Depending on how much you darkened and brightened the image with Dodge and Burn, you may find it looks a little washed out. Use the Brightness/Contrast adjustment if desired to boost the contrast for a more dynamic look.

Here’s our starting image: a flagpole and a flag, on separate layers. I’ve chosen the flag of Sweden to begin with, because it’s a simple design that will allow us to see the distortion and shading process clearly. We can change the design to whatever we want later.

Switch to the Burn tool, set to Highlights at 100% opacity. Using a soft-edged brush, drag from the top left of the flag to the top right, performing a loop downwards in between. The Burn tool darkens the image; the Dodge tool brightens it. You can hold Alt or Option to temporarily access the Dodge tool. Drag another loop just above the original Burn loop, to add the highlight to the flag. Wave warp can be used for things other than flags, but that’s where it gets a bit more complicated. You might want to pin the edges so they don’t warp! You might want to have it start and stop waving! To learn about those, see this guide to wave warp and other distort effects. You can paste any flag you want into this window. Here, I’ve added the Stars and Stripes, and resized the flag so it fits the original dimensions. The folds created so far can look a little lumpy. So use the Smudge tool to smear the ends into more precise, tighter folds. Use a small brush, with a strength of around 90% for best results.

And there you have it—a simple waving flag animation! Of course, you can manipulate the wave warp values and set keyframes to change the way it waves throughout a video if you can’t handle a tutorial being this simple. It’s now an easy matter to drag those handles on the left, to change the flag’s distortion so that it better matches the flagpole. Here’s the result of the work so far. The flat artwork we started with now looks much more like a real rippling flag—so much so that you barely notice that the design of the flag itself isn’t really rippling.

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There’s only one handle on the Flag distortion, about a third of the way along the top edge. Grab it and drag it to create a more traditional flag shape. You can choose to wave it up or down; I’ve chosen to go up first. Without changing anything, wave warp is pretty aggressive. It has fast, short waves and can feel pretty chaotic. To calm the effect to a gentle flap, I lessened the height to 6, the width to 142, and the speed to 1. You can adjust the effects in the timeline or in the effect controls to suit your video and intention. According to 17 USC Section 105, the American flag is public domain. (Using a different flag? Most flags are free for anyone to use.) This means that you can use its image in your video projects and you don’t have to pay or credit anyone. Shedding more light on these flags is senior curator Sue Prichard’s excellent introduction, which explains the history of what’s effectively maritime corporate identity, and how boat owners have used the rather limited visual vocabulary at their disposal to come up with endlessly new and exciting designs.

Creating a new flag to promote your own business, root your favorite sports team, or show your allegiance to a cause or a community? Create a flag design that’s distinct and memorable, the kind you’ll be flying with pride for years to come.

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Now it’s time to adjust the rest of the flag so it’s waving more effectively. You can drag the handles, or the corner points, or the four interior intersections in Image Warp to move it around. Try to make it look less stiff by waving the edges in a more realistic, organic way. When you’re satisfied, hit Enter. Use Command T/Ctrl T to enter Free Transform mode, and adjust the size of the flag so it fits onto the existing tape attached to the flagpole. Don’t perform any more distortions yet. All we’re interested in here is the approximate size. Canva has a selection of stunning flag templates in a variety of styles and themes. Grab one and put your personal touch on the design with ease using our beginner-friendly drag-and-drop tools. Show your vibrant true colors

Search online for a vector of the flag. I ended up creating my own in Adobe Illustrator and saving it as a .png, just so I could ensure it was high quality. (I also diluted the colors a bit to make it less jarring than the true red and blue.) Account icon An icon in the shape of a person's head and shoulders. It often indicates a user profile.

GIFs

Express the pride you have for your community with symbols and elements that truly represent it. Explore our rich media library of images, icons, illustrations, and vectors to add to your custom made flag. Colors play a significant part in making your flag distinct and eye-catching from a distance. Easily match your brand and community colors by utilizing Canva’s color palette feature. With Brand Kit on Canva Pro, you can effortlessly upload your brand colors to use on your flag and other designs. Fly your flag with pride Niche maritime history doesn’t easily lend itself to lavish coffee-table style publishing, so hats off to Four Corners Books and the National Maritime Museum Greenwich for taking a punt and producing this quite dashing catalogue of house flags.