Getting Started with Canva

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CreativePro Magazine issue 7 coverThis article appeared in Issue 7 of CreativePro Magazine.

Remarkably simple to use, Canva makes quality design and content creation accessible to everyone—even if you’re not an art school graduate or Adobe power user. With this software—available on desktop, web, and mobile—you can start a new project from scratch or take advantage of thousands of professionally made templates for print, social media, presentations, and even video. Plus, Canva facilitates collaboration between teams or clients.

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A camera slinging design geek and Photoshop nerd, Khara Plicanic is a natural born teacher who’s been sharing inspiration & know-how with fellow creatives for more than 15 years. When she’s not making futile attempts at reclaiming hard drive space or searching the sofa cushions for a runaway Wacom pen, Khara can be found plotting her next craft project, catching up with her favorite late-night hosts, or trying to remember where she left her phone. Find her at KharaPlicanic.com.
  • Robert Whitney says:

    Does Canva support Pantone libraries, at the paid level even? Seeing a lot of clients starting to use it, and as a print provider that’s a critical component to maintaining standards during output. Great intro too!

    • Khara Plicanic says:

      Hi Robert! As far as I know, Canva doesn’t support actual Pantone libraries, just approximation with HEX codes…

  • Dov Isaacs says:

    Potential users of Canva should also be aware of some major issues that affect the ability to accurately print from this application, especially via generation of PDF.

    Canva does not support output of any flavor of PDF/X, especially PDF/X-4!

    Canva PDF output is strictly device RGB. You might want to assume that such RGB is sRGB for lack of any other guidance. If you need to print from such PDF files, you should consider running Preflight profiles that explicitly convert R=G=B to an appropriate grayscale value. Otherwise, you should expect rich black/grey output. Associated with this is the fact that all such PDF pages have a background of R=G=B=255. Unless you detect and convert such backgrounds to pure white (i.e., CMYK=(0,0,0,0)), you may end up with oddball, unexpected tinted page backgrounds.

  • Kyle DeMartyn says:

    Why would a “creative professional” be using a program such as Canva?? And it doesn’t play well with commercial printing, assuming you want your final product to look good.

    • Dov Isaacs says:

      The problem is exactly who is a “creative professional?” There is no educational or licensing requirements to use that title. Canva is promoting itself as a way for anyone to instantly become a “creative professional” without any real knowledge of the fundamentals of graphic arts and especially of printing.

      And for what it is worth, the current Adobe Creative Cloud Express application isn’t really any better; it has similar limitations and could readily lead to the same issues in terms of problematic output.

  • Jana Schroeder says:

    I’m a graphic designer. I’ve got a client that needs animated GIFS. They want them really quick, lots of different sizes and the big hurdle is that they are small (under 150kb, and no more than 15 fps). I’m trialing Canva to see if it can save me some time. Anyone have any other options in CC or tips for Canva… would love to hear.

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