The truth is I often need some amazing blog images, invitations, & announcements but have a budget of zero dollars. My favorite free / inexpensive graphic resource for this crisis is: www.canva.com.
Thousands of beautiful graphic designs and stock photos are available for personal and professional use here for absolutely ZERO dollars! Perfect match! Tons more templates, graphics and images are available at an affordable $1.00 per item!
I love this site. It is easy to use – I can create something lovely for social media, or my blog/website in under 5 minutes (depending on my ability to make decisions when so many options are there) for free!
This allows me to create what I need in minutes with the ability to make instant changes. I can save my work as jpg, pdf or png and share my design instantly.
Favorite things:
One of my favorite things about the site is that you can apply your custom colors to any graphic or template- they give you the color code so you can keep your colors consistent for branding purposes. I am happy to have discovered the key to a consistent aqua here.
There are tutorials to help you make your design decisions and more advanced tutorials if you wish to learn more in their design school.
My final favorite feature about the site- I can edit, reuse, copy any previous designs: my last saved templates just wait there in all their loveliness as an image. I don’t have to name or store them on my computer- I can access them anywhere I have internet connection.
No, I am not affiliated with Canva or paid to post this.. I just want to share what I find helpful to other business owners and artists.
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As an artist that likes to be paid, I understand that a few graphic designers might not like this site being so amazing. I am not suggesting it can replace professional work graphic artists do, I promise. There are thousands of reasons to pay a graphic designer for work that no template or stock photo can replace. I hired one last week to make a greeting card from a watercolor painting- no website could do what she did for me. But for the instances such as a blog holiday greeting or an invitation to an art opening you would list on your social media – I am sold on this website.
May your blog and media be pretty and personalized!
Stephanie Macera 