All the main tools that allow you to create a graphic project for each business. Before being verbal, communication is visual. That’s why to get the right message to the public. Every entrepreneur has to worry about giving the right image to the brand. The logo, the coordinated graphic, and the layout of the company website are all elements that must be studied, designed, and created to tell the company and convey its personality.
A job entrusted to the skilled hands of graphic designers, professionals with a strong creative sense and solid technical skills. What is never missing from their work? The right tools to turn ideas into reality. We have collected a roundup of 13 graphics tools that a graphic designer cannot give up.
The Leading Software For 2D Graphics
Adobe Photoshop
It is the software par excellence dedicated to digital image processing. Known by all for the feats he can perform on photographs, he is a faithful ally of every graphic designer. Its use requires practice and good technical skills. It is based on working layers, thanks to which it is possible to modify the images. The layers allow you to separate the image into various parts, act without modifying the others, and create particular interactions between one and the other. They can be made as needed, and their number is unlimited. Photoshop allows many types of intervention:
- Light retouching.
- The integration of photos with graphics and text.
- New images that a camera cannot capture.
Adobe Illustrator
The reference point for illustrations and vector graphics, this software is a must for those who want to create a logo, a layout for the website, or even packaging for their products. Its strength lies precisely in the possibility of working in a vector system. What does it mean? Every creation made with Illustrator can be scaled to infinity without losing resolution and image quality.
Forget the pixels, therefore, for illustrations and 3D effects. Everything you produce can be customized with various products and shared. The only caveat is about the complexity of the software. Illustrator is not very intuitive and, on the contrary, requires in-depth study and a lot of practice to express all its potential and bear fruit.
Adobe Indesign
Designed for professional publishing, this software is indispensable for defining the design, layout, and pagination of documents for print and web publications. It combines the specific tools for composing text with those for creating typographic effects without forgetting to give space to the layout and contents such as graphics and images.
The management of the text is complete and flexible. You can set the columns to distribute the text and control spaces, indents, and tabs. That is, arrange the text inside a frame. In short, it is a must for creating posters, brochures, or other paper material for customers and at the same time for ebooks, presentations, or other content to be published online.
Specific Programs For Drawing
Sketchbook
Available on desktop and in mobile versions, it is the greatest ally of graphic designers who use the graphic tablet for their work. Oriented to drawing and painting, this software is also ideal for doing projects that require execution speed. Therefore it allows the creation of images in a few steps, reducing processing times.
The wide choice of brushes, shades, and lines, together with the most disparate blending and application modes, makes it a valuable tool for graphic designers and designers, and artists. It follows the logic of the work levels; therefore, it allows a good organization of the elements and facilitates in case of changes.
Clip Studio Paint
It is a drawing program structured on multi-level pages, designed for a graphic tablet, on a screen, or from a mobile device such as a tablet. Beloved in the comics industry, it is equipped with tools that reproduce pencils and brushes, adding 3D models, decorations, animations, and text.
In addition to the tools, the approach it is based on, which allows for frame-to-frame work, texture applications, and captions, makes it the first choice for designing illustrations and animations. The possibility of working with both bitmap graphics is not to be underestimated, i.e., with pixels and vector graphics.
Three Sites For Creating Custom Fonts
Any graphic designer can confirm this: fonts should never be overlooked. It may appear to be a simple choice, but it is not. A font tells a lot about a brand; to convey the message and, above all, to underline the visual impact. A significant contribution in terms of memorability. For all these reasons, it must be selected or created with care. As support in this phase, there are several specialized sites:
- The font in use: It is a kind of typographic archive, where the various types of fonts are cataloged according to the format, the font, and so on. The site also offers examples for each font to show the possible ways of use for each font.
- Friends of type: To use if you are looking for the latest industry news. In fact, on this site, lettering and typography projects just created by the creators are proposed. So avant-garde and style to inspire the birth of your font.
- Wordmark: Its peculiarity is the preview of the use of the font. In addition to proposing a substantial list of fonts, the site allows you to display your text with the chosen font to show the final result and allow an indeed targeted choice.
How To Find Inspiration For A Graphic Project?
We mentioned it a little while ago, graphic designers, in addition to specific technical skills, must have a good dose of creativity. Creativity that, unfortunately, does not always show up in command. In these cases, the automatic action is to look around.
Peering at what others are doing turns out to be a valuable move because it helps to stay up to date and stimulates the imagination. On the web, you can find numerous sites to be inspired by. An original idea can be hidden anywhere.
The first push for creativity comes from the social world, and it could not be otherwise. Social media are increasingly oriented towards visual communication and allow everyone to contribute. Born as a social network, Pinterest today can be considered an authentic collection of photos and images.
Wishart
The ideal support for beginners. A site entirely dedicated to the customization of preset graphics. It responds simultaneously to the need for technical simplicity and the demand for originality. Wishart is also a resource to keep in mind for professionals. It offers, in fact, a wide range of subjects to work on when you have little time or few ideas. All that is missing is that personal touch that will add character.
Behance
It is not a social network, but it works like a social network. It is dedicated to professionals in the graphics sector, but it is suitable for everyone. Designed for sharing projects and graphics, it can also be used for learning. In other words, Behance is versatile and perfect for finding news and graphic trends. If, on the one hand, professionals share their work, on the other, anyone can draw inspiration from them.
Other Valuable Resources For Graphics
It is impossible to conclude our overview of graphic tools without talking about two other supports:
Adobe XD
The best friend of UX and UI designers allows you to design realistic graphical interfaces. The advantage has a concrete prototype to develop a perfect user experience and a detailed track in the development phase. In addition, Adobe XD integrates seamlessly with the cloud libraries and software included in the Creative Cloud subscription plan and, therefore, with other Adobe software.
Cinema 4D – Maxon
Inevitable as a professional tool for 3D animation, modeling, and simulation. It presents a set of flexible and fast devices, accessible from a modern and intuitive interface, simple to use.
It is also equipped with an extensive system of presets for optimizing workflows, which, in general, makes every design project more effective and perfect for teamwork. Your graphics toolbox is now neat. Keep in mind that some of these tools are more intuitive and immediate to use, while others require study and patience. In any case, you can start devising the perfect graphic plan for your business.
Also Read: TEN BENEFITS OF DIGITAL MARKETING FOR YOUR BUSINESS