How do you create custom thumbnails for your YouTube videos
without having any graphic design experience?
I'll show you a fast, easy, and free way
to make great thumbnail images, and we'll do that right now.
Hey what's up, y'all?
This is Brian White and welcome back to VideoZeus,
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You simply cannot deny the power
of video thumbnails on YouTube.
Video thumbnails let viewers
see a quick snapshot of your video
and they can tell you so much about a video, or so little.
It's such a small detail that can make a huge difference
in the performance and appearance of your videos on YouTube.
But yet many of us haven't fully taken advantage
of the video thumbnail
either because we're not graphic designers
or maybe just don't know the importance
of a good video thumbnail.
Do yourself and your video a favor
and create a custom thumbnail
without relying on the options
YouTube generates automatically.
So I'm gonna show you how to make your own thumbnails
for YouTube videos in an application called Canva.
To get us started,
simply visit canva.com, create an account
or link your Facebook or Google account to it.
It's important to keep in mind this application is free,
but it also includes paid features
to further enhance your design experience.
However, for what I'm teaching you today,
the free account is all you need.
So inside Canva,
let's click right here to "Create a design."
This will load templates for different uses.
Certainly we want to make a thumbnail for YouTube,
so let's scroll down
to the Social Media and Email Headers section
and select the icon for YouTube thumbnail.
This will open up a new window.
The left side will list
all the thumbnail templates you can choose from,
the right side of the screen is your canvass,
or where you'll design your graphic.
To get started, let's browse the templates
and select a layout to work with.
All of these templates look great,
but not all are practical for a specific thumbnail.
I like to find one that looks cool,
one that has good font, good layout,
the text is left-justified.
So let's pick this one right here,
nice bold font, easy to read and plenty of room on this side
to add your background photo.
We'll start with adding that background photo.
I like to grab stills from my video
as it's the easiest way to keep your thumbnail relevant
to the actual video.
You can grab a still from your video
inside your editing program
or using a snapping tool here on Windows,
or a selection capture on Mac.
However you choose,
create the still frame and then go here to "uploads."
Browse to your file and open it.
Once the photo has been uploaded,
click and drag onto your canvass.
This will place it on top of the existing elements.
Now resize your photo so it fills the canvass.
Text on the left,
focal point of your still frame on the right.
This is looking pretty good.
Now let's customize the text graphic here
to say what we want:
in this case, "How to make thumbnails."
If what you're typing doesn't fit on the canvass,
click and drag here to expand the text area.
Let me add the word "custom" to this
which will help fill the screen, short and sweet.
Win, win.
Once you're finished with your thumbnail graphic,
simply click up here on "download,"
and PNG file format is great,
and boom, it downloads right there to your desktop.
Now hike over to YouTube and to your video manager,
specifically into the video
you want to add the thumbnail to.
Click "edit," then scroll over here
and click where it says "custom thumbnail."
If this option is not available,
it simply means your account has not yet been verified.
I'm including a link in the show notes below
detailing how to verify your YouTube account
to unlock the custom thumbnail option.
Navigate to your channel or refresh your page
to review the newly added custom thumbnail.
If you haven't already downloaded
my "Before You Shoot" guide,
please follow the link in the show notes below.
The guide will prove as a useful resource
for each and every one of your video creations.
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