task. I have mentioned my best graphic design software list one by one. Though multiple designing software is found in the current software market, selecting the ideal one is difficult. So I hope that you have gained some basic but better knowledge in choosing a better tool for your need. Wait for more forthcoming articles on Graphic Designing
by Chinthaka Samaraweera | Feb 17, 2019 | Become Your Own Boss, Graphic Design Website
When you start a business, the first thing you need is graphic designing service to create your brand logo, banners, and documents such as business cards, stationeries and social media banners. So you have to hire a graphic designer to accomplish these tasks. But nowadays you can do your graphic designing tasks by yourself using online graphic design software. In this post, I will show you the best free online graphic design software.
All professions need their own tools. Unfortunately, graphic design software packages are not low-priced. It is difficult to expense such a big-price for scholars and persons who are just setting up on their own.
There is a solution for those who can’t expense such a big amount of money on design software. The solution is free online graphic design software. There can be found multiple free online design software on the Internet. In here we are going to discuss the five popular and professional software from them.
What is Best Free Online Graphic Design Website Overview
Below I have shared 5 reputable online graphic design tools providers, and their recommended you to create your graphic design requirement yourself.
- Gravit Designer
- Vectr
- Canva
- BeFunky
- Design Wizard
Gravit Designer provides a full vector toolkit for free. You can create your vector art online Google Chrome, Firefox or you are free to download your PC Windows, Mac OC, Linux
Gravit Designer is a full-featured vector design app appropriate for all style of jobs, from screen and icon designs from side to side to presentations, illustration and animation.
This online software has a fresh and natural interface that modifies itself as you want it, this free graphic design software packages a full of tools for producing complete and stunning vector imagery, containing non-vicious booleans, a knife tool, and path graphs, and more various blocks and combination modes, and an influential text engine.
This app export as PDF, SVG or bitmap, and if you want to enter a project on the go, there’s the Gravit Cloud service that allows you to get to your work wherever you are.
Vectr is online preferences make it great for live cooperation. Its 100% free and it is intuitive and easy to use.
Vectr working Platforms are Browser, Windows, Linux, Chrome OS. Accessible both as a browser-based web app and as a stand-alone desktop app, This app is a free editor for making 2D vector graphics. With all the vector features hope for, and more sufficiently of choices for using filters, shadows, and fonts, it is multipurpose enough for daily design tasks. Mainly valuable are its live cooperation and synchronization options, which allow you to connect with anyone, anywhere, to create in tandem. You are able to export your document SVG, JPG And PNG. This is a genuine substitute to Adobe Illustrator CC.
Canva is one of the best and very useful online graphic design tool you can use free or paid. It is very easy to use if you are creating a beautiful visual art simple you need to drag-and-drop.
When you are first-time login canva website they ask to indicate what you are using canva software and what you do, Canva website wants to provide an excellent experience for designers of all kinds.
It looks like severe to place Canva below the ‘Image Editing Software’ heading for the reason that it does so much more. Canva is a photo editor, Logo, Flyer, Documents, business card template, color palette tool, font mixture picker, book learning resource, and photo collage maker, and it even features a committed infographic maker with thousands of free design essentials and 100+ free fonts at your fingertips.
Platform: Browser, available as IOS and Android apps
Those who do not have any prior graphic design knowledge can create attractive and professional level images using this free online design software. This software consists of three main tools. They are Photo Editor, Designer and Collage Maker. Though these tools simple to use for beginners, they can deal with different types of projects.
This is online free graphic design software and easy to understand and use. You are free to use stock images more than 1,000,000 are easily accessible due to the partnership with “Pixababy”.
You can create posters, banners, flyers, brochures, infographics and more easily.
If you want more professional tools like pop art effects, cartoon, and oil painting, you have to subscribe to BeFunky Plus.
Design Wizard is the most suitable online design tool for those admire the variety and it is one of the most accessible tools online. This tool provides a number of templates that are visually pleasing for social media as well as for printing. Apart from that, it offers more than a million images containing transparent images, icons, and vectors.
Users can access daily updated visual library and this library is completely full of infinite videos, illustrations as well as graphics options. All are licensed. Users can use those for commercial purposes.
Design Wizard has many great features. The magic resizes button is one of them. This feature lets users to quickly transform the template’s size while creating an image. Design Wizard will assist you in building a brand for your business by providing options to create professional visual contents.
More than 1,000,000 premium images are available and more than 15,000 templates available. Templates for social media and print
Free professionalization capabilities such as custom template resizing and Integrations with Buffer, Hubspot and Marketo.
Which is best freelancing graphic design websites for small business
You can hire professional freelance graphic designer on a budget? here’s everything you need to know to get the job done. Here is the best 10 freelancing graphic design websites you can hire very talent freelancer.
This post about a collection of free online graphic design software will help you in selecting the best online graphics tool for your graphic design works. Await for more forthcoming articles on Graphic Designing.
In addition, you can find guides for a small business owner like Graphic design for small business
by Chinthaka Samaraweera | Feb 8, 2019 | Become Your Own Boss, Graphic Designer
When you initially think about earning money through freelancing as a Graphic Designer, where should you actually stops? What is the best freelancing websites for graphic designers? Before step in to freelancing, you should research for the correct answer for the above question.
When I step into this field, I initially searched the internet for the best freelance website for a graphic designer to earn money. There were lot of search results. When I dig in to the sites, I came to know that only a few are genuine. Most of the search results are fake sites. I did have work with both of them and learned a lot.
As you heard so many genuine freelancing sites these days, you have to select the best site for you to work with if you are a fresher. There are fiverr.com, freelance.com, upwork, 99design, people for hours and Toptal and some others. Among these how to select the best freelancer website for a beginner? This should be the main concern for you. Now I am going to expose you the correct selection.
Actually, Fiverr is the best option for a beginner. But you should next come up with the question “why is Fiverr better than the other sites?”
Will try to do a comparison first. Except for fiver, all the other freelancer sites tend you to bid and search for jobs. But in fiverr when you have a considerable number of good and positive reviews, project owners will come to you directly and ask for your help in completing their tasks. That is the basic comparison in between freelancer sites. If you updated your profile well organized with gigs, then your profile become a shopping window in the internet. Now you know the benefit of fiverr.com. You will receive jobs without even bidding or applying.
How to start my Graphic Designer Journey?
You should not try to grab big projects. Start with small tasks like background removing, photo editing or image tracing. These would be better for a beginner to start with. Once you are finalized with good quality, you will get the return by your customers. Those are Ratings and comments. If your profile is rated well, then definitely you will get more customers looking for your service.
I can recommend trying upwork.com and 99design.com if you are a beginner. These two platforms can be recommended if you are really a fresher.
Which is the 10 popular freelance websites
Below I have shared 10 popular freelance websites reputable freelancing websites for graphic designers , and their site recommended you to start your graphic design journey.
- Fiverr
- Upwork
- 99design
- Freelancer
- PeoplePerHour
- Guru
- Toptal
- Ifreelance
- Designhill
- Designcrowd
How to choose a website for freelance graphic designers
Doesn’t matter what the website is. You should come up with a clear professional portfolio with quality sample design pieces to showcase your ability. If you are a beginner, try to focus on small areas like background removing, Photoshop editing or logo design. Then create and set up your portfolio with those example works. There should not be hundreds of sample pieces. Maximum 10 to 15 best pieces would be fine to promote yourself. You can upload your sample projects to dribbble.com or behance.net to show case your name to the seekers. Even though freelancer sites are a great place to start with, high demand for work is currently been penalized by price with a huge freelancer’s availability. Getting a job to your budget is not easy for a beginner. So initially you must market yourself for low prices and try to maintain a good healthy and professional portfolio with good rated comments. Then you could maximize your budgets upon your demand. Now you will think why should we work for a lower cost? But in terms of return in the future, that would be the best option. Do not listen to “Never work for free”. If you want to become a good freelancer, sometimes you might need to work for free initially. Then customers will definitely recommend you for their referrals. This would be a better stream of finding more jobs in the future and get the demand on yourself.
Now we have had a detail conversation about freelancer sites available for beginners. You might have heard some more freelancer websites which are available on the internet. We can share our knowledge and our findings for freelancer websites which will be a help for someone to make their graphic designer journey.
