When you design a banner, you want your graphics to print out at top quality. If you’re not using photos, the best way to design your banner is to create it as vector art.

There are 2 basic types of banner graphics: raster art and vector art. Here are some of the differences:

Raster art

Raster art is made up of pixels. If you zoom in far enough, even a high-resolution raster image shows pixels. You can only enlarge raster art to a certain point before it becomes jagged or pixellated.

Photos are always raster art. Sometimes you will have to put raster art on a banner, and that’s fine. You’ll just need to be extra careful of the resolution and size you design the banner at. But anytime you can use vector art instead, the banner design will print out clearer.

Raster art files for banners are very large files because they contain so many pixels.

Examples of raster art files: Photoshop PSD, JPG, TIF, GIF, PNG

Vector Art

Vector art uses lines and curves instead of pixels. No matter how close you zoom in on your banner design, or how big you make your banner, vector art will always be crisp and clear.

Because vector art saves shapes and not pixels, the files are much smaller than raster art for banners. This is especially helpful since many computers can’t handle large raster art, but if you create vector art for your banner instead the computer can usually handle it.

Examples of vector files are: Illustrator AI, CorelDraw CDR, Inkscape SVG, PDF, EPS. Note: these files are not always vector, because they allow you to include both vector and raster graphics all in one file.

Make sure you create your file in one of these programs. Don’t convert your banner from a raster type to a vector type because it will not actually change it to vector art.