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Content creation. Unless you’re a graphic designer, it can be a phrase that’s said with dread. Yet an increasing amount of marketers, CEOs and customer service representatives are faced with creating content for online and offline channels. If you’re asked to create content for your digital screens, this can pose even more of a problem. What size should it be, what format? Where do I get images from, how can I get it up onto the screen when I’m done?

Creating content for digital screen displays is just as easy as creating for the web or social media. With the seven free tools below, ScreenCloud and a TV screen, you can be powered up in minutes. Here’s our pick of the bunch and how to use them to create the optimal digital signage display:

Canvais the Netflix of slidedeck creation tools. Forget InDesign, Powerpoint or anything else masquerading as a content creation tool. Canva is slick, intuitive and comes with a host of designs, templates and cool tools that allow you to get going on impressive presentation decks, brochures and social media content. As well as brochures, PDFs and showreels. Here are a few reasons why it’s ideal for creating digital screen content:Thousands of images.Canva comes stocked with illustrations, vectors and stock photographs that are available for your perusal. Each stock image costs $1 which is super cheap and there’s also a selection of free images to choose from. No external sourcing saves time finding the right images to illuminate your displays and allows you to work within one window. Using stock images means you won’t lack the resolution needed to make your images look great on a digital screen. You can also upload your own, making it easy to drop in logos, headers and the assets that suit your brand.

It’s likely you’ll already have branded fonts to use within displays, but digital signage can sometimes call for a new variation. Text used on screen often needs to be bigger, more widely spaced or within a different formation for it to work.

Font Squirrel. If you need a free font for commercial use, such as creating great content for your digital screen display, then Font Squirrel is the place to head to. The website is super simple to use and has a variety of fonts to choose from.

Infographics are great ways to display information that could otherwise be fairly droll. Save hours of design time by using Hubspot’s 15 free infographic template downloads. Not only are they beautifully designed but they also come with a handy guide on choosing colour schemes, selecting a style and the best practice for using an infographic template. The files are downloadable in either PowerPoint or InDesign, so you can begin editing in either programme instantly, then save as an image to finish up and voila! You have a lovely looking infographic ready for your screen display. Just be aware that these templates come in portrait mode, so you may want to play around with the dimensions or flip them on their side if you’re working with a screen in landscape.

Placeit is a great tool if you’re looking to add your own branding to a stock image or something that’s been taken by a member of the team. Unless you’re a designer, led by designer tools, manually customising an image to blend with an image you’ve already had, or have sourced from a stock site, can be difficult. Placeit allows you to upload your images and screenshots into a stock photo template. For example, allowing you to add a screenshot of your CRM to a stock photo of a PC or allowing you to add a dashboard or shot of your video player onto a screen that’s mounted on a wall. The images available span from mobiles and tablets, through to laptops and desktops, in a variety of situations and settings so there really is something for everyone.

As we mentioned in this post, choosing an appropriate color scheme for your digital sign display can be difficult. Different rules apply to digital screens, than print or even most online content. This can make it hard to create a color scheme that’s eye catching but not garish, on-brand but still easy on the eye. That’s where Design Seeds comes in. Design Seeds is a website that provides hundreds of variations of color palettes which work well together. The format of the site shows the color scheme with a photograph and six color strips to match, allowing you to see what might work for your own website, images or screen content. The images are personally curated by the owner and can be anything from an image of a bird, to a street or aeroplane. Once you’ve selected a color palette, you can gain access to each color’s HEX code by hovering over the color strip. If you need further inspiration, check out their Pinterest board - it turns everyday items into color palettes in a beautiful way.

So there you have it. Seven great, easy-to-use tools that turn marketers into designers and standard digital screen content into excellent digital screen content. Once you’ve had a play, use our free trial of ScreenCloud to get your fresh new content up onto your screens

The marketing world concurs; that paper is in the past, all is now digital, and digital signage is everywhere. From the landmark Piccadilly Lights, revamped in 2017 with a state-of-the-art 4K LED screen and running cutting-edge digital signage software, to the iconic Times Square digital screens. Digital signage is all around us.

If you are a business owner or a marketing manager, finding a digital signage solution is a must. 70% of U.S. residents aged 12 or older have seen a digital video display in a public venue in the past month. That is a huge audience you need to make sure you are taking advantage of.

That’s why we’ve put together a list of some of the best digital signage software tools around, to help you make the most out of your digital displays. No matter what your requirements are there is a solution for your needs.

With this digital signage solution, you get the ability to create and schedule playlists on a single interface. This allows you to put multiple pieces of content together and set the displays to cycle through a playlist, instead of having to schedule each piece of content.

Screenly also offers you the ability to display 1080p Full HD images, videos, and live web pages. Usefully, the software automatically detects your TV and monitor dimensions to render your signage in the highest resolution available.

You can use Screenly OSE for free, however, if you want key features such as the ability to manage multiple screens from a single account and cloud-based storage, you’ll need a subscription. A yearly subscription to the Business plan costs $17 a month per screen.

This digital signage software is ideal for a variety of purposes, from displaying business metrics on a dashboard to digital menu boards in a restaurant. For QSRs, an effective digital menu board is particularly important as 29.5% of customers find digital menus influential for the purchase of a product.

Marketing themselves as the first company to offer advanced digital signage to everyone for free, DigitalSignage.com is a browser-based solution that allows you to easily create an amazing digital presentation on your PC. You can then share this to an unlimited number of remote screens. This is the major selling point of DigitaSignage.com, as most options require you to pay for their subscription service to unlock additional screen support. For example, you could have a monitor close to your point of sale and an advertising kiosk, such as the LamasaTech Guida kiosk shown below, as another screen closer to the entrance. Both would be able to display your digital signage content.

To access all of the features DigitalSignage.com offers you’ll need the Enterprise subscription. However, the free version offers you enough core features to be able to create and display your content.

Features such as content scheduling and multi-screen support are available with this software. You can set what your displays are showing, allowing you to more directly engage with your community via graphical, video and text-based messages.

Part of the reason for its popularity comes from the fact that this convenient tool is open-source, which means the service is free to use and deploy. To run your digital signage software with Concerto you just need to pay for the hardware, such as a freestanding advertising display.

PeakSignage gives you the ability to launch your messaging and monitor your screens from an online dashboard that can be accessed from anywhere in the world via any modern browser.

PeakSignage also allows you to group your screens, meaning you can easily align the messages on your devices. For example, if you have a window display, like the one shown below, and a few freestanding kiosks in your reception, you could group all of these and have them display your welcome messages. This saves you valuable time, as you only have to create your content once and then push it to the group rather than having to create duplicates for each screen.

A bonus here is that you can use these grouped screens to clearly communicate with your employees as well as customers. Using PeakSignage, you can display useful information such as a calendar of meetings or current targets on your screens. This will improve your internal communications, which can result in a 25% increase in productivity from your staff.

Another useful feature is the Emergency Override. This lets you create an alert, which could include fire exit locations and meeting points, that will be displayed on your screens in the event of an emergency. You can activate the emergency mode from the PeakSignage dashboard and your screens will immediately update to display your alert message. This lets you provide the safety information your customers and staff will need quickly and clearly, helping to improve your on-site safety.

In terms of the user interface, Yodeck has a straightforward dashboard making it easy to navigate quickly. Your media files can be pushed to a screen directly from the upload page, so your content can be displayed right away with no downtime. Free templates are also included to help you get started with creating your digital signage.

ScreenCloud markets itself as a “barrier-free” digital signage solution. This is definitely the case when it comes to connecting the app to your screens, as any media player or even “smart TV” can be used as your screen.

Once you have connected your screen and added it to your account, you can use the web portal to start assigning content. As with many of the other solutions in this article, you can manage your screens and assign content remotely.

Creating content is done by uploading your images or videos and placing them on the canvas, where they can be positioned and resized. To add more life to your digital signage, OptiSign offers a set of widgets such as date, time and weather, that will alter depending on the location of your screen. The stand-out widget though is the Apps widget. OptiSign has a range of apps that you can link to your content and display, these include:

OptiSigns subscriptions start at $10 per screen per month. This gives you the basic features you’ll need to create your digital signage. Custom fonts, a feature that helps give your digital signage a more unique look, are unlocked in the Pro plan for $12.50 per screen per month. While you’ll need the Pro Plus plan to access more security features, as well as alerts if your screens are down.

You can manage how adverts appear on your digital signage screens. Whether it"s on one screen or a whole network, you can schedule your content, and get reports on your ads that are being displayed.

Price always matters, that"s why for £2.99 per month we"re the most cost-effective digital signage platform! And if you thought that was a good deal... your first 10 screens are free!

We know how painful it can be to find the right solution, and sometimes it"s either too costly or the free trial doesn"t last long enough to make a decision. That"s why with PosterBooking your first 10 screens are completely free, we won’t even ask for any payment details!

PosterBooking turns any TV screen into a digital sign. Allowing you to display images and videos for a variety of uses including for advertising, restaurant menus, general messages and more.

We believe digital signage shouldn"t be expensive, that"s why we offer your first ten screens free of charge, you won"t even need to add your card details to get started either. If you need more than ten, we"ll only start billing you from your eleventh screen.

Adding a display to your Arduino can serve many purposes. Since a common use for microcontrollers is reading data from sensors, a display allows you to see this data in real-time without needing to use the serial monitor within the Arduino IDE. It also allows you to give your projects a personal touch with text, images, or even interactivity through a touch screen.

Transparent Organic Light Emitting Diode (TOLED) is a type of LED that, as you can guess, has a transparent screen. It builds on the now common OLED screens found in smartphones and TVs, but with a transparent display, offers up some new possibilities for Arduino screens.

Take for example this brilliant project that makes use of TOLED displays. By stacking 10 transparent OLED screens in parallel, creator Sean Hodgins has converted a handful of 2D screens into a solid-state volumetric display. This kind of display creates an image that has 3-dimensional depth, taking us one step closer to the neon, holographic screens we imagine in the future.

Crystalfontz has a tiny monochrome (light blue) 1.51" TOLED that has 128x56 pixels. As the technology is more recent than the following displays in this list, the cost is higher too. One of these screens can be purchased for around $26, but for certain applications, it might just be worth it.

The liquid crystal display (LCD) is the most common display to find in DIY projects and home appliances alike. This is no surprise as they are simple to operate, low-powered, and incredibly cheap.

This type of display can vary in design. Some are larger, with more character spaces and rows; some come with a backlight. Most attach directly to the board through 8 or 12 connections to the Arduino pins, making them incompatible with boards with fewer pins available. In this instance, buy a screen with an I2C adapter, allowing control using only four pins.

Available for only a few dollars (or as little as a couple of dollars on AliExpress with included I2C adapter), these simple displays can be used to give real-time feedback to any project.

The screens are capable of a large variety of preset characters which cover most use cases in a variety of languages. You can control your LCD using the Liquid Crystal Library provided by Arduino. The display() and noDisplay() methods write to the LCD, as shown in the official tutorial on the Arduino website.

Are you looking for something simple to display numbers and a few basic characters? Maybe you are looking for something with that old-school arcade feel? A seven-segment display might suit your needs.

Next on our list is the 5110 display, also affectionately known as the Nokia display due to its wide use in the beloved and nigh indestructible Nokia 3310.

These tiny LCD screens are monochrome and have a screen size of 84 x 48 pixels, but don"t let that fool you. Coming in at around $2 on AliExpress, these displays are incredibly cheap and usually come with a backlight as standard.

Depending on which library you use, the screen can display multiple lines of text in various fonts. It"s also capable of displaying images, and there is free software designed to help get your creations on screen. While the refresh rate is too slow for detailed animations, these screens are hardy enough to be included in long-term, always-on projects.

For a step up in resolution and functionality, an OLED display might be what you are looking for. At first glance, these screens look similar to the 5110 screens, but they are a significant upgrade. The standard 0.96" screens are 128 x 64 monochrome, and come with a backlight as standard.

They connect to your Arduino using I2C, meaning that alongside the V+ and GND pins, only two further pins are required to communicate with the screen. With various sizes and full color options available, these displays are incredibly versatile.

For a project to get you started with OLED displays, our Electronic D20 build will teach you everything you need to know -- and you"ll end up with the ultimate geeky digital dice for your gaming sessions!

These displays can be used in the same way as the others we have mentioned so far, but their refresh rate allows for much more ambitious projects. The basic monochrome screen is available on Amazon.

Thin-film-transistor liquid-crystal displays (TFT LCDs) are in many ways another step up in quality when it comes to options for adding a screen to your Arduino. Available with or without touchscreen functionality, they also add the ability to load bitmap files from an on-board microSD card slot.

With the touchscreen editions of these screens costing less than $10 on AliExpress, these displays are another great choice for when you need a nice-looking display for your project.

Looking for something a little different? An E-paper (or E-ink depending on who you ask) display might be right for you. These screens differ from the others giving a much more natural reading experience, it is no surprise that this technology is the cornerstone of almost every e-reader available.

The reason these displays look so good is down to the way they function. Each "pixel" contains charged particles between two electrodes. By switching the charge of each electrode, you can influence the negatively charged black particles to swap places with the positively charged white particles.

This is what gives e-paper such a natural feel. As a bonus, once the ink is moved to its location, it uses no power to keep it there. This makes these displays naturally low-power to operate.

This article has covered most options available for Arduino displays, though there are definitely more weird and wonderful ways to add feedback to your DIY devices.

Rise Vision is easy-to-use cloud digital signage software that works with any player on multiple digital signage screens. Save time with 500+ customizable templates and if you ever need help get free training and exceptionally fast support.

Automatically pull and display content from services like Google Slides, Google Calendar, Google Photos, Canva, Twitter, our partners like Good News Network®, and more.

Whether you want to display video on a certain screen, weather updates, news tickers, RSS feeds, slideshows, documents, or web pages, just access our digital signage systems from a device of your choice and easily update and manage your engaging content.

Online Monitors AnyWhere is a cloud-based Content Management System (SaaS) that allows you to design, update, and display beautiful layouts via any Internet-connected device that can run an HTML5-based browser.

Planar® CarbonLight™ VX Series is comprised of carbon fiber-framed indoor LED video wall and floor displays with exceptional on-camera visual properties and deployment versatility, available in 1.9 and 2.6mm pixel pitch (wall) and 2.6mm (floor).

From cinema content to motion-based digital art, Planar® Luxe MicroLED Displays offer a way to enrich distinctive spaces. HDR support and superior dynamic range create vibrant, high-resolution canvases for creative expression and entertainment. Leading-edge MicroLED technology, design adaptability and the slimmest profiles ensure they seamlessly integrate with architectural elements and complement interior décor.

From cinema content to motion-based digital art, Planar® Luxe Displays offer a way to enrich distinctive spaces. These professional-grade displays provide vibrant, high-resolution canvases for creative expression and entertainment. Leading-edge technology, design adaptability and the slimmest profiles ensure they seamlessly integrate with architectural elements and complement interior decor.

From cinema content to motion-based digital art, Planar® Luxe MicroLED Displays offer a way to enrich distinctive spaces. HDR support and superior dynamic range create vibrant, high-resolution canvases for creative expression and entertainment. Leading-edge MicroLED technology, design adaptability and the slimmest profiles ensure they seamlessly integrate with architectural elements and complement interior décor.

Planar® CarbonLight™ VX Series is comprised of carbon fiber-framed indoor LED video wall and floor displays with exceptional on-camera visual properties and deployment versatility, available in 1.9 and 2.6mm pixel pitch (wall) and 2.6mm (floor).

Carbon fiber-framed indoor LED video wall and floor displays with exceptional on-camera visual properties and deployment versatility for various installations including virtual production and extended reality.

a line of extreme and ultra-narrow bezel LCD displays that provides a video wall solution for demanding requirements of 24x7 mission-critical applications and high ambient light environments

Since 1983, Planar display solutions have benefitted countless organizations in every application. Planar displays are usually front and center, dutifully delivering the visual experiences and critical information customers need, with proven technology that is built to withstand the rigors of constant use.

ASUS Eye Care technology is designed to reduce the risk of Computer Vision Syndrome (CVS) symptoms caused by spending prolonged periods in front of a display.

Blue light emissions, display flicker and glare are some of the factors that cause CVS. ASUS monitors featuring ASUS Eye Care Technology ensure comfortable viewing, while caring your eyes at the same time.

Onscreen flicker is caused by the rapid on/off cycle of an LED backlight as it tries to maintain the brightness of the display. It is more noticeable when the display is set to dimmer settings.

An integrated TÜV Rheinland-certified ASUS Blue Light Filter protects eyes from harmful blue light. Settings can be quickly accessed via the onscreen display (OSD) menu, and an intuitive slider makes it easy to adjust filter levels to suit any scenario or user preference.

All ASUS Low Blue Light Monitors feature an easily accessible onscreen display (OSD) menu that allows you to access four different Blue Light Filter settings onscreen.