Creating an infographic | Creative Freedom

What once began as a curiosity has quickly grown in popularity. Yes, the infographic is now a tool used by everyone from marketing companies to schools and universities. An effective way to communicate ideas, the infographic is by far one of the biggest success stories in melding together the essential components of visuals and the written word. They’ve become ever more important in being able to convey the most complex information easily and for a wide audience.

Creative Freedom has previously written on the subject of infographics and their power over an audience: “Graphics may be processed quicker, but it’s harder to communicate abstract concepts with only an image. It’s too open to interpretation, which is why people spend so long talking about paintings at museums. Using a combination of text and images, infographics are able to create visual messages that are reinforced in both directions to maximise potential engagement and fact retention.” It’s the engagement factor that is most important in creating an infographic, the key is to finding the right balance between imagery and text.

There are plenty of infographic templates out there that can help you manage the basics, such as Venngage and Freepik, but it’s always a good idea to learn how to create one from scratch, as the vectors etc on offer may not fit with your intended idea. Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator are the chosen tools for most infographic designers, as they give you the freedom to experiment.

Adobe Illustrator is the best of the two for creating an infographic, as this software gives the greater amount of room to make your infographic more impressive. In Designmodo, Iaroslav Lazunov has laid out the essentials to creating an infographic in Illustrator. Specifically showing how to change graph appearance and retaining its dynamic functions.

Unlike the majority of design projects, designing an infographic is slightly different. For example, in the first phase of design you have to keep information search and data processing at the forefront. Basically, you need to keep your marketing head switched on at all times.

The Basic Setup

When working in Illustrator, it’s all about keeping proportions, laying out information in a simplified manner, and making sure your imagery and text fit together seamlessly. The basic setup of your design goes like this:

– Open up Illustrator and create a new document by using the Rectangle Tool (M) to draw a shape.
– Create columns by first selecting the rectangle and drag a guide onto the centre of the shape. Drag guides onto the left and right edges of the shape too.
– Condense the shape so it fits within the leftmost guide and centre guide. After, add another guide where the centre of this condensed shape is.
– Using the Rectangle Tool (M) draw a thin white box on the centre line that will be the width of the gap between the columns. Add guides to both sides of the small box and delete the centre guide.
– Repeat the process for the other columns with your final result being below. Widen the orange box so it’s slightly larger than the outermost guides.

By doing this, you’re able to see clearly where you need to place your imagery and text. Remember, you need to give your infographic some character if you really want it be efficacious in delivering the right message.