Trending December 2023 # Boxy Svg Tutorial: How To Create A Custom Folder Icon # Suggested January 2024 # Top 15 Popular

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You’ve looked high and low for the perfect icon theme but don’t like what you’ve found and decided to create your own custom folder icon. What software should you use, and how can you start? This Boxy SVG tutorial provides the step-by-step instructions for creating a simple folder icon.

Installation

There are many tools you can use to create SVG files, but the relatively new Boxy SVG is one of the most straightforward and fluid. Boxy SVG is available for Windows, macOS and Linux. It is available to download for free in the Windows Store, Mac App Store and Snap store. Simply search for “boxy svg” in the respective app store to install it. Linux users can install it on any Ubuntu-based distribution. Find it in the Software Center or fire up a terminal and use:

sudo

snap

install

boxy-svg

In Arch and Manjaro, you’ll first have to add support for snap packages and then use the same command.

Boxy SVG is also available as a web app, though it will require a subscription to use it.

Start with a rectangle

This Boxy SVG tutorial designs an icon for folders. Since folders are rectangular, select the Rectangle tool, the 12th one on the left toolbar, with the solid rectangle icon.

Use it to define a rectangle covering the bottom half of the default canvas – like the one seen in the screenshot below.

Clone and Resize Basic Transformations

Now you can tweak its individual points to change its shape. Although that wasn’t necessary to simply skew the rectangle, this shows how to tweak individual points, to create more interesting shapes or have better control over perspective.

Use the Edit tool (second one in the left toolbar, directly under the Transform tool, with a triangular arrow) to select the two control points on the right side of your new rectangle.

Colors and Perspective

Use the Transform tool to move your new – now smaller and skewed – rectangle so that it touches your larger one. Use the Fill tool (first on the right toolbar, with a paintbrush icon) to give it a color. For now, use any color you wish as a placeholder.

Create a clone of the smaller, skewed rectangle and move it to the left side of your larger rectangle, using methods demonstrated earlier.

Use “Back” from the Z-order group of options in the Arrangement panel to send those rectangles behind your larger one. “Front” does the opposite and will bring an object in front of everything else. The accompanying “Raise” and “Lower” options move an object “forward” or “backward” in individual steps.

Create a clone of your larger rectangle, and move it to the right and up so that it’s in contact with the other side of your skewed rectangles. You should have one large rectangle in contact with its left side and another one in contact with its right side, as shown in the screenshot below

Send this rectangle to the back as well, and give it a different color so you can easily tell each one apart.

Make the Flap

With the basic shape of our folder ready, it’s time to make it look more folder-like. A category flap will help with that. The folder’s shape below had to be tweaked a bit since it looked too fat.

Create a wide and short rectangle on a blank spot of your canvas. You’ll have a basic idea of its size if you keep in mind this will soon turn into a flap for the already-designed basic folder shape.

Move the flap so that’s in contact with the top-left side of the front large rectangle of your folder.

Tweak its size and placement until you believe the result looks folder-like.

Gradients and Shades

The easiest way to give the illusion of volume and make icon colors more interesting is through the use of gradients. Select the large, front rectangle and the Fill tool (first on the right toolbar or F on the keyboard). Under “Type,” select the second icon, “Linear Gradient.”

Notice the value directly under the color selectors – that will be by default accompanied by a “Hex” setting. Copy this value to your clipboard.

Select the rest of the rectangles and assign the same gradient to them. Since there does not seem to be a way to “copy gradients” in Boxy SVG, you’ll have to enter the color values manually. That’s why you should copy the color value from the previous gradient. You’ll have to return to it to also copy the second color value and paste it to the gradient of your second rectangle. Repeat for the other two until all sides of your folder have the exact same gradient.

With the Edit tool active, play with each folder side’s gradient. Make the left and right sides a little darker by dragging the light point of your gradient outside your rectangle. Do the same for the side at the back, but make it look even darker.

Final touches

To make the folder icon look more like a folder than a yellow box, fake some pages as a nice extra detail. By now you should be familiar with the processes involved.

Start by creating a light-grey rectangle in front of your folder, somewhat smaller in size.

Add a stroke around this rectangle to give an illusion of depth, without any pseudo-perspective effects that were used on the folder. To do this, with your rectangle selected, choose the Stroke tool (second on the right toolbar or S on the keyboard). Assign a black color to it, but turn the transparency slider to around 80 percent, close to the right side. The border that appeared around your rectangle should look transparent and be a gray that is somewhat darker than the rectangle’s main color.

Copy and paste your rectangle. Give the new clone a somewhat darker grey fill value. Leave the stroke as it is.

Use the Arrange panel to move your new rectangle behind but offset to the top and right compared to your primary page rectangle. Use the Transform tool to rotate it two to five degrees to the right.

Repeat the last steps to create a third page behind the first two.

Return to the Arrange panel, select all your three pages and send them Back. Use the “Raise” option to bring them toward the front step by step so they’re in front of your folder’s back side but behind its front side.

This example adds another rectangle under the folder. It was skewed to one side, a grey-to-transparent gradient was added, and the Compositing panel (third on the right toolbar, C on the keyboard) was used to add a Gaussian Blur filter. The result was a nice, smooth shadow under the folder. Feel free to skip that little detail if you wish.

Once you have saved your file, you can replace your Gnome icons with this newly created one.

Now that you have created your icons, follow along in the next tutorial to design a logo in Inkscape.

Odysseas Kourafalos

OK’s real life started at around 10, when he got his first computer – a Commodore 128. Since then, he’s been melting keycaps by typing 24/7, trying to spread The Word Of Tech to anyone interested enough to listen. Or, rather, read.

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You're reading Boxy Svg Tutorial: How To Create A Custom Folder Icon

Learn How To Create Custom Brushes On Inkscape?

Introduction to Inkscape brushes

Brushes are used for creating calligraphic or artistic paintings and artworks. The brushes in Inkscape are fundamental and elementary in nature. Brush strokes are generally used to create digital paintings and media artworks in Inkscape. Inkscape has quite a few options for creating, modifying, and reforming the shape and origin of Brush strokes.

How to Use Brushes in Inkscape?

Using Brushes in Inkscape is straightforward and simple. Since Inkscape is a vector software the capabilities of creating digital art using Brushes is finite. Users who are more into sketching and canvas painting use brushes in Inkscape. The user can use the brush tool or calligraphic tool in Inkscape to create artworks or they can also create custom brushes on Inkscape. Custom brushes are nothing but brushes created from shapes and objects by the user itself.

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3D animation, modelling, simulation, game development & others

How to use Brush or Calligraphy tool in Inkscape?

Following is an example to demonstrate the use of the Brush tool:-

Launch Inkscape

Create a new File

Go to the Brush tool or Calligraphy tool in Inkscape

The tool has different presets available. As shown in the image.

Marker: used for curves and curved ends

Brush: used for smooth and fine ends

Dip pen:- used for tilt ends

Tracing: helps in creating a trace with streamlined strokes

Splotchy: used for creating cylindrical tips

Wiggly:- used for creating jolted curved tips

We can also create custom names and brush strokes by using add or edit calligraphic profile Option in the options toolbar.

Next, we can set the width of the Brushstrokes with the help of the Width option as shown in the figure below. Here also, we have two sub-options: Pressure responsiveness (mostly helpful when using a stylus pen or tablet for designing) and Tracing lightness of the background.

Next, we can set the width of the face and tip of the brush strokes with the help of the Thinning.

Further, we can modify the angle of the brush strokes with the help of Angle.

We can also edit the behavior of the Angle when directed towards a certain direction with Fixation.

With the Caps and Tremor Options, the user can change the shape and thickness of the brush tip and add roughness to the brush stroke.

Once the brush strokes are created, the user can edit the same by using the EDIT PATH BY NODES.

How to create custom brushes on Inkscape?

To create custom brushes in Inkscape, we use shapes and Bezier tools and apply considerable smoothness to the shape. The process of creating brushes through the Bezier tool is easy and requires minimal effort from the user. Following are the steps to create custom brushes:-

Launch Inkscape

Create a new file.

Go to the shapes tool and create a small square as shown in the image below.

Draw a path with the help of Bezier tool as shown in the figure below.

The brush stroke is created with the help of the shapes tool. Similarly, we can use any other shapes as well to create brush strokes in Inkscape.

We also get the option, to apply Pressure of the device to the brush strokes when required.

Also, we need to keep in mind the option for Smoothness present in the options panel.

Further, we can edit the brush stroke with the help of the Edit Path by Node.

Conclusion

In this article, we study extensively creating and styling Brushes and strokes in the Inkscape program. Mostly used by digital painters and artistic designers, Brushes and their presets prove to be a convenient feature in the vector graphics program.

Having a basic framework for brushes palette, yet having all the necessary components, Inkscape Brushes has a persistent skillset and significance.

How To Create Custom Range Sliders With Css And Javascript?

A range slider, is an input field in HTML, that accepts the type as a “range”. It is used to select a numeric value within the given specific range, we can pass the range inside the input field as shown below snippet of code

As you can see in the above snippet of code, the type is equal to the range and we provide the min = “0” and max = “100” values, which will be the range of the field.

The custom range sliders help customize the field range as per the need.

In the following article, let us understand how to create custom range sliders, using CSS and JavaScript.

Let’s create separate files for each language −

Using oninput() event

An oninput event is an HTML event that is used to perform the immediate action when a user enters a value in the input fields. Following is the snippet of code to use this event −

Following is the explanation of the code below −

HTML file(index.html)

This is the HTML file must be saved with a .html extension. In this file, we will create an input range field and that will be our custom range slider, inside the input field we will set the range. and also create a span tag to show the custom range slider value.

Following is the code of the HTML

index.html

CSS file(style.css)

This is the CSS file created with a .css extension. Using the CSS we will manage the styling of the HTML page.

Following is the snippet of code to connect the CSS file with the HTML file −

Following is the code of the CSS −

chúng tôi

span

{

position

relative

;

top

;

left

;

font

size

;

font

weight

700

;

}

{

position

relative

;

left

;

font

size

;

}

input

[

type

'range'

]

{

webkit

appearance

none

;

width

400

;

height

;

background

color

black

;

border

radius

;

}

#slider

webkit

slider

thumb

{

webkit

appearance

none

;

width

;

height

;

border

radius

;

appearance

none

;

cursor

pointer

;

background

color

blue

;

}

JavaScript file(index.js)

This is the JavaScript file which must be saved with a .js extension. In JavaScript, we will write a program to fetch the input range value and show it to the users by using the innerHTML property.

Following is the snippet of code to connect the JavaScript file with the HTML file −

Following is the program of the JavaScript

chúng tôi

function

Range

(

)

{

let

range_value

document

getElementById

(

'slider'

)

;

let

result

document

getElementById

(

'res'

)

;

res

innerHTML

"Range value is: "

range_value

value

;

}

Example

On executing the above HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

span

{

position

relative

;

top

;

left

;

font

–

size

;

font

–

weight

700

;

}

{

position

relative

;

left

;

font

–

size

;

}

input

[

type

‘range’

]

{

–

webkit

–

appearance

none

;

width

400

;

height

;

background

–

color

black

;

border

–

radius

;

}

#slider

–

webkit

–

slider

–

thumb

{

–

webkit

–

appearance

none

;

width

;

height

;

border

–

radius

;

appearance

none

;

cursor

pointer

;

background

–

color

blue

;

}

function

Range

(

)

{

let

range_value

document

getElementById

(

‘slider’

)

;

let

result

document

getElementById

(

‘res’

)

;

res

innerHTML

“Range value is: “

range_value

value

;

}

With the HTML, we create the content of the page. We first create an input field that accepts the range as a type, and inside the input field, we pass the min value equal to 1 and the max value equal to 100 as shown below −

And later on, we create an oninput event as you can see in the above snippet of code, the oninput event is used to calculate the value at the time the user enters the value in the input field. And then we fetch the input range value through its id as shown below −

let range_value = document.getElementById('slider');

We fetch the span tag and through the innerHTML property, we show the range slider value as shown below −

res.innerHTML = "Range value is: " + range_value.value;

Following is the program to create a custom range slider

Following is the code of the HTML

index.html

Following is the CSS code

chúng tôi

span

{

position

relative

;

top

;

left

;

font

size

;

font

weight

700

;

}

{

position

relative

;

left

;

font

size

;

}

input

[

type

'range'

]

{

webkit

appearance

none

;

width

400

;

height

;

background

color

yellow

;

border

radius

;

}

#slider

webkit

slider

thumb

{

webkit

appearance

none

;

width

;

height

;

border

radius

;

appearance

none

;

cursor

pointer

;

background

color

red

;

}

button

{

width

150

;

height

;

background

color

blue

;

color

white

;

border

none

;

cursor

pointer

;

position

relative

;

left

;

top

;

transition

0.5

;

border

radius

;

}

button

hover

{

opacity

0.7

;

}

Following is the JavaScript program

chúng tôi

let

btn

document

getElementById

(

'btn'

)

;

let

range_value

document

getElementById

(

'slider'

)

;

let

result

document

getElementById

(

'res'

)

;

res

innerHTML

"Range value is: "

range_value

value

;

}

Example

On executing the above HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

span

{

position

relative

;

top

;

left

;

font

–

size

;

font

–

weight

700

;

}

{

position

relative

;

left

;

font

–

size

;

}

input

[

type

‘range’

]

{

–

webkit

–

appearance

none

;

width

400

;

height

;

background

–

color

yellow

;

border

–

radius

;

}

#slider

–

webkit

–

slider

–

thumb

{

–

webkit

–

appearance

none

;

width

;

height

;

border

–

radius

;

appearance

none

;

cursor

pointer

;

background

–

color

red

;

}

button

{

width

150

;

height

;

background

–

color

blue

;

color

white

;

border

none

;

cursor

pointer

;

position

relative

;

left

;

top

;

transition

0.5

;

border

–

radius

;

}

button

hover

{

opacity

0.7

;

}

let

btn

document

getElementById

(

‘btn’

)

;

let

range_value

document

getElementById

(

‘slider’

)

;

let

result

document

getElementById

(

‘res’

)

;

res

innerHTML

“Range value is: “

range_value

value

;

}

let btn = document.getElementById('btn');

How To Create Custom Apple Watch Faces To Match Your Style

The Face Gallery section in the Watch app has tons of watch faces to choose from. It’s also in this section you can customize and manage your Apple Watch faces. However, if you want to create a custom watch face or get an exciting one that’s different than what Apple offers, you have some easy options.

In this tutorial, we show you how to create and use beautiful custom watch faces on your Apple Watch.

1. Use Facer

Facer is the easiest app to create a custom watch face or download ones created & shared by the Facer community. Obviously, you can further customize the downloaded watch face built by someone else with complications of your choice.

Here’s how to get a custom watch face using Facer on your Apple Watch:

1) Download Facer for free from the iOS App Store and open it on your iPhone.

2) Finish the initial app setup.

3) Inside the Facer app, you can tap Create your own design to build a custom watch face.

4) Alternatively, explore the list of available watch faces and tap one you like.

6) Tap the watch face and choose your desired complications to customize it.

7) When everything is done, scroll down and tap Set as current Watch Face.

The plethora of watch faces published by the Facer community members is possible thanks to a feature in watchOS 7 and later that allows sharing of watch faces with friends and family. Spend some time in the Facer app and get watch faces that seem suitable for your taste.

2. Use a personal photo as your watch face

If you like, you can sync photos from your iPhone to your Apple Watch and use it as the watch face. You also have the option to add a few complications to the photo watch face. Here are two tutorials to help:

3. Customize your watch face with Watchsmith

From the creators of Widgetsmith, a custom widget maker for iPhone, comes Watchsmith. With it, you can make your own complications and then have them change dynamically throughout the day. For example, this lets you start your morning with the weather and then change to see your activity in the afternoon.

Get started with Watchsmith

Install Watchsmith on your Apple Watch by opening the Watch app on your iPhone and tapping Install next to Watchsmith. If you need help, here are 3 ways to download apps to your Apple Watch.

When you first open Watchsmith on your iPhone, you’ll need to grant permissions for your Watch. Tap Manage Permissions on the main app screen and then tap Authorize for each of those you want to use. This includes location, health, and calendar for apps like Weather, Health/Activity, and Calendar. When you finish, return to the previous screen to start creating your custom Watch face.

From here, select the complication type to customize it. Depending on the one you choose, you can adjust things like font, top or bottom color, and background color.

Once you get the complication exactly as you want it, tap the back arrow and optionally give it a name. If you want to add a dynamic complication, tap the plus sign button. Then move the range to the date and time you want, and customize that complication. Tap Save to apply the changes.

Go to the face on your Watch, press and hold, and tap Edit. Select the complication spot and then tap the Watchsmith complication you created to add it to your Watch face.

If you get stuck or have a question, you can check out the handy walk-through video. In the app on your iPhone, tap the Settings button (gear icon) and select Walkthrough Video.

Summary: Watchsmith is an app that lets you add customized Apple Watch complications. After you personalize the complication inside the Watchsmith app on your iPhone, you can choose Watchsmith as a complication for your Apple Watch face.

4. Change your watch face automatically based on time or location

Finally, you can also match your style by having your Apple Watch face change automatically based on time or location. This ensures a fresh watch face at different intervals and keeps the tiny computer on your wrist personalized, fun, and productive.

Other Apple Watch tips:

How To Build A Custom Launcher In Android Studio

Read Next: The best Android app makers for creating apps and building them with zero code

When it comes to Android customization, the launcher is the holy grail.

How might you go about creating your own Android launcher? Read this post — and the upcoming part two — that’s how!

The game plan

It needs to be mapped to the home button and launch when your device starts up.

It needs to display custom wallpapers.

It needs to show and launch apps from the homescreen and from an app drawer.

It needs multiple screens through which you can scroll.

It needs widgets.

The Android manifest

Launching apps is a simple matter of using intents. Intents allow us to launch activities, apps, functions, and more. In this case, we’re going to launch Google Chrome using its package name, which is com.android.chrome.

To do that, you simply need this code:

Code

Intent launchIntent = getPackageManager().getLaunchIntentForPackage("com.android.chrome"); Intent launchIntent = getPackageManager().getLaunchIntentForPackage("com.android.chrome"); startActivity(launchIntent);

Code

public static Drawable getActivityIcon(Context context, String packageName, String activityName) { PackageManager pm = context.getPackageManager(); Intent intent = new Intent(); intent.setComponent(new ComponentName(packageName, activityName)); ResolveInfo resolveInfo = pm.resolveActivity(intent, 0); return resolveInfo.loadIcon(pm); }

After that, we can simply set the icon as we like it in onCreate():

Code

ImageView chromeIcon = (ImageView) findViewById(R.id.chromeButton);

How to create an app drawer

Code

public class AppInfo { CharSequence label; CharSequence packageName; Drawable icon; public TextView textView; public ImageView img; public ViewHolder(View itemView) { super(itemView); textView = (TextView) itemView.findViewById(R.id.text); img = (ImageView) itemView.findViewById(R.id.img); } @Override int pos = getAdapterPosition(); Context context = v.getContext(); Intent launchIntent = context.getPackageManager().getLaunchIntentForPackage(appsList.get(pos).packageName.toString()); context.startActivity(launchIntent); Toast.makeText(v.getContext(), appsList.get(pos).label.toString(), Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show(); } } public RAdapter(Context c) { PackageManager pm = c.getPackageManager(); Intent i = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_MAIN, null); i.addCategory(Intent.CATEGORY_LAUNCHER); for(ResolveInfo ri:allApps) { AppInfo app = new AppInfo(); app.label = ri.loadLabel(pm); app.packageName = ri.activityInfo.packageName; chúng tôi = ri.activityInfo.loadIcon(pm); appsList.add(app); } } @Override public void onBindViewHolder(RAdapter.ViewHolder viewHolder, int i) { String appLabel = appsList.get(i).label.toString(); String appPackage = appsList.get(i).packageName.toString(); Drawable appIcon = appsList.get(i).icon; TextView textView = viewHolder.textView; textView.setText(appLabel); ImageView imageView = viewHolder.img; imageView.setImageDrawable(appIcon); } @Override public int getItemCount() { return appsList.size(); } @Override public RAdapter.ViewHolder onCreateViewHolder(ViewGroup parent, int viewType) { LayoutInflater inflater = LayoutInflater.from(parent.getContext()); View view = inflater.inflate(R.layout.row, parent, false); ViewHolder viewHolder = new ViewHolder(view); return viewHolder; }

Code

PackageManager pm = c.getPackageManager(); Intent i = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_MAIN, null); i.addCategory(Intent.CATEGORY_LAUNCHER); for(ResolveInfo ri:allApps) { AppInfo app = new AppInfo(); app.label = ri.loadLabel(pm); app.packageName = ri.activityInfo.packageName; chúng tôi = ri.activityInfo.loadIcon(pm); appsList.add(app);

The next steps

How To Use Canva: Tutorial For Beginners

Are you just starting out with Canva and trying to learn how to use the platform as as seamlessly as possible?

If so, this is the guide for you.

We’ve covered everything a Canva beginner needs to know needs to know to get up and running with this incredible online design tool.

Let’s dive right in.

Jump to a specific section:

What is Canva?

There’s a very good chance that everyone reading this already knows what Canva is, but just in case you don’t here’s a quick introduction for you.

Canva is an online graphic design software that was created to allow anyone, regardless of their design skills and experience, to create professional-looking visuals with ease.

The tool is designed to be as beginner-friendly as possible, so you should have no problems learning how to use it.

With Canva you can create a huge range of designs including posters, logos, videos, social media content, printables, banners, websites, and so much more.

Essentially Canva is the ultimate tool for creating high-quality designs and marketing assets quickly and easily.

Canva homepage

Part 1: Steps to get started with Canva

Below are 10 steps you can take to quickly go from a beginner Canva user to having a solid grasp of the platform.

Step 1: Sign up for an account

You can use Canva without signing up for an account but to get access some important basic features such as being able to save your designs we highly recommend you sign up for a free Canva account.

Signing up for a Canva account

Step 2: Starting a design

To start off a design you can choose between two methods. Either you can start from a blank canvas or a simply choose a predesigned template as the starting point for your design.

Blank canvas

Starting from a blank canvas

You can also select a specific design type under the ‘you might want to try’ header:

Choosing from the ‘You might want to try…’ section

Any of these options will take you to the editor area (which we’ll cover in the next step).

Templates

As mentioned you can choose an existing template to start your design from.

To find your ideal template you can either go to the ‘Templates‘ tab via the left side of the homepage and scroll through some of the existing template options:

Link to template area

Templates area

Or you can search for specific templates in the search bar e.g. ‘YouTube thumbnail’ and find a template from the search results page:

Searching for templates

One good method of finding free templates on Canva is to choose a specific design size e.g. ‘Facebook post’, go to the editor with a blank canvas, and then select a template from the side panel.

The templates with a crown icon are the ones only available to Canva Pro users, and the ones without a crown icon are free to use for all users:

Choosing a template from the editor

Step 3: The editor area – basics

To get started with the Canva editor, there are a few basic areas to cover:

Modifying existing elements

If you choose an existing template, there will be various elements already on the canvas. These can be easily modified and customized to your liking.

Adjusting an element on the canvas

You will also see some additional customization options for your selected element above the editor. Depending on the type of element that you’ve selected there will slightly different options here.

For example with a text element you’ll see options such as font type, text size, color, alignment, uppercase, effects (we’ll cover these later), and a few other options:

Text customization options

With a graphic element you’ll see different options depending on the type of element that you’ve selected but the basic options normally include color, flip (e.g. horizontally or vertically), and effects:

Graphic customization options

Whatever element you select you’ll have additional options at the top right of the editor including position – which allows you to align the element to a specific area of the page (e.g. top, middle, bottom, etc.), and transparency – which allows you to change the opacity of a specific element:

Adjusting the position Adjusting the transparency

Grouping elements

Selecting all elements

Working with layers

If you have several different elements in your design each element will be on its own layer. Sometimes it can be tricky to select a particular element if it’s on a layer that is near or at the bottom of the layers hierarchy.

Selecting deeper layers

You can also adjust the layer position of an element if you select it, then go to ‘Position’ and you can choose to move it forwards, backwards, to the front, or to the back:

Moving a layer forward or backward

Lock elements

If you like how a specific element or group of elements looks within your design, you can make sure they stay exactly how and where they are by locking them in place.

Locking an element

Guidelines & Safezones

If you move around an object on a page, guidelines will appear on the canvas to show you how the selected element lines up with the other elements on the page and also how it lines up on the overall canvas:

Using guidelines

You can also go to ‘File’ and select to show rulers & guides, margins, and print bleeds which is particularly useful if you’re creating print collateral:

Showing the rulers, margins, and print bleed

Undo or Redo changes

Undo and Redo buttons

There’s also the ‘redo’ button if you want to reapply the alteration.

Adding new pages

Adding or duplicating pages

Viewing multiple pages

If you do have multiple pages within the same design file, you can quickly see how they all look together side by side by going to the ‘Grid view’ option.

This is particularly useful if you’re creating something like a Facebook or Instagram carousel post, you can quickly check if all the pages look together:

Grid view button

Grid view

Saving your designs

Before you save your design we’d recommend naming your design, this particularly useful if you plan to create lots of designs, so you can easily come back and find it, and also store in a relevant folder (we’ll cover this later on).

You can even name the individual pages within your design to keep things super clear and organized:

Naming your design files

Saving your design

Step 4: Further customizing your designs

Now that we have the basics covered, let’s dive into some more of the customization options that you have when designing with Canva.

Elements

Canva has an incredible amount of design elements that you can use. We’ll only cover the most widely used ones in this guide including graphics, shapes, and photo frames but there is an almost endless amount for you to choose from.

To find the elements that you need you can simply put in a search term to see what’s available e.g. ‘Flowers’.

If you only want to find free elements, you can filter your search results to only show free ones, this option is also available for templates, photos, audio, and video search:

Searching for elements Filtering for free elements

Canva also has ‘Collections’ which are groups of elements in the same style that you can use to keep your designs consistent:

Elements collections

Graphics:

Some of the graphics that you add to your design will allow you to alter the colors, whilst with other graphic elements you might not have that option.

To get around this you can go to ‘Edit image’ and select the Duotone or ColorMix options to alter the colors of these elements:

Going to the ‘Edit image’ area

Using the Duotone color effects

Shapes:

Canva has plenty of shapes, lines, and icons that you can add to your designs to spruce them up:

Line and shape elements

Frames/Grids:

The frames and Grid elements are shapes in which you can add images too. They offer a really quick to create interesting and unique designs.

To use these, all you need to do is add one to your page, then go to the photos tab, find a photo that works for you and drag it over the frame or grid and the image when then appear inside it:

Frames and grids in Canva

Adding a photo to a frame

Other elements includes:

Graphs and charts

Tables

Stickers (animated elements)

Gradients

And much more.

Seeing more elements from an artist, and also ‘Starring’ an element

Text

The text elements on Canva are very easy to adjust and customize too. You simply go to the text tab on the left side of the editor, and you can add a heading, subheading, or body text element, and this will be added to the page.

Adding new text elements

You can choose from a range of text presets and combinations that Canva has already together. These already have some text effect applied to them.

Text presets and font combinations

If you’re looking to spruce up a text element in your design you can select it, and then go to the effects area. You’ll see a whole range of options here.

Text effects

For example, you could select ‘Shadow’ which adds a drop shadow effect to your selected text element and you get a few additional customizations options such as being able to change the opacity, the color, and more:

Adding a text shadow effect

Photos

Canva has a huge library of stock photos that you can utilize for your designs. Many of which are free to use for free Canva users.

You can put in a search term to find specific, and Canva also has some theme suggestions as well as trending photos to help you find the photos that you’re looking for:

Photos tab

Adding a new photo

There’s also the background remover tool, which is only available for Canva Pro users at the moment (we’ll cover this in the Canva Pro section):

Image effects

You can apply filters to the photo and add color effects such as Duotone and Colormix:

Image color effects

And you can crop photos too if you only want to use a specific section of the photo:

Image crop option

The image will appear in Canva for you to use (just make sure you’re allowed to use that image before you do this):

Photo from Unsplash

Pasting the photo directly into the Canva editor

Backgrounds

In the backgrounds tab you unsurprisingly have a huge number of background images that you can use for your designs.

The are all categorized into themes such as landscapes, food, nature, etc. to make easy for you to find the kind of background you need. You can also search for one if you have something specific in mind.

Backgrounds tab

The backgrounds can be customized in the same way that any other image can be on the Canva.

Styles

If you’re in need of inspiration when it comes to color palette of your design, or even the font combinations that you should be using the ‘Styles’ tab in the Canva editor will be really useful for you.

They have a range of suggested color palettes, font sets, and also combinations of all these things that you can select and it will automatically apply those suggestions to your page or all the pages of your design if you choose that option:

‘Styles’ tab

There’s also the ‘Shuffle’ button which allows you to use the selected suggested color palette and font combinations but switch them around to see how they work best with your design:

‘Shuffling’ styles

Animations

You can then select one of the animations available and this will be applied to all the elements on the selected page:

Page level animations

You can do the same for individual elements too, so rather than animating everything on a page it will only apply to the selected element:

Element level animations

You can even upload files directly from other platforms including Dropbox, Facebook, Instagram, Google Drive, and Google photos:

Uploading from third party sources

The elements you upload can be customized in the same way as any other Canva element.

Utilize previous designs

If you have made designs before, these will be under the ‘All your designs’ tab. So, if you want to create a similar design you add a previous one to your page and modify it, or grab elements from it that you want to use for your new design:

Accessing previous designs

Step 5: Creating videos

To create videos in Canva, you can start off by choosing your video format with a blank canvas.

If you navigate to the videos tab on the Canva homepage you’ll see a range of video options including the standard 1920x1080px, mobile video, slideshow video, Instagram reel, and several others:

Video options on Canva

From a blank canvas you can add videos from Canva’s library (or upload your own videos), graphics, audio, etc. to start creating your video.

Alternatively, if you have a specific format in mind already e.g. an Instagram story video, you can search for templates, and choose one that you like to start off your video creation:

Instagram story video templates

The editing options available will be the same regardless of what video format or templates you choose.

To show you how to edit and create a video we’ll utilize a template.

When you’re in the editor and you’ve selected a video element you’ll see the customization options above the editor, these will include the ‘Edit video’ section where you can remove the video background (Pro feature only) and also add light and color adjustments to the chosen video element:

Video background remover

Video adjustments

You can also trim the length of the video or choose which part of the video file you want to feature in your design:

Trimming the video length

The other options on the top bar are the playback options (e.g. auto play or loop video), crop (to adjust which part of the video file you want to show within your design), flip, and animate (although the animations will only effect the non-video elements of your design such as text, graphics, etc.):