There’s been a lot of buzz around the new infographic craze: “How to Build Your Own Infographic” is the tagline of a series of free tutorials that teach you how to design and build a new infographic.
The idea is that a new kind of infographics is born when you apply some basic infographics skills to the world of social media marketing, and then the process is super-simple.
The tools and techniques are there.
But they’re not as easy as you might think.
There’s an element of fear in the process, and it might be a little intimidating at first.
“There’s so much confusion about what an infographic is, it’s hard to really explain it,” says Chris Fong, an infographics creator and editor at the infographics blog Designboom.
“I think the hardest part is trying to explain the concept to people.”
In fact, you might need to spend a little bit of time explaining the concept itself to someone.
“Infographics are a really important part of the design process,” Fong says.
“If you have to explain why something is important, that’s not a good design decision.
So if you can’t explain it clearly, it makes the whole thing much harder to understand.”
The good news?
The tools are there for you.
There are tools for creating custom-made, one-sheet infographics, which you can use to show off your brand, your company, your product, your services, and even your own brand.
If you’re looking to create a new infographics project, there’s a lot you can do right now to get started.
Here are the top 3 tools that you can download right now that will help you make your own, one page, interactive infographic in a single day.
1.
Illustrator and Photoshop: There are lots of great Photoshop and Illustrator tutorials on the web, and you can find them all on the Adobe website.
Here’s a few of the best: Illustrator tutorial: Using Illustrator as a design tool, Fong recommends taking a look at his Illustrator course and getting the fundamentals down.
The course will teach you basic techniques like curves and line thickness, but also includes a section on how to create an infographic using a grid and line styles.
2.
Adobe Illustrator for iOS: You can get this free online version of Adobe Illustration for iOS.
It has a few tutorials and tips for beginners.
If that doesn’t do it for you, you can also download the free, stand-alone version, which is built for iPad and can be used on any device.
3.
Illustration and Photoshop Elements for iPad: You’ll need to install the Adobe Photoshop Elements app, which includes some powerful features.
“It has everything you need to start your own infographic with Illustrator, including a grid view,” says Fong.
“Plus, there are some great tutorials on how it works on mobile devices, too.”
Here’s how to do that: Open up Illustrator in the top right corner, then tap the “Open In” icon.
In the list of elements, tap the Illustrator icon.
Tap the “Shape” tab.
In this new window, choose a color and select “Create with,” then click “Create.”
This will take you to a page where you can choose the size of your grid and choose a grid style for your infographic.
You’ll also need to make a selection for the color of your infographic’s border, or your font, or the color that will be displayed in the header.
When the page loads, you’ll be presented with the options for the font, the color, and the background color of the border.
When you make these choices, your graphic will appear in your graphics menu, and will be styled in the grid style.
You can tweak the font and color of this grid as you see fit.
“You’ll be able to tweak a lot about your infographic,” says D.C. Johnson, a graphic designer and founder of CreativeGrip, an online marketing tool that allows you to create professional-looking infographics.
“But for the most part, the font is what will determine how it looks on the screen.”
You’ll be guided through the process of adding colors to your infographic, and can customize the colors as you like.
3D printing and digital fabrication: There’s a ton of great resources on the internet about 3D-printing your infographic with Adobe Illustrators Elements.
This tutorial on Instructables, for example, includes detailed instructions on how a designer can create an animated infographic using just a few tools.
You also can use Adobe Illustress, Photoshop Elements, or Illustrator Elements to create your own custom-built infographics using the new Adobe Photoshop elements.
You might also want to consider 3D print.
This video, from CreativeGrips, shows a step-by-step process of printing a custom-printed infographic.
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