A useful how-to book for the things you don't want to have to struggle to research. If you read this, I hope you find these to be helpful. Suggestions welcome, comment topic suggestions below for a chance for your topic to be in this book with a men...
Okay, so when you're adding images when creating a banner you have to make sure that the end result will not be over 1 megabyte, which sucks for quality of banners. Wattpad doesn't have a set dimension/ratio for for their Banners. You'll have to personally experiment with sizes to get your desired results.
Personally, I like to use Canva for my graphic designs. I recommend it because it's pretty easy to use and it's free. Though, some things require a membership. I've never needed to use any of the membership elements though.
Part 1: Setting Dimensions
I've found a lot of ratios and dimensions for the Wattpad profile banners. Personally, I couldn't seem to find the right one until I did some math myself.
The only dimension I've found that works for me is the 960 x 300 (which has an aspect ratio of 12:5). The visible borders of these dimensions are 900 x 200 (which has an aspect ratio of 9:2).
In Canva you can see the dimensions of the elements as you resize them. This is how your banner will look once the dimensions are set. You can use a shape tool to create a border or to use as a guide for what you will see once you set your banner.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The border and all the design elements inside of it will be visible.
To add a border that is visible you need to leave some space as shown above. If you don't leave some space then your border will not show up and/or some parts of your design will be cut off. Basically your total design dimension should be should be 960 x 300 and your border/guide is 900 x 200.
Canva gives you the option to use custom dimensions. Using this tool set your banner dimensions to 960 x 300. Canva allows you to center your elements once you've set the desired size so that you can make sure you have the correct dimension for your 900 x 200 border.
Here is a banner I made as a (poor) example, using these dimensions.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Feel free to save and test the banner example and the banner guide above so that you can get a feel for how to design your banners and how they will look. Keep in mind that Wattpad adds a somewhat transparent grey film, so the colors might not appear as you've designed.
Part 2: Design Elements & File Sizes
Once you've set your dimensions and are ready to design, keep the following things in mind.
1. Your banner's image size needs to be 1 MB or less in order for it to be allowed to be set.
2. Don't crop off the space you leave for the border in order to reduce the file size! This will leave parts of your design cut off.
3. To reduce the file size of your banner, consider resizing or redesigning it. When you design an image, the images and other elements you add will take up space and make your image bigger. So, to make your image smaller you can use less elements or resize your image (keeping within the ratio 12:5). There are websites out there that can make your image file sizes smaller for you.
4. Always make sure to make copies/duplicates before attempting to resize images or to redesign them, in case you don't like the outcome. Canva saves previous designs on your account and allows you to make copies so you don't lose previous designs because you wanted to redesign and try something new.
You're ready to design! Have fun!
If you need tutorials please let me know as well as the device you need it for.
I'll make a more step by step guide if necessary! Hope this helped!
