Chiara Chimù Mulas | Graphic Design and Illustration

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Top Awesome Free Resources Every Graphic Designer Should Know About

Chiara Mulas

Hey there, welcome to my collection of essential FREE resources I wish I knew about when I started.

In today's digital landscape, , having access to the right tools and inspiration is critical to stay ahead and express your creativity freely. This list will let you easily turn your design dreams into reality faster than you can say "Photoshop"!

Before we begin, pro tip: Bookmark this page as I regularly update it with new discoveries!

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Who said that to design you have empty your wallet? Maybe you’re starting now, maybe you’re not a designer and you’re just looking to design a Valentine’s Day card. These powerful online tools meet your needs without cost:

  • Canva
    The popular free designer tool easy to use for beginners and intermediate. Browse their abundant templates library to create something suitable for your personal projects or for your business. Just make sure to respect your branding guidelines!

  • Figma
    A more advanced tool that honestly works like magic. The free plan allows you to have up to 3 boards with multiple pages inside. It’s great for who is just starting but also to manage bigger projects as a side tool.

  • Coolors
    One of my all time favourites. A free tool that allows you to create palettes in a super easy (and quite fun) way. Check the palette visualizer tool and thank me later.

  • GIMP
    One of the all time most popular alternative to Adobe Photoshop, no need for explanations here.

  • Inkscape

    A popular alternative to Adobe Illustrator, great for designing vector visuals.

  • Adobe Express
    Adobe released its own free tool for people that have basic needs like designing social media posts or simple flyers. It’s worth trying it.

  • Pixlr
    A good online alternative to Adobe Photoshop. This used to be 100% free but now has a 0,99€ per month plan that sounds quite fair, since it gives you also AI credits to use within the platform.

  • Design Wizard A tool that allows you to edit images, add text and store them. What you can do is limited, but still, it’s free.

  • Fotor
    A free on line photo editor with a fancy background remover tool. Not bad, uh?

  • Womp
    A fun tool to play with 3D design, the free version is limited but you can still create quite a lot with it.

  • Piktochart
    A tool that allows you to create infographics easily. With 100MB of storage space, is a cool free tool to try.

  • Adobe video to gif converter
    If you think this is useless, you probably never felt the struggle of turning a video or an animation into a good quality, low sized gif file. If you know, you know.

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Nobody like Stock Images, let’s be honest, but there’s another way. These websites offer high-quality, free images for commercial use, perfect for any design project:

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  • The Noun Project - Millions of icons and illustrations with various licenses

  • Reshot - Curated vector graphics and illustrations

  • Flaticon - Extensive library of free and premium icons in various styles

  • Victeezy - Extensive library of free and premium icons in various styles

  • Freevector - Discover a range of free vector graphics

  • Fontawesome - Popular icon library with diverse styles and formats

  • SVGRepo - Search and download high-quality SVG icons

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Creativity got stuck? Fear not, these websites are here to save your day! Find your design inspiration through cutting-edge designs and trends, across various industries, to fuel your imagination.

  • Behance - Showcase of professional design work across various industries

  • Designspiration - Discover trending designs and aesthetics

  • Dribble - Explore a community of designers' work

  • Freeicons - Find icons and inspiration in one place

  • Pinterest - Create custom boards for visual inspiration gathering

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Unlock your potential with these curated, free graphic design courses and tutorials. From mastering design fundamentals to learning new techniques, here’s a bunch of knowledge only waiting for you to explore it.

I didn’t follow these courses as I found them recently, but I thought they might be useful for beginners. So if you do, leave me a comment and let me know how they are.

Master design fundamentals

Deepen your expertise

Remember: These are just a starting point. Explore, experiment, and find courses that align with your specific design goals!

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All work no play makes designers go… well, you know! So stretch your creative muscles and have a blast with these engaging online games:

  • Better Web Type - Train your eye for typography perfection

  • Can’t Unsee - Hilarious optical illusions to challenge your perception

  • Color - Test your color knowledge and create harmonies

  • I Shot The Serif - Dodge falling serifs in this fast-paced game

  • It’s Centered That - Obsessively align elements for virtual satisfaction

  • Kerntype - Master kerning skills for flawless letter spacing

  • Kolor - Experiment with blending and manipulating colors

  • Pixact.ly - Sharpen your pixel perfection skills

  • Shape type - Create typographic marvels by manipulating shapes

  • The Bezier Game - Navigate Bezier curves like a pro

  • The Boolean Game - Play with Boolean operations to create unique shapes

  • Typewar - Battle other players using your typography skills

Now Go and Have Fun Creating

I hope these top free resources will help you. Whether you're already a professional or just starting, these links and tools will help your journey.

To keep updated on resources and fun stuff like this, subscribe to my Newsletter.

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Let me know if I missed some I should add here and if you used any of these.

Love,
Chiara