28 Apr 2020

15 Essential Graphic Design Tools That Can Be Useful

When we talk about graphics designing it is hard not to discuss some of the best and highly recommended graphic designing tools. The simple reason behind it is that design tools are at the core of any visual communication process. 

If you need a unique and creative graphic design for your business, you need to have the right set of graphic design tools.

Just like a chef needs their knives or a mechanic needs their wrench, a graphic designer needs designing software tools to create amazing designs.

Sure, a designer can make something beautiful using Microsoft Paint. But the intuitive controls and flexibility of a good program can make all the difference. And, with the digital space expanding exponentially every year, the need for finely designed graphics has been increasing rapidly as well.

But, one question that businesses (or a freelance designer) commonly face is which graphic design tool to use; as there are many to choose from.

So, in order to ease your selection process, we have narrowed down the list to 15 essential graphic design tools that you can use for your creative requirements in 2020.

1. Photoshop

What else did you expect to appear at the #1 spot in the list of essential graphic design tools? Adobe Photoshop is easily the most recognizable of the graphic design software available today. From basic cropping to more complex raster designs, when it comes to image manipulation, Photoshop can do it all. 

2. Illustrator

Adobe Illustrator offers a wide variety of tools, filters, and effects, and is widely used by graphic designers for logo designs, website designs, video game designs, and more. Photoshop and Illustrator both come from the same family and share several common features, with the only prominent difference being that Illustrator is mostly used for Vector graphic designs.

 3. InDesign

Another very popular and effective graphic designing tool from the Adobe family is InDesign. This tool is very effective and a must-have for publication houses. In fact, it has been in application for laying out magazines and newspapers since 1999.

4. Affinity photo

A close competitor to Adobe Photoshop, Affinity Photo is yet another useful designing tool for raster designs. It is available for, both, Apple and Microsoft operating systems.

5. Affinity designer

Similar to what Affinity photo is to Adobe Photoshop, Affinity designer is to Adobe Illustrator. It is considered to be a great tool for budding designers to learn the basic use of layers as it is simpler and faster than the Illustrator.

6. PROOF

PROOF is the latest offering by GraphicsZoo that lets you manage all your design projects from one place. You can create your designs, make edits, and share the drafts with other teammates. It is a highly effective and recommended graphic design tool for projects involving several stakeholders. Get more information on this holistic designing toolhere.

7. Pixlr

Pixlr is one of the most popular free online photo editor applications which is used by many designers to fine-tune their images. This is mostly used for raster images to make last-minute changes in the images.

8. Vectr

As the name suggests, Vectr is a free option for editing and working on vector images. It’s a simpler option for anyone to learn and use, and perfect for those who don’t need the advanced features for high-end applications.

 

 9.  Canva

It won’t be an understatement if Canva is labeled as the best graphic design tool for beginners. With an incredibly user-friendly interface and a wide array of design features as well as free images, one can create amazing designs for blogs, social media pages, and more.

10. RemoveBG

As the name clearly suggests, RemoveBG is an online image editing software application used specifically to remove the background of an image. It is frequently used by designers who don’t want to get into the complexities of using Photoshop to edit images.

 

11. Venngage

Just like RemoveBG, Venngage has its own specific feature; Infographic! With thousands of creative infographic templates to choose from, Venngage is a great tool to simply drag and drop images to create amazing infographics.

12. Paletton

The success of graphic design is carried largely on the shoulders of the color scheme used in the design. And that is why having the right set of colors is extremely important. Paletton is a tool that allows you to happily pick your hues on shading to choose from some attempted color blends; such as, Monochromatic, Adjacent Colors, Tetrad, as well as Freestyle.

13. Fotor

Fotor is another commonly used and highly effective online tool for graphic design. With its bundle of easy to use features, one can create images easily and in a lesser time interval for small projects.

14. ProofHub

Remember the PROOF offered by GraphicsZoo? Well, ProofHub is a similar tool available on a subscription basis to manage all your design projects from one place.

 

 15. Filestage

Filestage is an online audit and endorsement tool that gives visual designers unlimited oversight over the substance survey process. Additionally, it offers the status of tasks initially. In one minute you can understand which partners have endorsed your structure and the ones you need to audit your work.

To conclude...

Some of you may have used a few of these tools, some of you may have used all of them; while some of you may have heard of these tools for the first time. The underlining point here is that choosing the right set of graphic design tools for your visual communications can be a tricky task, as designs can be subjective to different opinions.

So, why not share your requirements with us and let us help you with all your graphic design projects. Simply send in a ‘Hi’ at support@graphicszoo.com