Over the years, churches have changed in the way they interact with the congregation. Technology is partially responsible for this transition and visual presentations have become an integral part of worship and sermons. But do you know what really works when it comes to designing worship visuals that members would love? While the content is important, you cannot ignore the significance of a great design. Design is actually what holds the attention of the members and keeps them engaged in the entire session. Here are some design tips that you must follow if you want to craft compelling worship visuals.
Create something holistic
Worship visuals are all about holistic experiences and this mindset should reflect in the design as well. Ensure that the presentation has the right blend of words, lyrics, and backgrounds to create something impressive and memorable. Every image, word, and lyric should blend seamlessly to create an impact on the audience.
Use attractive but relevant colors and images
While choosing the colors and images for your worship visuals, make sure that you have ones that are attractive yet relevant. Cheesy images and colors are often not liked by the audience because they do not match the mood and context. Think of a single theme and adhere to it through the entire presentation. Remember that simplicity makes the best impression.
Avoid overwhelming the audience
Another design rule that you must follow with worship visuals is to avoid anything that overwhelms the audience. This applies to every aspect of your design, whether it is words, images, videos or backgrounds. Look to create a seamless experience without changing the slides too quickly. Give the congregation enough time to absorb one slide before moving to the next.
Create themes and sub-themes
If you want to use visual presentations on a regular basis, the cost will surely be a major concern for the church. It would be great to have some themes and sub-themes for your worship backgrounds so that you can play with them to present something new in every session. Some smart variations will not be detectable by the audience and they will probably enjoy every single presentation.
Polish your photography skills
If you can take some good photographs, they can serve as assets for your presentations. A good one surely adds a personal touch to the session and the audience will love them more than templates. Photographs also become wonderful memories that your church and the members will surely cherish for a lifetime.
Use creative stock libraries
Besides using photographs, you can also include some creative stock libraries to make worship visuals more attractive and memorable for the audience. Google offers a range of free and paid images that you can explore for this purpose. Just browse the internet and you will find a wealth of images that you may easily integrate into your presentation.
Leverage royalty-free videos
While you can use some creative images from the internet, videos can take the presentation to the next level. Look for the ones that are royalty-free because you would not want your church to get into copyright infringement issues. You can even use videos from major motion pictures in the presentation, provided that you have the license for use.
Develop design standards
Whether you have volunteers or professionals working on your church visuals, do develop proper design standards and have them in place. Specify the basics of graphic design, such as font family, colors and sizes and image sizes that they should use for every visual. This is important to ensure that every presentation is consistent and makes a great impression on the audience. Also, having well-defined standards ensures that whoever prepares the presentations has clear guidelines to follow.
Choose the right people to prepare designs
Even if you get the designs prepared by volunteers, make sure that you choose only the people with the right skills and expertise. Amateurs can spoil the show and you should not take a risk with them. Have more than one person for the job because you would not want monotony to set in. Give the designers some creative freedom to explore their design ideas even while they stick to the standards.
Even if your church has a small budget and works with volunteer designers, it is still possible to create effective visuals for your presentations. Just make sure that the team invests their best efforts and creates something that the audience would really want to see. Try to bring the storytelling element in the design if you truly want to create winning presentations!
