Canva for Beginners | Learn the Basics of Canva

1. What You'll Learn: Hey, my name is Tamara and I'm a graphic designer. I think there's designer for around 15 years, working for various agencies as well as running my own signs studio, galaxy bomb, and created this class because Canvas, such a great tool for design, especially if you're new to design and don't know where to start. This class is designed for beginners. So whether you're brand new to Canvas, you never opened it up before. Or maybe you've dabbled, but you know, there's still a lot that you don't know. This class is going to be perfect for you. Things that I'm going to teach you in this class are how to navigate Canvas using the different menus and interfaces. How to set up your design based on what type of design you're creating, as well as how to export it properly. So whether you're creating a graphic for social media or say a business card for print, you're going to want to export different file formats based on where your design is going to use. After we've covered the basics, I'm going to walk you through step-by-step on how to create a social media graphic from scratch. Okay, I can't to jump into this class with you. Let's get started. 2. Homepage Navigation: How is this amazing online design tool? It's perfect for beginners because you don't have to purchase any software. You can just basically jump right in and start designing. So to sign up for an account, go to canva.com. And then in the top right-hand side you'll see it says login. So if you already have an account that's where you can just login or you can click sign up. So once you click sign up, you're gonna see this little window and sign up with Google, Facebook, or your email. It's pretty simple. So I've logged in with my free account. So whether you have a pro counter group, how you're going to see something slightly differently. So this is probably similar to what you're going to see when you first log in. So at the top here you'll see the menu. If you hover over the different options under templates, you're going to see all of the different templates available to you. So there's quite a few in here. This isn't all of them, but these are the most popular ones. So once you click into one of these categories, it's going to show you all the different templates that are already formatted to those categories. So under features you're gonna see a few more categories. I don't typically use this menu button, but it just kinda goes into detail bit more about the different elements. A lot of this stuff you're going to be using once you're already in InDesign and I'm going to explain that all later. And under him learn, it's kinda neat. They've, they offer courses as well. So if you want to take your knowledge a little bit further, you can explore this area and check out the different tutorials and courses that Canva offers. So at the top you're going to see what will you design. And there's a few different options there. This is one way to jump into designing something. And you'll also see a button that says Custom Size on the right-hand side. So if you wanna do, if you know the dimensions of what you want to design, you can click that and it'll let you specify the custom size. Another way to see what's available is in this main carousel, you can click the arrow and navigate through a bunch of different document types available to you. So you can see there's everything from a Facebook post to an infographic, Facebook cover banner, a collage business card brochure. And then if you, you can kinda narrow it down, these are the automatic suggestions that's giving you. But if you click up here, you can narrow it down into the different categories. You can see there's quite a lot to choose from. Topic sticker. And then if you click on More, they'll show you even more options here. So book cover, calendar, poster. So if you already know what you want to design, say you want to design a business card. You can search it up top here and you'll see it come up. So there are a lot of different options when I type in business card, this top 1.533 by two inches is your generic size for business card. So that's also another way that you can start with a blank template. So on the homepage as well, you're going to see a left-hand menu. Right now. You can see that I have my mo, my personal account, the free account, and there's one person attached to that account. If you're working with a team, you can actually add in multiple people into your account and work on Project Scatter, just kinda neat. Sit down, you can click all of your designs. So any designs that you create are going to show up in here shared with you. You can see if someone shares a design with you and they link you to it so you're able to edit it. This is where those designs are gonna show up. Once you start creating a lot of designs, it can get pretty messy in here. So I'd suggest creating folders and not just lets you organize things a little bit better. So whether you're creating folders for a specific project that you're working on. Or if you're creating a folder for maybe have like a template so you can keep all the specific templates in that one folder. It makes it a lot easier to find things that you're looking for. Trash, basically where you've thrown stuff out. So this is where you can create a team down below here. And then you can invite different people into your team to work on stuff together. Then below that we have tools where it says brand kids. So in order to access this one, you do need a Pro account. The brand kids pretty useful if you are a business owner and you have a brand already and say this is, this is where you can upload your logo and you can upload your color palette, as well as your fonts. So then when you're working on creating designs, all of this is going to be at your fingertips when you're designing. And then below that we have content planner. So this is a really neat feature that Canada has. Say if you're doing graphics for social media like Instagram, you can actually plan out what you're going to post each day. So if you hover over the different dates, we'll see a little plus sign. If you click that, you'll be able to navigate all of your designs. So if I had a bunch of Instagram designs in here, I could select them. There's also templates in here as well that show up. But basically once you click on those templates, the design will show up in here. So you can pre-plan what you're going to post. And it just makes it a little bit easier if you want to try and build up your social media following. You can just go in here, see what you've planned that day and post it. It's super-easy. 3. Design Tools: Okay, So here is your blank design template. At the bottom you're gonna see this Zoom feature as well. So if you want to zoom in on your design, you can drag that cursor over and I'll zoom it in. Or you can change it under here to a specific Zoom percent. I like it under fit because then I can see the whole design. I find that it's easiest to work with if you have multiple pages in your design. So if you're doing an Instagram Carousel, something like that, and you want to be able to view all your designs at the same time, you can click this little icon where it says grid view. And that will show you all of your different designs. And then you can just click into the one that you want to edit. And super helpful if you're working with maybe like ten different designs that you're going to post as a carousel and you can see exactly how they all look together. I'm starting up in the top menu here you'll see a few different options. So if you click File, you'll see a few different menu options here. You can create a new design, Show Rulers, Show Guides. So if you want to align things in a certain way, this is a way where you can see the rulers. And if you want to drag the rulers onto your design, you can just click into where the rulers are and hold your mouse down and drag it down. So this is, this is handy if you want to get everything aligned in a certain way. If you want to get rid of the rulers, you can just click on that again and it'll hide the rulers. And it also hide the guides which you just drag it in there. You can also show the margins. I don't typically use the margins or the print LEA, unless I'm creating something for print. So for things like social media graphics, you're not going to need to worry about margins or print, Wade. But if you're printing out something like a resume or a menu or business card, then you're going to want to pay that much attention to the margins and the print bleed when you're printing something out professionally, having a print bleed, which is that extra little space outside of the outward most dotted line. Having that extra bit of design that extends past that dotted line is important because when it's printed, the printer will cut off the edges past that dotted line. And that just makes sure that your design and extends all the way to the edge. If you don't have a print bleed on there, sometimes you're gonna get a white border around your design. Just not going to look at we're going to turn those off for now since we're making a social media graphic, we don't really need to worry about that. And then down here you can just see how you can save it to a folder. You can check out the different versions that you've worked on. You can copy it, you can download it. I don't use this menu to too much like I only really use this menu if I need to use the rulers, sometimes I'll use it or if I want to see the print bleed if I'm working on a print documents. Other than that, a lot of this stuff you can navigate to from other places that are a lot more convenient. Okay, and then we have resize and you'll see the little crown icon. That means that this specific features only available to you if you have a Pro account. But I find this one's pretty helpful, especially for social media. Because a lot of people nowadays are posting. I'm like if they're post on Instagram, but then they're also posting something to Instagram stories as well. So say if you design your graphic in here and you want to automatically resize it for stories. It's kinda nice because you can just click this. And 1080 by 1080 pixels is the right dimensions for an Instagram post. But if I want to change it to Instagram stories, I just type in 1080 by 1920. And if I was using a Pro account, then this would say copy and resize. And it's just a really simple, easy ways to resize your deadlines. These two buttons up here are Undo. So if you're starting to design and you want to go back, you can click that. Or an easier way is just to press Control Z, Command Z. And that will erase your last change and bring you back. You'll see up here it says all changes saved. So an awesome thing about Canva is that automatically saves your design as you're going along. You don't have to constantly press Control S File Save, to save your work. It's going to be saved in here. That being said, if your internet goes out or something like that, It's not going to be able to say if, but you'll see a message pop up here that will say, unable to say, Hey, this is where you can change the title of your design. So we're just going to call it Instagram. Here you'll see share. You can share your design. Once you're done, you can send it to someone by typing in their email. But then there's also this little drop-down menu here. So if you're creating designs that you want to use as templates. So you want to be able to send the link to people and then they can click on it and use the design as a template, customize it. Then you can click use as templates or if you just want them to be able to look at it, then share link to view, and then you can copy that link and send to them periodically download. So once you're done creating your design, can just click download. A lot of these options are available for a Canva pro accounts. But if you're on the free and just download it as a PNG. Once we have a design in here, let me click all these things and then the three little dots here just give you a few more different options. So you can post directly to Instagram from, from Canvas. So I've kinda saves the need to save the graph into your phone and then post on there. You can just post directly. And then there's a few different options here too, where you can present it on your computer. You can share the link, schedule, that kinda thing. 4. Adding Elements: And then we have a side menu. So when you're creating the InDesign, you can either start with a pre-made template. It will automatically come up with a bunch of different suggestions here for template. And you can also do a search. So say you wanted to do a Christmas template or something like that, can type in Christmas and you'll get a bunch of different options. If you're want him to get better at graphic design and practice a bit, I'd recommend starting with a blank design null and building your own design. That's the only way you're going to get good is through practice, okay, below templates, we have elements. Here. You're gonna see all the different options for building your design. There's a section at the top called recently used lines and shapes. So you can click on, see all and see all the different elements under that. So there's quite a few different options for adding these interior design can just click on them and you'll see them in here. Then you can customize the colors clicking in here. I'll let you change it to whatever you like. You can drag it around, you can resize the elements by holding on the corner and dragging it. When you have the icon selected, you'll see the little rotate buttons. You can rotate the items as well. And when you're drained and around, you're also going to see these little purple lines pop up. So that's going to let you know when the item is centered, you'll see the top line and then that horizontal line when it centered vertically. So when I have them both to pop up, That's how I know it's exactly in the middle. And then they'll also have these little margin lines that pop up sometimes too. So if you want to align your text to those or something like that, so it's all cohesive. You can use those as a guideline. Then we also have graphics. So click seal. There are a ton of different graphics that you can use in here. And the best way is to do a search. So if you know what kind of what you want, what you're looking for, I can search for an in here. If you scroll down though, you're going to see a bunch of different categories of popular graphics already. So you can see there's quite a few organic sketched fruit. It's kind of interesting. You can click on them and pop Min, customize the colors. So yeah, there's a lot to see in here. You're gonna see some animated ones. You're going to see static graphics. You can search for watercolors, gradients. I mean, the options are endless here, so graphics is real. I really great category to explore and find what you're looking for. And under a photos you're gonna see quite a few different options. Again, if you're searching for something, in particular, you can just type that in. And it will show all the different photos that have that tag in there. So a lot of these you'll see it comes up as pro. There's very few that are free. So again, definitely recommend if you want to take Canva bit further to upgrade to that pro accounts, you have a lot more access to the different elements available to you. K next step, there's a video categories. So again, tons of different video. If you want to start adding video into your designs or create videos. And then we have audio. So again, you can add audio into videos as well. The glow that we've got, charts, frames and grids. So frames and grids are pretty interesting. I love using these. Basically what they are is you're going to see B's frame, then they're going to have this landscape drawing on them. But basically what that means is you can add in the frame interior design and then say you gotta photos. Just go back to that certain programs here. Let's see photos. We're going to add in this girl here. So basically you drag and drop your photo into the frame and then you'll see it pop in and it takes on the shape of the frame. So I love that little effect that they have in there. Here's an example of a grid. Can see how you can drag one photo into one of them and the other photo into the other. Encourage you just to play around with the different elements, play around with the graphics, the photos, the frames that grids, and start layering things and seeing how things left. Next we're gonna go down to uploads. So this is where you can upload your logo, any photos that you have, your own custom elements, things like that. So you can see I've uploaded in mind logo in here so I can easily use it in my designs. Okay, and the next chapter I'm going to talk a little bit about how to add text and add effects in that test. See you there. 5. Formatting Text: So on the left menu, you'll see an option to add texts. Once you navigate to that, you'll see a few different buttons at a heading, at a subheading, add a little bit of body text, so it doesn't matter which one you click really because they're all customizable to whatever you need. So you can adjust the size by clicking and drain on a corner, justing the size that way. Or you can adjust the size by changing the font size here. Can also type in the number as well. Can change the font by using this drop-down menu here and there are a ton, a different book font options. You can just keep scrolling forever basically and click on whatever one you want to use. Some are free, some are pro, and you'll be able to tell because they'll have that little crown if they're approved typeface. The next step you have the colors so you can change the color here to whatever you like. And then we have italicize underline. And then there's also this option to make it uppercase. You can click that. Then we have alignment. So that'll just align your text too, left, right, left, or center. And we have a bullet option here, P want to add and bullets who news out this button here is for spacing. So the letter spacing, you can drag that and it will increase the space between the letters and the line. Spacing will increase the space between the lines. And then we have this category called effects. So if you click on that right now you'll see it's coming up as none. But you can click on these different effects and you'll see it'll add different things to them. So we have shadow adds kind of a neat drop shadow to it. Lift, which is a bit of a glow. Kahlo splice. Oh, glitch and neon. So this isn't really quick and easy way to add text effects to your design. Each effects will have settings within it. So you can drag these different settings. You can change the offset, the interaction can add blur into its transparency. And then you can also change the color to. So I'd recommend is just kind of fiddling around with these different texts, effect styles, seeing what you like. One thing to keep in mind though when you're doing design, is that simple is typically best. You want to make sure it's easy to read. So if you start adding too many texts effects and there's not enough contrast between the text and the other elements in the background. It makes things a little bit trickier to read. Always make sure that your tax pops. And then underneath you'll see where it says sheep. So this is kinda, boy can adjust this curve and it'll curve the text a long shape. Just kinda nice. So you can see how it's slightly curved now, which is, gives it kind of a neat effect. And then we have animate. One of the abilities that Canva has is that you can make animations within your graphics. So if you click on animations, you're going to see a bunch of different options. So this is kinda fun if you want to add a bit of movement into your Instagram posts. If you find one you like and just click on it, and it will show up in here so you'll see how it says fade. So that means that this is now animated text and you can preview it by clicking the Play button at the top. It faded in really fast so that I'm getting so kinda easy to miss. But just be sure if you're going to be Adyen animations or videos. When you download to your graphic, you're gonna need to download it as an MP4, which is a video file rather than a PNG. Okay, for now though, I'm just gonna get rid of the animation. Okay, and from here, There's position where you can align the different Rican, align your text to a certain areas on the page. This little icon here controls the transparency. So you can turn that up and down. So if you want to lock your texts, duplicate your text or deleted, those options are there too. I usually just delete on my keyboard. If I want to delete something, it makes it a little bit easier. Then there's also all these RD main font combinations. So you can always scroll down to u and z, these ones that are already done for you and use those in your designs as long. 6. Design a Social Post: So for this design, we're just gonna do a fairly simple quote graphic for Instagram. So I'm gonna start with a quote. Obviously that's huge. That's because our text sizes massive. So we're going to turn that down so we can see it, can drag it again. So it's centered in there. Then if I want this to go on a couple lines, you'll see this little toggles. And you can change the toggle and you'll see it pops down to the second line. So yeah, there's a few different fonts in here. So we're gonna choose kinda neat little font. I like this one. Go for that. And then for the background, you can change the background by clicking on it and clicking into the background color. So here you can select a color that works well. Then I'm going to adjust the line space in slightly, just bring that a little bit closer. Let's make this bigger and make it really easy to read. I'm keeping in mind as well to have some margins based on the left and right. We want to make sure that it's not too close to the side like this. Just looks nicer when you have that bit of breathing room around the sides. And then we're going to add in some elements. So under graphics, just going to search for abstract. You'll see all these different options pop up. If you can just click on them and they will pop up into your design, you can rotate it, resize it. You can see there are so many different elements that you can choose from. So it's pretty needs all the different options that you have. And then if you create an elements and you notice that it's on top of your other elements. And we just need to select it right-click and send backward. And that's going to or send to back. And that's going to make sure that it's behind your other elements and you can see everything else. If you want to resize multiple elements that you've got selected, you can hold down Shift and then drag that those corners and then that's just gonna let you resize a couple things at the same time. And let's add in a photo, I'm going to use the frame feature that I was talking about earlier. Pop that in there, and then I'm going to add in photo into that frame. So when you do a search, just make sure you're on the category that you want to search in. So I'm under Photos. Drag and drop that in there. Okay, it's very basic design, but just so you get the idea of how you can incorporate bonds, images, and elements, interior design. 7. Add Animations & Video: Another neat thing is you can put videos in frames as well. So you can drag and drop it. And you'll see the video pops in right into that frame. Then instead of this static abstract image, to search under graphics. And on the right-hand side here you'll see this little filter option. If you click on that, you'll be able to select the color that you want to look for. But you'll also be able to select if it's static or animated. So in this case, we want to do an animated graphic. And let's do a white graphic. Oh, nothing's popping up here. Let's get rid of It's just to animate it. And there we go. So you'll see all the different animated elements pop up under the abstract cout category. Kind of an interesting moving graphic here. So I'm scope of that in the corner. Do control C, control D to duplicate it. It's kind of a neat way to add in a bit of movement into your designs as well. If you want to preview that, a tool can see the link here. It says ten seconds at the top. Just click on there and it will preview your video and show you what it's gonna look like. 8. Exporting your Design: So now that you've completed your design, it's time to export it. What you can do is click Download on the right-hand side. Download the PNG. You can save it to your computer or send it to your phone and then post your graphic. You can also post directly to Instagram from Canvas. You just need to link your accounts. So that option is available. If you have a pro accounts, you can link your Instagram and it makes it just a lot more easy to post directly. You don't have to worry about saving the graphic to your phone. There are a couple of different types of Instagram posts that you can save out. We could have one that has animation and video, or you can have a static posts where it's, there's nothing moving. If it's a static posts like this lens, you can save it as a PNG. But if you have some video in there, you're going to want to save it as an mp4, okay, That pretty much sums up the basics of Canvas. Now you should be able to create a social media post, as well as you should know your way around the menu system. 9. Class Project: All right, I hope you enjoyed this class and now I feel totally comfortable when you're working within Canvas, creating your designs for your class projects. I'd love to see the social media graphic that you've created. Thanks for joining me in this class.