Part of what makes designing fun for us, is making that certain project look custom and personalized. And the best part? You don’t have to be a professional graphic designer to achieve that customized look. Use clipart! Drumroll… today’s topic is:
One of my favorite resources for clipart is The Graphics Fairy. Each day, Karen posts a new graphic. The great thing about this particular site, is that Karen already converts most of her files into what is called a vector graphic. Take this vintage diagram of a lobster. Karen goes through, removes all the diagram elements, and gives you a fantastic custom piece of clipart, easy to download to your desktop and upload into your editing software. And in this case, she also gives you the choice between black or red! Don’t you love options?
Just insert the graphic into the top of your project, such as this free printable for a lobster recipe, and you have a custom card to accompany a gift or share at your next recipe swap party. Perfect.
Part of what makes a design custom is not only the use of clipart, but coming up with a novel idea. Let’s say you have a college graduation coming up and you would like the perfect card to wish your congratulations. For example, you could go with the theme of a bird leaving its cage and entering the world on its own. From there, you can search for keywords like “birdcage vector” or “birdcage graphic.” You’ll end up with a lot of options! Once you find the perfect cage, start hunting for the perfect bird. Insert the graphic into your project, play with the angle to make it look like a pair, and you have a custom card that will set your gift apart from the others.
If designing your own project still sounds intimidating, start out by using free printables that are virtually finished, but still offer that custom product. Like these change of address cards by Sissyprint. This format of clipart is super easy to insert into your editing software, such as printshop or a word document, and simply type your information into the blank space. Fast, simple, and it still looks as though you whipped this up specifically for your latest move.
Selecting the right mix of fonts is also part of making a custom look. Check back next week, as we will be showing you how to select fonts and incorporate them into your designs.
Happy designing! Get creative and make something special.
Sissyprint was founded by a sisterly trio, made up of a pair of sisters and a cousin,
all of which love design and sharing their products free of charge.
Hey there Tip Junkies! My name is Emily and I am so excited to team up with my fellow sissies from Sissyprint and share some of our design secrets with you! We’re really opening up our bags of tricks, so stay tuned through the month of October and get in on the nitty-gritty on how to become more graphic design savvy.
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