I have noticed some wonderfully original banner designs popping up recently & realised that a lot of people are missing out on this prime opportunity to tell potential followers a bit more about themselves.

Why are personalised banners so important?

The first thing it shows is that you are seriousness about this platform.

Make that little bit of extra effort and it immediately gives a message of intent to your potential followers.

As someone who has put in the time to make an original & eye catching banner, there is a good change that your steemit articles will be of a similar visual quality. Increasing the chance of gaining more followers.

Banners also provide a crucial opportunity to get across a little bit more about who you, what you represent and why people should follow you!

You can be totally creative about this using home made funky fractal based visuals like @chron here who used JWildfire to create the fractals and chose to retain his anonymity by hiding behind the head of a robot... which is actually quite amusing at times ;)

...or if you prefer, you can just be simple about it, adding in a few descriptive words on a darker (but still relevant) background.

@halcyondaze has done this particularly well:

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Here is a recent banner I created for the famous UK megaphone 'performance artist' @dannyshine who speaks the truth (in the face of angry policemen) on the streets of London!

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And another I created for @copa-communion a man who has the ability to change the way you look at the world forever in his Church of Perpetual Astonishment.

Notice how I have made the central section of both banners darker to allow for the white words which are added on Steemit.

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Finally here is the one I created for my @steemmasters account

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The Unconscious Tipping Factor

The banner creates a STRONG VISUAL feeling which can be a big factor in tipping the balance between someone hitting that FOLLOW button or moving on to check out the next person. Sometimes they don't even need to read the words. I can only speak for myself but I have followed people based on their banner design alone.

So, there are a few are things to be conscious of when creating your banner.

As an example I give you my first banner design for my @samstonehill account

created the day the banner feature was activated on Steemit!

To make the colourful sunrise panorama backdrop for my desired banner I shot four HDR images using a motion control tripod panning system to span a 180 degree angle. I would normally use this device for my time-lapse shots.

You can see the four processed images here.

After this i did my best to stitch them together in Adobe After Effects and created my panoramic shot.

Then I added a Steemit logo, enhanced with some glow effects and a PNG of an lovely orange sunrise:

Here are all the elements combined.

and now with the new elements added this morning

and here is what it looks like when a potential follower views my blog page.

Take note of the two tabs UNFOLLOW & MUTE which should be factored in when creating your design because these tabs are not visible when looking at your own account. Only when other people are looking at it. So it's worth logging in with a different account to check what it looks like to other people.

I have intentionally placed my little list directly between the two white tabs.

NOW I AM TELLING A STORY WITH MY BANNER!

You can see my beautiful happy, healthy family. You can see that we live on Steem. You can see that we are travellers and if you are clever, you can see that we live in Bali. And the list to the right of the banner gives people a few more words which may resonate with them enough to hit UPVOTE, RESTEEM & FOLLOW!

Vibrational Resonance

Take every chance you have to create a vibrational resonance which will attract exactly what it sends out. You don't want the kind followers who still think Beyonce is the best thing that ever happened to them (I assume!) so make sure the vibration you create represents all that is BEST about you and all that you would love to see more of :)

I'm not going to say that my design is 100% finished yet...it was put together very quickly this morning before the kids woke up and I feel like I can do better still. But it is certainly better than it was before!

Final things to look out for

Having an accurate measurement of the required aspect ratio for this very skinny banner is a good place to start.

I use shift cmd 4 on my mac to create a screenshot of my desired aspect ratio and use this as my size template in Photoshop.

Spend some time thinking about this shape and the areas which need to be relatively clean, visually speaking, to permit for the small white words which are added on Steemit.

Have a look at @sirwinchester's banner design here, which I particularly like... Classy & effective. Has a clear vibe to it.

He has made a real effort to create something instantly original and eye-catching. Including his Facebook & Instagram links too.

Be conscious too that many people use their browser window zoomed in at 80%. This may or may not be intentional but it will display the banner in a different way. So always work with your view set to actual size... and encourage everyone else to do the same!

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Hope this has inspired you to pimp out your banner immediately...

remembering that the purpose is to tell others more about who you really are and why they should follow you!

The more you enjoy getting stuck into the visual arts, the better you will get at creating that which others don't see. A feeling. A resonance. An ENERGY. Others feel it. Subconsciously. And that is all part of the magic of creativity my friends 🙏🏻