How to create different types of graphics for your website
Hello, and welcome!
A post with fresh images is a pleasure to the eye.
An image with a compelling message is a challenge to the intellect.
A post that serves both visual and verbal imagery is what you should strive for.
In today’s post, I will show you how to create different types of graphics for your website using a smart and simple tool. Creating custom images for your posts will increase the value of your content by making it stand out.
On this website, we try as much as we can to produce original and visually-appealing graphics. As a matter of fact, posts with eye-catching images usually attract more visitors and increase user engagement. Eventually, our images consistently rank high in Google Image Search as you can see here and here.
How can you achieve the same result? Let’s first start with describing the different types of images that you can actually find on a website.
Step 1 (How to Create Different Types of Graphics for Your Website):
A picture is indeed worth a thousand words. As you can see in the image above, there are at least four types of graphics that you can use on your website.
Photographs
Photographs are pictures that are usually made using a camera. The most common examples of photographs that you can find on a website are the following:
- Post thumbnails or featured images which represent a particular post or page. You usually see them on home or blog pages. It is important to use a consistent colour palette in order to create a harmonious look.
- Product photographs which portray objects that you want to sell. Make sure that the pictures are of excellent quality since you want to persuade people to buy your product.
- Portraits that feature people. This is common in blogs about fashion and photography. Good portraits are the ones that tell a story about the subject.
- Landscape photos that depict natural spaces or sceneries. You will often find such pictures on travel blogs.
- Screenshots which are captured by your computer. Their quality is not excellent but they enable you to show parts of an electronic document to your visitors.
Infographics
Infographics have recently become very popular. They enable us to break down information into digestible chunks and visually present it in a concise way with the help of short text and images.
Common examples of infographics are:
- Timelines which show the chronology of events. They usually include dates and some history.
- Statistical infographics which enable us to represent data. These can be in the form of charts or graphs.
- List-based infographics which give us the exact steps of a particular process or enumerate examples.
- Hierarchical infographics which allow us to organise information according to specific levels of relevance.
- Comparison infographics which can show the differences or similarities between two products, services, people, organisations or processes. They usually help us to make decisions.
Photographs and infographics are not the only images that we can find on a website. On the contrary, we can use other types of pictures to transmit messages to our audience.
Illustrations
Illustrations enable us to depict our ideas in a visual and fun way. There are different types of illustrations:
- Drawings are done by hand or digitally-drawn on a computer. A drawing on a piece of paper can be scanned to get an electronic file. It is an excellent idea to use drawings on your website because they add a touch of authenticity considering that they are personal.
- Doodles are little sketches that we produce when we are absent-minded. As a matter of fact, we usually find these types of illustrations in notebooks. Doodles are a fun and creative way of expressing our inner thoughts.
- SmartArt is a powerful PowerPoint feature that enables us to create different types of diagrams that can illustrate our ideas. In this post, we have used SmartArt graphics to facilitate understanding of new concepts.
- A comic strip is a sequence of drawings that tell a story. These drawings are represented in boxes where text is shown in balloons. Comic strip stories are often humorous.
- Cartoons are simple drawings or sketches that can be satirical or humorous. You often encounter cartoons in newspapers.
Charts
Charts are popular additions to a blog post or page. They enable us to depict information using tables, pictures, lines, curves, graphs or diagrams.
Below are the most commonly-used charts that you can actually create with PowerPoint:
- Bar charts represent data with rectangular columns of equal width. In fact, these bars can be vertical or horizontal.
- Pie charts show data in a circle. This circle is divided proportionally and the different parts that we get are called slices.
- Line charts show the evolution of data. As a matter of fact, they consist of points connected by a straight line.
- Map charts enable us to represent geographical data in a visual way.
- Bubble charts show data using several circles of different sizes in three dimensions. They enable us to understand the relationship between different categories.
Step 2 (How to Create Different Types of Graphics for Your Website):
The SmartArt feature in PowerPoint helps us to come up with designs that are clear and visually appealing.
As the picture shows, you just need to follow a few steps in order to come up with a new graphic.
Creating the Graphic
- First of all, you need to open PowerPoint if you have Microsoft Office.
- Then, click on the ‘Insert’ tab which will lead you to the SmartArt feature.
- Afterwards, click on the ‘SmartArt’ tab and you are ready to come up with your first design.
- Choose the graphic that you prefer. There are several options such as list, process, cycle, hierarchy and pyramid.
- The initial design has few shapes so you need to add more shapes (if necessary) by right-clicking on the figure.
- The next step consists in adding text to the figure.
- Besides, there are some designs that enable you to add pictures with online or offline images. Make sure to respect copyright when you are using images that do not belong to you.
- If you do not like the colours, you can customise your SmartArt with your preferred colours. In the picture above, we even added the shapes with the numbers.
- After you are satisfied with your design, you can save it as a picture and use to on your website.
Software for Editing Graphics
Sometimes, you might need to enhance the quality of your images. There are several ways you can do this.
- You can use Paint to reduce or increase the size of your image depending on your needs.
- It is possible to You use Canva to crop the image. You can also adjust the contrast or brightness of the final picture.
- Use PicMonkey for more editing templates.
- You can create a transparent background for your image with this amazing free tool here. Canva allows you to do this but you have to pay for the service.
- Animating your photo is equally possible using Canva.
- If you love paintings and drawings, you might want to use these Apps here to turn your pictures into drawings.
Further Exploration (How to Create Different Types of Graphics)
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About the Author
Thandi Ngwira Gatignol is the founder of Learn English With Africa. She was born on June 11th, 1981 in Blantyre, Malawi. When she was 19, she left her country of birth for France. She currently lives with her two daughters and husband in Poland.
Thandi holds a Bachelor’s degree in English studies obtained at the Université Paris X Nanterre in France and a Certificate in Journalism from Malawi. She has taught English as a French Ministry of Education certified teacher both in France and in Poland. She speaks six languages fluently, including French, Polish and Italian. She is now learning Kiswahili, German and Spanish. Salt No More is her debut novel and you can find her other books here on the website or on Amazon.
English Article: How to Create Different Types of Graphics for Your Website (Smart and Simple Way) Level B1-B2© Learn English With Africa, May 2021
