There are plenty of ways for you to catch your customer’s attention. One of which is by using captivating designs for your flags and banner designs. Since the attention span of humans these days is getting shorter and shorter, having eye-catching designs increases your brand’s chance of getting noticed. The competition is getting tougher and the entry-level is getting lower, so brand owners need to be creative and think out of the box. There are plenty of websites for graphic designers that could help them craft interesting designs for flags and banners.
Below are a few of these websites which you could check out. In our previous blog, we have briefly described each of them. This article is dedicated to learning more about these sites in-depth. We hope that this could help you and your team in coming up with designs worthy of everyone’s attention.
1. Canva
If you haven’t been using Canva. You’re missing out on an opportunity to create beautiful designs for FREE. Yes, although Canva offers a premium service, you can still use their FREE features. There are plenty of ready-to-use templates (250,000+) that save you tons of time and effort. You can still manage to come up with a decent design. In addition, with the FREE feature, you have 5GB of cloud storage available. This software as a service (SAAS) is so easy to use thanks to its drag-and-drop feature. You don’t have to be a professional designer to learn how to navigate around their website.
What’s even better is that the free feature of Canva gives you access to more than 1 million free photos and graphics. There is no excuse for you to start designing those banners and advertising flags that catch attention. If you want more features, you can upgrade to Canva Pro. This will give access to more than 100+ million premium photos,videos and other content elements. You also have more access to cloud storage (1TB) and full access to Magic Studio’s AI tools. Before upgrading, try to use the Free access first and check out how you feel about it. If you love it, then move to the upgraded version for more access to other cool features this site offers.
2. Pexels
If you need stock images to use for your designs. Pexels is the go-to site. When you visit the site and see a photo you like, the site will give you information about the image. This info includes:
- Dimensions
- Aspect Ratio
- File Size
- Camera
- Focal
- Aperture
- ISO
- Shutterspeed
- Taken at
- Software
- Colors
- Views
- Likes
- Downloads
You will also know if the photo is free to use or not. This gives you the peace of mind that you are not using licensed images on your designs but rather free stock images. When using the free images, you are not required to give credit to the photographer. But, giving attribution is something appreciated and encouraged. With the free images, you are allowed to edit or make any modification to align with the overall design of your flags. Using free stock photos will save you time and money from doing your pictorial. Pexels has a collection of about 3.2 million free stock images and videos. It is also currently owned by Canva. It’s no wonder why Canva offers millions of photos on their site.
3. Pixabay
If you can’t find your preferred photos in Pexels, try shifting to Pixabay. This website is another collection of free stock photos, vectors, and videos. Currently, the website has about 4.4 million collections of high-quality stock images and other content such as music, sound effects, GIFs, and illustrations. Similar to Pexels, you can use the content from Pixabay without giving attribution to the photographer or videographer even if for commercial purposes. Although it’s free to use the media content and no attribution is required, it is still recommended to give credit to the owner. This gives them more encouragement to upload good media content which can be used by others. Additionally, it also gives them the exposure they need which is helpful, especially for new photographers. If you are really happy with the image, you can send your appreciation by donating. You can click the ‘donate’ button after you have downloaded the needed image. These donations will then be sent to the owner’s PayPal account.
On the other hand, if you want to be a contributor to the website, you need to register first before uploading your content. With the easy-to-download feature and search functionality, you’ll find this site convenient when you’re designing your banners.
4. Unsplash
Unsplash is another good website when you are looking for royalty-free images. There are plenty of high-resolution images that you can choose for your flag’s design. For ease in search, there are several categories you can look at. Some of these categories include 3D Renders, Animals, Architecture and interiors, Experimental, Fashion and beauty, Film, Nature, People, Sports, and Travel. Unsplash offers more than 3 million images which are of high quality and free to use. Thanks to its community of almost 300,000 photographers, the site has more than 4 billion of its content downloaded by users. You don’t need to be a professional photographer to join the community. You can simply create an account at their website and start contributing your photos.
If you are going to use this site for your banners and flag, take note that images are free to use either for commercial or non-commercial purposes. Similar to Pixabay and Pexels, you don’t need to ask permission to use the images. If you are going to give credit, that will surely make the day of the content owner. In terms of what’s not allowed, you can’t sell the images without making any significant changes to the original content. You are also not allowed to compile the photos from the website to make a website similar to Unsplash.
5. Freepik
If you still want more access to free images, visit Freepik. This site is a treasure trove of media content ideal for creating elegant and professional banners and flags. Apart from the stock images, Freepik also offers vectors, AI images, Icons, Videos, PSD, 3D, and Fonts. When it comes to searching images, there is a category dropdown button where you search for the type of image you’re looking for. There is also a search bar where you can type your preferred image. In addition, you can also create customizable icons, presentation templates, and editable illustrations and use videos that are in 4K and full HD. This company started in 2010 and since then it has served millions of people with free media content.
6. Free Images
Free Images – the name says it all. This is a great site for free photos, illustrations, templates, mockups, vectors, cliparts, PSDs, and icons. You can join the community by signing up. The membership for this site is 100% free. Within a few minutes after signing up, you will receive a message that your account has been activated. Unlike the previously mentioned sites, when using the images from Free Images you may have to credit the owner in some cases. In addition, you also have to give notification when using their photos as the site serves as a hosting platform only. If you want to use a photo, you can contact the artist by clicking the ‘contact user’ button.
Without any consent from the owner, you can’t use their photos. If you have tried connecting with them but no response has been received, try using other photos instead where you can get permission to use them. When using this website for your design, make sure that you are familiar with the site’s guidelines when it comes to downloading and using the media content.
7. 123RF
123RF offers a diverse collection of free stock photos, videos, audio, fonts, AI image generators, AI writing, graphics, and illustrations. Similar to Canva it has both free and paid features. The site boasts a collection of more than 200 million media content which you can use for your banners. It also holds a complete tool for quick edits which includes background remover, and other photo effect features. To further improve your design, you can use filters and effects to add more visual appeal to your designs. These cool collections of effects will add more life to your content. You can also use the AI to perfectly match the colors of your designs. The auto-enhance feature also helps in beautifying your images.
8. Rawpixel
Rawpixel is the home of more than 1 million free stock images. You can also select PSDs, vectors, illustrations, and graphic templates to create classy, personalized designs. These images often possess a distinctive, artistic quality that can set your flag and banner designs apart. To help you decide between the free and premium versions, the former gives you access to their public domain and 5 images free to download from the Free collection. However, when using the free option you need to give attribution to the owner. You can still use the images for commercial purposes. On the other hand, when using the premium feature, you need to pay $8.99 per month for more high-quality design resources. You are only allowed to have one use per member but the access opens the door for more exclusive images.
These are just eight of the designer websites where you can access free images and in some cases allow you to create beautiful artwork within their platforms. Try one or two of these sites, get yourself familiar with their navigation and features, and start designing! Leverage the free access first before upgrading to save you some marketing budget!
