Creating digital signage content isn't as easy as you think. There are many factors to consider, from font size to image choice and color scheme. And for non-designers, it can all be a bit of a headache - especially if you really need to get your digital signage content out there.

Luckily there are some great free tools for digital signage design. Some of these you might already know, some might change the way you create your signage displays.

elow, ScreenCloud  and a TV screen, you can be powered up in minutes. Here’s our pick of  the bunch and how to use them to create the optimal digital signage  display:

Best for: brochures, presentations, tenders and slide decks

Canva is the Netflix of slidedeck creation tools. Forget InDesign, Powerpoint or  anything else masquerading as a content creation tool. Canva is slick, intuitive and comes with a host of designs, templates and cool tools  that allow you to get going on impressive presentation decks, brochures  and social media content. As well as brochures, PDFs and digital posters. Here  are a few reasons why it’s ideal for creating digital screen content:

Thousands of images. Canva comes stocked with  illustrations, vectors and stock photographs that are available for your  perusal. Each stock image costs $1 which is super cheap and there’s  also a selection of free images to choose from. No external sourcing  saves time finding the right images to illuminate your displays and  allows you to work within one window. Using stock images means you won’t  lack the resolution needed to make your images look great on a digital  screen. You can also upload your own, making it easy to drop in logos,  headers and the assets that suit your brand.

Drag and drop interface. You don’t need to be a  designer of any type to use Canva. Its drag and drop interface allows  you to play around with designs until you find something that feels  right.

Intuitive. By clicking on an element (photo,  illustration, text, chart) you get a series of options to change  colours, typefaces, sizes and so on. Every aspect is self-explanatory so  there’s no learning curve needed to get you up and running.

Best for: quick announcements, simple messaging, professional style displays without designer input

Quick Post in our very own and very clever design app. All you do is add your text, an image of your choice and choose your preferred style, et voila, perfectly presented and formatted digital signage content - for free! 

As part of ScreenCloud's suite of free digital signage tools, Quick Post is an essential tool for teams who want to make great content with no input from designers. You can either input your choice of text and image, pull content from a URL or upload a file such as a jpeg or PDF for your source material. 

Simply adjust what you want displaying, save and you're ready to go... 

Best for: images, collages, social media headers, customer testimonials, menu displays

PicMonkey is a  popular online photo editor used by bloggers, marketers and anyone  looking to create fast, good-looking images. The best thing about  PicMonkey is that it lets you do image editing and design without  downloading any type of software. Here are a few of its most endearing  features:

Photo touch up. This allows you to manipulate photos in any way,  shape or form; crop images, change the exposure, straighten (I’m always  using this one), manipulate the colour, sharpen and add canvas colors.  This includes adding frames, overlays and textures and so many filters  and filtering options it makes Instagram look like a novice.

Options. What we love most about PicMonkey is the sheer amount of  editing options. Unless you need very advanced photo editing tools,  PicMonkey’s options will suffice and the premium ‘Royale’ account, which  opens you up to even more options, is only $33 per year. The only thing  I would mention is that the options available for creating text aren’t  as advanced as they could be. The fonts are limited and it can be  difficult to fit your copy to your brand guidelines without the premium  account or creating text as an image elsewhere first.

Creating collages. As well as options for editing an image and  creating an image from scratch, PicMonkey also lets you create collages.  This can be useful for customer testimonials and social media images, among other uses.

Best for: digital posters, menu boards and adverts

It’s likely you’ll already have branded fonts to use within displays,  but digital signage can sometimes call for a new variation. Text used  on screen often needs to be bigger, more widely spaced or within a  different formation for it to work.

A couple of free font options where you can source new font designs for your projects include:

Type Genius.  Type Genius is super useful if you’re looking for a combination of  fonts. Perhaps one for your header and another for subtext, but that  work together and look great. It provides you examples of fonts being  used together on other websites as well, so you can see what works  before committing it to your screen.

Font Squirrel.  If you need a free font for commercial use, such as creating great  content for your digital screen display, then Font Squirrel is the place  to head to. The website is super simple to use and has a variety of  fonts to choose from.  

Jeff Schreiber.  For more stylised fonts there are sites like that of Jeff Schreiber.  Jeff is a designer, illustrator and typographer from The Netherlands who  releases free fonts which are great for poster and digital screen work.  There aren’t a huge amount to choose from but this can be a good  approach if you’re looking for something unique that’s going to make  your content pop.

5. Hubspot’s free Infographic templates

Best for: statistic displays, reports, presentations

Infographics are great ways to display information that could  otherwise be fairly droll. Save hours of design time by using Hubspot’s  15 free infographic template downloads.  Not only are they beautifully designed but they also come with a handy  guide on choosing colour schemes, selecting a style and the best  practice for using an infographic template. The files are downloadable  in either PowerPoint or InDesign, so you can begin editing in either  programme instantly, then save as an image to finish up and voila! You  have a lovely looking infographic ready for your screen display. Just be  aware that these templates come in portrait mode, so you may want to  play around with the dimensions or flip them on their side if you’re  working with a screen in landscape.

Best for: menu boards, adverts, images and video

To get your content up quickly it can be useful to have a pool of  stock image and video sites that you can quickly collate content from.  The benefit being, that you can source high-quality images that work  well within a screen format and that are of professional quality.

A couple of our favorite image and video stock sites include:

Death to the stock photo.  These guys are kind enough to send you a new pack of stock photos each  month which can be used commercially however you desire. Launched by a  bunch of creatives looking to promote the use of less boring stock  images and illustrations, the image packs range from countryside, to  office and even food. For access to more images, users can sign up for a  premium package, at $10 a month. The agency also crowdfunds trips to  locations, with any users who make a pledge receiving hundreds of images  taken from the location - ensuring that your photos may never need be  boring again.

StockSnap.io  StockSnap has a huge collection of free high-resolution images that you  can use with no attribution required. The best thing about StockSnap’s  collection is that the images don’t look like they come from a  traditional stock site. Think Instagram and WeHeartIt rather than  iStock. The site also has a great search feature where you can hunt by  keyword and refine by most popular, number of views, favorites and so  on. It’s definitely one to check out!

Motion Elements This  site provides stock footage of video clips and animations that you can  use within your own creations that start from around $5 per month.  Benefits of using the site including free After Effects templates and  unlimited usage of the footage once bought. If you sign up to the  mailing list on their homepage you also receive 30 elements for free.  The only downside, is that being based in Singapore, some of the footage  is very Asia-centric, for example, the cityscape footage is mainly of  Asian cities. Other good video stock sites to try if you can’t find what  you’re looking for include Free HD Footage and Ignite Motion. Both are a little old school in their site design, but do the job nethertheless.

Best for: creating demonstrations, slidedecks, product shots and testimonials

Placeit is a great  tool if you’re looking to add your own branding to a stock image or  something that’s been taken by a member of the team. Unless you’re a  designer, led by designer tools, manually customising an image to blend  with an image you’ve already had, or have sourced from a stock site, can  be difficult. Placeit allows you to upload your images and screenshots  into a stock photo template. For example, allowing you to add a  screenshot of your CRM to a stock photo of a PC or allowing you to add a  dashboard or shot of your video player onto a screen that’s mounted on a  wall. The images available span from mobiles and tablets, through to  laptops and desktops, in a variety of situations and settings so there  really is something for everyone.

Best for: overall themes, dashboards, customer testimonials, menu boards

As we mentioned in this post,  choosing an appropriate color scheme for your digital sign display can  be difficult. Different rules apply to digital screens, than print or  even most online content. This can make it hard to create a color scheme  that’s eye catching but not garish, on-brand but still easy on the eye.  

That’s where Design Seeds  comes in. Design Seeds is a website that provides hundreds of  variations of color palettes which work well together. The format of the  site shows the color scheme with a photograph and six color strips to  match, allowing you to see what might work for your own website, images  or screen content. 

The images are personally curated by the owner and  can be anything from an image of a bird, to a street or aeroplane. Once  you’ve selected a color palette, you can gain access to each color’s HEX  code by hovering over the color strip. If you need further inspiration,  check out their Pinterest board - it turns everyday items into color palettes in a beautiful way.

So there you have it. Our pick of the great free tools for digital signage design to turn marketers into pro-designers and standard digital screen content into excellent digital screen content. 

Once you’ve had a play, use our free trial of ScreenCloud to get your fresh new content up onto your screens

Finding great digital screen content shouldn’t be arduous or expensive. Use these free tools to create images, digital menu boards, videos and more.

Finding great digital screen content shouldn’t be arduous or expensive! Here we tell you our top 7 tools for creating great images, customer testimonials, slide decks and more.

8 Free Tools For Creating Digital Screen Content

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8 Free Tools For Creating Digital Screen Content

8 Free Tools For Creating Digital Screen Content

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