Create Amazing DTube Thumbnails - Canva.com Full Walkthrough

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Hi friend, welcome back. Will you join me in creating amazing @dtube thumbnails for your DTube channel?

This is important because thumbnails are the very first thing people see when they are searching through their feeds, or looking for information on a specific topic.

How do you make your thumbnails pop? How do you make them stand out from the others in terms of picture quality? And also, how do you do all of this without paying a dime out of your pocket?

The answer is Canva.com. If you don't already have a Canva account, it is free to create one. Simply log in via social media or by using your email address.

(I highly recommend watching the video above so that you can actually see what I'm talking about here in the text.)

Now that you're inside Canva, I want you to choose the Blog Title design size. It should be one of the first design sizes you see. In my video, I mention the Presentation 16:9 sizing which works along with the Blog Title sizing.

Now it's time to upload your own title. Click on uploads, and then upload a photo.

PRO TIP...

Screenshot a photo from your phone while your video is playing or
paused. This will create a high-quality image that you can then upload to Canva without it being pixelated.

Now that your photo is uploaded to Canva, it is time to adjust the settings on it such as the brightness, contrast, and blur.

Click on the "filter" button towards the top of the screen and play with the features in there. When you click on "advanced options", it will display even more features to choose from that you can use to make your photo look even more high-quality.

I like to raise the contrast in my photos to around +15, and my blur to -15. Those settings work great in my photos, feel free to use those or adjust them to fit your liking.

After that, you can add any additional images overtop of your main image such as a logo or another small photo. I chose the @onelovedtube logo this time and placed it in the corner of my thumbnail.

Great. That is done.

Now it's time to choose a shape to place behind our text. Click on Elements in the sidebar, then click on Shapes.

I normally choose the square shape with the round edges for mine, but feel free to use a different one if you like. Once you click a shape, then it will show over top of your main photo.

Drag the corners to adjust the sizing. You can also adjust the direction of the shape whether that be straight or a bit slanted for dramatic effect.

A really neat feature of Canva is that you can adjust the transparency of each object. For instance, if you click on the shape you just inserted, you can move your mouse cursor up to the top right of the screen where it shows the transparency icon. It is normally directly next to the Arrange button which we will talk about.

Adjusting the transparency of an object is useful because sometimes you want to see through an object instead of it blocking the view of the photo behind it.

Normally I will choose around an 88 transparency level, depending on the color of the background photo and what color font I would like.

Now that you have your shape the way you want it, it is time to add some text. Click the "T" icon on the left of the screen, and then choose Add Heading.

You can now enter in your title. I highly recommend that you do not put your entire title on the thumbnail. This will cause the thumbnail to become too crowded and make it hard for your audience to decipher.

Therefore, I recommend inserting up to 4-5 words that describe what your post's subject is about. After you've chosen those words and have written them out, you can then adjust the font.

With the title highlighted, click the Font box at the top of the screen to view a list of different fonts. I normally like to choose a font that is rather bold so that other's can view the title clearly, even from the DTube homepage.

Next, you can adjust the sizing, as well as the line height of the text. This can all be done from the options to the right of the font box. I recommend exploring the different elements and playing around with them so that you can get a general idea of what you want your thumbnails to look like.

I like to adjust the coloring of my font last, and normally choose 2 colors so that the wording stands out more.

Now it is time to download your photo. Choose Download at the top of the screen, then go with either a JPG or a PNG file download.

Pro Tip

As of right now, DTube only allows thumbnails, or snaps rather, that
are less than 1MB in size. Therefore, visit resizeimage.net to use
their FREE image resizer.

All I do is visit http://resizeimage.net, upload my image, then scroll down the page to where it says Resize Your Image. I then adjust the percentage down to around 70% instead of 100%.

Then I scroll down and click on the Resize Image button. The website will resize the image and show how large the new file is. If it is still larger than 1MB, then simply resize the image again, except this time use a smaller size percentage.

And walla! You now have a beautiful thumbnail that you can upload to DTube without any errors whatsoever.

I hope that this walkthrough gave you clarity on how to create amazing @dtube thumbnails completely free of charge.

Leave a comment below and let me know if this helped you. Also, I'd love to hear from you if you have a favorite website or tool that you enjoy using to create amazing DTube thumnails.

Have a great day my friend and remember...YOU ARE AWESOME.

Take care.

-Ken
@kenmelendez

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