So you may be wondering why would I need music clip art? Well, the digital music landscape is more crowded than ever, and the proliferation of platforms and mediums has had a democratizing effect. The music industry once guarded by labels and distributors is now open to all artists that want to express themselves through their music and art.
As a musician in the 21st century, an important part of music is having good music clip art that will make your music visually pop, and to do that you need the right tools.
First, let’s explain what music clip art is:
Definition of music clip art
Clip art is the term from graphic arts which defines pre-made images that can be used as visuals for different media. It is a collection of pictures which may be integrated into a document, presentation, banner, merchandise, and other stuff that requires visuals.
Historically, “clip art” was created before digital technologies and the Internet came on stage. The word originated from the widespread practices of cutting and clipping out the images from printed stuff to use them again in other publishing projects. There even were special clipbooks with images ready to cut out for what people may need them other stuff such as music posters, film designs and more.
Clip art today is generally digital artwork that features images related to music. This type of art can include literally anything – from a variety of images such as musical instruments, singers, notes and other music-related images, to psychedelic landscapes of all colours.
Music clip art is often used to decorate websites, create album artwork, artist posters or illustrate music-related articles, and is also used to promote events featuring artists such as concerts and fans that create their own fan posters, memes and promotions for their favourite musicians.
Types of Music Clip Art
There are multiple types of Clip art that can be used, depending on the purpose.
Some popular types of music clip art include musical instruments, musical notes, and music-themed illustrations, which are used by musicians and creative designers.
These types of clip art can be used to create a dynamic visual representation of a musical concept, to illustrate a musical composition, or to add a fun and creative element to any project. This can be with instruments and animations which are used to create a more vibrant and fun aesthetic while promoting an album or an event.
Visual clip art is also featured in multiple music videos as they add animation to the videos and create unique and exciting visuals for the fans.
Best Music Clip Art Tools & Examples
There are many websites where artists can find the best music clip art tools. Some examples include Adobe Stock, which is used by multiple famous musicians. It is an incredible royalty-free stock photo, with stunning graphics or photoshop templates, Adobe stock is the perfect asset for every artist.
Other royal-free websites with brilliant clip art tools are Shutterstock, Pixabay, Clipart.me, and VectorStock.
These tools provide a wide variety of clip art images, illustrations, and vectors that can be used to create music-themed designs, banners, promotional images and album covers. Additionally, there are many free online resources such as Music Clip Art and Clip Art Music that provide free clip art images and illustrations.
Finding Free Clip Art
Although there are websites that offer royal-free stock clip art tools, some of them may require you to purchase a monthly or yearly package in order to download and save images without their signature watermark.
But there are also many online websites that offer free clip art. Some sites that offer full free stock and are used by many people in the industry are Pixabay, Freepik, and Openclipart.
These websites offer a wide selection of illustrations, animations, and photos which are related to music and other topics. Additionally, many websites offer royalty-free clip art that can be used for commercial and non-commercial purposes.
They are used by some of the biggest businesses in the music and film industry as they are high quality and have a variety of options to choose from to help create the perfect products for their artists.
Creating your own Music Clip Art
If you prefer something original and more to your taste, you could create your own music clip art for your work. Creating your own clip art can be done in a few different ways.
The easiest way is to use a graphics program such as Adobe Photoshop or GIMP. With these programs, you can create your own designs using shapes, colours, and other elements, which gives you artistic freedom while creating unique designs to suit your style.
You can also use a vector graphics program such as Adobe Illustrator, which is a popular choice for some of the biggest companies in the world or Inkscape to create more complex designs.
If you don’t have access to a graphics program, you can also search for royalty-free clip art online and edit them onto your artwork to create the design that you want. You can use one of the websites we mentioned above to download the images that you want to use in your own designs.
Finally, if you are feeling creative, you can always draw your own music clip art. All you need is a pencil, paper, and some imagination!
Using Clip Art as a Musician
Music clip art can be used in a variety of ways to create the most exciting and artistic work for you or your company. It can be used to create a visual representation of a song, to illustrate a particular musical concept, posters, merchandise and more!
It can also be used to create a fun and lively atmosphere for a presentation or to add more colour and aesthetics to a website or blog.
Clip art can also be used to create a custom logo or graphic for a band or music-related business to help promote their art. It can also be used to create a unique and eye-catching design for a t-shirt or other apparel.
The music clip art is a great way to add a bit of creativity to any music project.