Top Tips and Tricks to Create a Fantastic Collage
Want to make a photo collage for your family or friends? Update your social media account with a story told with your pictures? Or create a cool ad for your online shop but have never done it before? Good news, you don’t need any photo editing or collage-making experience to create unique artwork all by yourself. What do you need, then? A bunch of pictures, a reliable collage maker, and a bit of inspiration.
In case you want to get some inspiration check awesome birthday collage ideas and create a stunning collage for your friends and family. Want to create a unique collage for a different occasion? Just follow the link on the website you will find many more useful tutorials on making amazing photo collages. But, first, let’s explore a dozen helpful tips on how to make a cool collage. Ready? Then, dive in.
Choose the Main Topic
It’s better to decide on one of the themes for collages that perfectly suits the occasion and then select pictures that best describe the chosen topic. By the way, you can use photos that were taken in absolutely different times and places or pictures from one photo shoot. Look through the images you want to include into your creative collage and pick the most suitable ones. You can also use some images from the stock websites if you want. This way you will not only create cohesion between your pictures but better express your idea and tell a whole story. For example, scout for stylish wedding collage ideas and choose the right one.
This tip will help you to create a more attractive collage. Choose 2 or 3 key colors that naturally complement one another, for example, yellow and purple, blue and orange, red and green. You can mix them to create neutral hues or blend them together for shadows because complementary colors usually make each other stand out a bit and appear brighter. Avoid putting together colors that clash with each other like red and purple, orange and blue. One more trick is to stick to pictures that are just warm-toned or cool-toned. You can pick photos based on this principle or enhance them while creating your collage. This way your collage will look even more stylish.
One of the easiest ways to give the images in your photo collage a unified look is to apply the same filter to each of the photos. First, try out different effects and filters to find the most suitable ones, play with their settings to change the hue and brightness, to correct colors, and to tweak their intensity. You do not need to change them a lot to give your photo collage an attractive polished look. Alternatively, you can make most of the photos black and white and leave the main pictures colored.
The software you will be using can allow you to choose a grid from a built-in layout collection, so you can opt for the one that you like most. Alternatively, your collage-making program can allow you to create a customized layout. If so, think of how many photos you want to use and the way you want to arrange them. Then make the grid that perfectly suits your creative needs. In case you want to change anything in your layout you can always tweak it and get a completely new grid.
Select Matching Colors
This tip will help you to create a more attractive collage. Choose 2 or 3 key colors that naturally complement one another, for example, yellow and purple, blue and orange, red and green. You can mix them to create neutral hues or blend them together for shadows because complementary colors usually make each other stand out a bit and appear brighter. Avoid putting together colors that clash with each other like red and purple, orange and blue. One more trick is to stick to pictures that are just warm-toned or cool-toned. You can pick photos based on this principle or enhance them while creating your collage. This way your collage will look even more stylish.
Apply Effects or Filters
One of the easiest ways to give the images in your photo collage a unified look is to apply the same filter to each of the photos. First, try out different effects and filters to find the most suitable ones, play with their settings to change the hue and brightness, to correct colors, and to tweak their intensity. You do not need to change them a lot to give your photo collage an attractive polished look. Alternatively, you can make most of the photos black and white and leave the main pictures colored.
Pick a Layout
The software you will be using can allow you to choose a grid from a built-in layout collection, so you can opt for the one that you like most. Alternatively, your collage-making program can allow you to create a customized layout. If so, think of how many photos you want to use and the way you want to arrange them. Then make the grid that perfectly suits your creative needs. In case you want to change anything in your layout you can always tweak it and get a completely new grid.
Mind the Composition
It’s a good idea to stick to some golden photography rules while creating your unique collage. Some pieces of advice such as one-point perspective, the rule of thirds, symmetry, or negative space are perfectly applicable to photo collage creating. These rules can help you to create more eye-catching and balanced pictures. For example, don’t leave much space around the subject of your pictures, zoom in on your photo and crop it to fix this issue. Resize your images if necessary and leave not much empty space around them. Then, change the positions of your pictures in the grid to get the most balanced collage composition.
Add Frames & Borders
One more way to direct your viewers’ attention to the particular images in your photo collage or just enhance your creative project is to add frames. Choose a crisp or solid outline in any width and in any color. You can play with settings and turn the frame into a different single-color border or add some shadowy effect to it. Create outlines following the same style for every photo: round borders, rectangular or square frames, or any creative shape of a star, for example. Alternatively, you can add a frame for the whole collage or leave your artwork completely borderless.
In some cases, a plain white backdrop can look really nice, but not always… You can erase the default background that you do not like and replace it with a different photo. For example, a picture of the starry sky can be a good backdrop for a collage celebrating some achievements. Alternatively, opt for a solid color background, try different colors and change their intensity to choose the one that perfectly suits your project and doesn’t distract your viewers from the photos.
This trick will help you to connect the overall image with colors. To do that just reiterate colors in the fore- and background by using one of the colors or their shades in the background on the subject itself or vice versa. For instance, you can choose only images that have something pink or orange in them. As it is not always possible to use pictures based on the color criteria you can use the same color and some of its shades for frames or borders. Giving the images in your collage such a cohesive feel, you will create an overall sense of unity and balance in your artwork.
Sometimes pictures are not enough to deliver your best wishes or tell the whole story you see behind these photos. So, add some funny or cheerful text captions. Mind the occasion and type in congratulations, your best wishes, etc. Then tweak the text to your liking and make sure that the style matches the chosen theme of your collage. If not, change the font, the color of your text, and its position. Try not to overlay all your photos with text and add only some meaningful captions.
These little funny images can set the mood of your photo collage. You will not need to use lots of them, just choose a few suitable stickers that perfectly correspond to the theme of your artwork. They can be funny cakes with candles and colorful balloons for a birthday collage. Or some stickers featuring a couple in love for a wedding collage. Place those small graphics in a corner of a photo or between some pictures. Change the size of the sticker, make it bigger or smaller. The main trick here is that these little images should be not the center of attention but attractive embellishments for your celebrative collage.
In case your photos do not perfectly suit your project in terms of composition or color scheme you can easily improve them. If your collage-making software has a built-in photo editor you can make use of it and improve color balance, adjust saturation, contrast, and lightning, or crop images. Alternatively, enhance your photos with the help of some other editor before creating your unique collage. Even if the latter way is more time-consuming, you will enhance your pictures the way you need.
The last but definitely not the least of our collage tips is to use a powerful collage-making program. Choose the one that has a wide range of photo editing tools. It will save you much time, precious space on the hard drive of your PC, and your money since you will not need to purchase and install any extra software. A well-packed collage maker should have lots of built-in templates, stickers, filters, and effects as well as the possibility to customize them. One more advantage of purchasing a handy collage making program is that you will be able to export your artwork in good quality and without any watermarks. So then you can not only share it online but print it in high resolution whenever you need it. Built into the collage maker tips and available tutorials on how to work in the chosen program will be one more of its advantages. Why? Because you will be able to realize all your creative ideas and make an awesome collage yourself.
Now you have explored the best tips and tricks and know how to make a good collage for any occasion all by yourself. Start your computer, look through the folders with your photos or grab some stock images to use them along with your own pictures. Then launch your collage making software and start creating your awesome artwork.
Change the Background
In some cases, a plain white backdrop can look really nice, but not always… You can erase the default background that you do not like and replace it with a different photo. For example, a picture of the starry sky can be a good backdrop for a collage celebrating some achievements. Alternatively, opt for a solid color background, try different colors and change their intensity to choose the one that perfectly suits your project and doesn’t distract your viewers from the photos.
Repeat Main Colors
This trick will help you to connect the overall image with colors. To do that just reiterate colors in the fore- and background by using one of the colors or their shades in the background on the subject itself or vice versa. For instance, you can choose only images that have something pink or orange in them. As it is not always possible to use pictures based on the color criteria you can use the same color and some of its shades for frames or borders. Giving the images in your collage such a cohesive feel, you will create an overall sense of unity and balance in your artwork.
Incorporate Some Text
Sometimes pictures are not enough to deliver your best wishes or tell the whole story you see behind these photos. So, add some funny or cheerful text captions. Mind the occasion and type in congratulations, your best wishes, etc. Then tweak the text to your liking and make sure that the style matches the chosen theme of your collage. If not, change the font, the color of your text, and its position. Try not to overlay all your photos with text and add only some meaningful captions.
Apply Several Stickers
These little funny images can set the mood of your photo collage. You will not need to use lots of them, just choose a few suitable stickers that perfectly correspond to the theme of your artwork. They can be funny cakes with candles and colorful balloons for a birthday collage. Or some stickers featuring a couple in love for a wedding collage. Place those small graphics in a corner of a photo or between some pictures. Change the size of the sticker, make it bigger or smaller. The main trick here is that these little images should be not the center of attention but attractive embellishments for your celebrative collage.
Enhance Your Images
In case your photos do not perfectly suit your project in terms of composition or color scheme you can easily improve them. If your collage-making software has a built-in photo editor you can make use of it and improve color balance, adjust saturation, contrast, and lightning, or crop images. Alternatively, enhance your photos with the help of some other editor before creating your unique collage. Even if the latter way is more time-consuming, you will enhance your pictures the way you need.
Opt For Well-Equipped Software
The last but definitely not the least of our collage tips is to use a powerful collage-making program. Choose the one that has a wide range of photo editing tools. It will save you much time, precious space on the hard drive of your PC, and your money since you will not need to purchase and install any extra software. A well-packed collage maker should have lots of built-in templates, stickers, filters, and effects as well as the possibility to customize them. One more advantage of purchasing a handy collage making program is that you will be able to export your artwork in good quality and without any watermarks. So then you can not only share it online but print it in high resolution whenever you need it. Built into the collage maker tips and available tutorials on how to work in the chosen program will be one more of its advantages. Why? Because you will be able to realize all your creative ideas and make an awesome collage yourself.
Now you have explored the best tips and tricks and know how to make a good collage for any occasion all by yourself. Start your computer, look through the folders with your photos or grab some stock images to use them along with your own pictures. Then launch your collage making software and start creating your awesome artwork.
Top Tips and Tricks to Create a Fantastic Collage
Reviewed by Opus Web Design
on
August 31, 2022
Rating:
Reviewed by Opus Web Design
on
August 31, 2022
Rating:
