Tutorials
How to Find Lower-Thirds on Shift Worship
Setting Up Your Lower-Thirds
You asked, and we answered! Lower-thirds are created and released with each new collection on our site! Follow along to see how easy they are to find and use.
Step One: Head to the collections page on Shift Worship.
Step Two: Select the collection you would like to use for your next service.
Step Three: Select and open the collection you want, and scroll down to the transparent text layers section of the page.
Step Four: Download what you need!
What Are Lower-Thirds?
Lower thirds are graphical elements or overlays utilized in videos to showcase information about the content on the screen. They are commonly used to provide additional information, such as a speaker's name, location details, or any other relevant text that complements the video content. Typically, lower thirds can be viewed at the bottom of the video. You can typically see lower thirds in action in television broadcasts, documentaries, news reports, online videos, church services, and various types of video content.
How to Use Lower-Thirds:
Lower thirds typically include text, graphics, or a combination of both, and serve several purposes:
1. Identifying Speakers: It's a great idea to let your congregation know who is speaking, and what their role in the church is. It gives authority towards messages and announcements, and it also gives a great point of reference. For first time guests, this is one of the first impressions they have of the church. It is a great tool to make newcomers feel welcome. It also allows for viewers to establish a stronger connection with the church. It provides them with a name and face that they can find and connect with afterwards.
2. Provide Information: Lower-thirds are a great way to offer information while someone is speaking or singing. It's an opportunity to provide extra details about the conversation happening on screen, without changing the flow and disrupting attention. It also creates space for attention to be grabbed again. For example, a guest may have been unable to engage in the initial conversation, but can easily grasp the content of the conversation by viewing the information on the screen.
3. Transitions: Need to change direction during a service? This is a great way to do this! Lower thirds are a nifty tool that can be used to change the direction of the conversation. It let's attendees know that the message is moving forward, and gives then the tools to follow along.
4. Call to Action: Use lower-thirds to provide instructions you would like your congregation to follow. You can have call to actions such as prayer requests, offering, volunteer opportunities, and small group connections.
Lower thirds can be designed in various styles and can be customized to match the service! They are often created using video editing software, graphic design tools, or specialized lower-third generators. The use of lower-thirds in video production enhances the overall viewing experience by providing context and improving the visual aesthetics of the content.
How to Change Fonts in the Quick Editor
The awesome Quick Editor tool allows you to customize any motion or still background in a collection with your own text or elements. Use the pre-installed fonts or add your own. It’s so easy!
Changing Fonts in the Quick Editor
To further personalize your worship services, we’re excited to guide you on how to use fonts to customize your media with the Quick Editor. Follow these simple steps to bring a unique touch to your content:
- Access the Quick Editor: Log in to your Shift Worship account and navigate to the Quick Editor. If you haven’t already, select or create a project where you’d like to customize the fonts. Your first step will consist of choosing a motion or still background, and selecting the format as well.
- Text Element Selection: Most designs will generate a prompt for you to “edit this text”. You can delete that text box or add a new one by locating the “add text” element within your project (Bottom of the Quick Editor). Click on the text box you wish to modify to activate the text editing options.
- Font Selection: In the text editing toolbar, you’ll find the “text” option. Click on it to reveal a dropdown menu showcasing a variety of available fonts, colors, and formatting options.
- Browse and Choose: Scroll through the font options to find the one that aligns with the tone and style of your worship service. Select the text you would like to change and then click on your preferred font to apply it instantly to the selected text.
- Adjust Font Size and Style: Adjacent to the font selection, you’ll find options to adjust the size and style of your text. Experiment with these settings to achieve the desired look for your worship slides.
- Save Your Edits: Once you’re satisfied with the font customization, remember to download your changes to preserve your creative work. You can do this by clicking the “download” button within the Quick Editor interface (bottom right).
Feel free to explore different fonts and combinations to create a visually captivating worship experience. If you encounter any challenges or have further questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to our support team.
Uploading Your Own Font
Now that you are a pro at editing text in the Quick Editor, you have the flexibility to upload your own fonts, adding a unique touch to your content. Follow these generic steps to incorporate custom fonts seamlessly:
- Access the Quick Editor: Log in to your Shift Worship account and navigate to the Quick Editor. Select or create a project where you’d like to upload custom fonts.
- Text Element Selection: Locate the “Text” element within your project. Click on “Advanced: Use Your Own Fonts”.
- Font Upload Option: Look for the “Custom Font” or “Upload Font” option in the font dropdown menu. Click on it to initiate the font upload interface.
- Choose Your Font File: You can upload font files in various formats such as .ttf or .otf . Click on the designated upload button and select the font file from your device or drag and drop the file.
- Verify Compatibility: Ensure that your custom font is compatible with the Shift Worship Quick Editor. The software works seamlessly with popular font providers like Adobe Fonts and Google Fonts.
- Apply Your Custom Font: Once uploaded, your custom font will appear in the font dropdown menu. Select it to apply the unique style to your selected text.
- Fine-Tune as Desired: Adjust the font size, style, and any other formatting options as needed to create a cohesive and visually appealing design.
By uploading your own fonts, you have the creative freedom to infuse your worship content with a personalized touch. Should you encounter any challenges or have questions, our support team is here to assist you.
What is the Quick Editor?
Introducing the Shift Worship Quick Editor – an innovative, in-browser editing software designed exclusively for members of the Shift Worship community. This powerful tool empowers users to elevate their worship presentations with unprecedented ease and creativity.
With the Quick Editor, members can seamlessly customize their worship content by selecting from a diverse library of motion and still backgrounds. Whether seeking a serene backdrop for reflective moments or dynamic motion backgrounds to amplify energy, the Quick Editor provides a wide array of options to suit every worship context. Users can also choose from various formats, ensuring compatibility with different display systems and preferences.
Tailoring your worship experience has never been simpler. The Quick Editor’s user-friendly interface enables members to effortlessly add and manipulate text, integrate impactful images, and incorporate essential elements to enhance their presentations. Whether you’re crafting a sermon series, creating promotional material, or developing engaging worship slides, the Quick Editor streamlines the process, allowing you to focus on delivering a meaningful and immersive worship experience.
Unlock the potential of your creativity with the Shift Worship Quick Editor – where customization meets convenience, and every worship presentation becomes a canvas for inspiration. Elevate your worship experience today with the power of in-browser editing at your fingertips.
Try Quick Editor with a Free Trial
Embark on a transformative journey of worship design with the Shift Worship 30-Day Free Trial! Unleash the full potential of your creative expression by gaining exclusive access to the innovative Quick Editor during this trial period. Craft compelling worship presentations effortlessly, choosing from a rich library of motion and still backgrounds. With the Quick Editor, you can personalize your content by adding text, images, and elements, elevating your worship experience to new heights.
During these 30 days, immerse yourself in the versatility of the Quick Editor, experiencing firsthand its user-friendly interface and powerful customization features. Explore the ability to choose from various backgrounds, select different formats, and even upload your own fonts for a truly unique touch. Uncover the limitless possibilities of worship design, all at no cost.
Don’t miss out on this opportunity to enhance your worship presentations. Join the Shift Worship community with our 30-Day Free Trial, and let the Quick Editor be your companion in creating impactful and inspiring worship content. Start your trial today and witness the transformative capabilities that await you!
Adding PNG Elements to the Quick Editor
Add Your Own Elements
Now you can add your own PNG art elements (including church logos) to the Quick Editor. The video above gives you a visual demonstration of how to do this, but you can also keep reading for more information!
What is a PNG?
A PNG is an image file format used for storing and transmitting images made up of individual pixels. (Pixel: Smallest invisible unit of a digital image, showing a single point of color or light on a screen). PNGs are perfect for logos, diagrams, and graphics with sharp edges since they maintain their original quality. Another unique factor of PNGs is that they have the capability to become fully transparent, partially transparent, or opaque. (This is great for blending backgrounds). With this file format, you can also compress the file to balance image quality and file size.
How-To Use the Element Section
To begin, head to Shiftworship.com, and select the collections page. Once you select the desired collection you will then open the Quick Editor (found on the upper-right side of the screen). From there, you can select the format and size that you need. In the video, an HD motion is used! The option to adjust and add text should then appear (bottom of the screen). To add a transparent PNG into Quick Editor, hover over the ‘Elements’ option on the bottom left of the Quick Editor screen. You will then see two different options appear. The first, “My Elements”, displays any elements (like PNGs) that you have uploading into Quick Editor. The second section is “All Elements”. All Elements is a constant updating library of various transparent PNGs that are included in the Quick Editor. These are extra items that allow you to take your editing skills to the next level!
Customizing Media With Elements
To add an element to your media, select the “Element” button, click on the desired element-and you should see the PNG on your media! From there, you are able to move and resize the element to fit the design. Utilize the “Layers” function of Quick Editor to create special effect and designs with your elements. This is a great tool for if you are wanting to have text appear in front of a logo, or other element.
Designs that are great for utilizing your own images:
- Announcements
- Community Events
- Small Group Updates
- Offering Call to Actions
- Camp Updates
- Holiday Programs
Uploading Elements
To upload your own elements, open the Quick Editor and click the “Elements” option on the bottom left. Select “My Elements”. to upload, simply drag the desired PNG file into the Elements section or the graphic background! Your PNG element will then be stored under “My Elements” for future use. Pro tip: upload multiple PNGs to create amazing media!
Turning Files Into PNGs
If you are experiencing any issues with uploading your images, we recommend verifying that the file is a PNG. Most computers will have the option to edit the file, and then prompt you to save it as a PNG format.
Even Better Dropbox Syncing
Check Out Our Dropbox Tutorial
In this video tutorial Chris, a Shift Worship team member, walks us through how to utilize Dropbox with your Pro Membership.
You may notice the user-friendly button that appears on the right-hand side of the screen when viewing your collection. This exists to simplify the download process. With a quick click, you can have all the files in the collection downloaded into your Dropbox account.
Chris also explains a new change that has been integrated with the syncing feature. As we mentioned above, one click is the usual route to having all the collection content downloaded at once. We are thrilled to share that this feature has had an upgrade! Pro members now have the ability to customize what media is synced when the Dropbox button is selected. Users can edit these preferences in their account settings under the option "Dropbox preferences" section. This function makes sure that users are receiving the content they need, and not feeling overwhelmed with sorting through downloaded content.
What is Dropbox & Why Do Should You Use It?
Dropbox is a cloud-based filing and sharing system that allows it users to organize, share, and store important files and documents. Founded in 2007, Dropbox serves as a great resources for churches, teams, businesses, and individuals looking to organize their files. All they need is an internet connection!
File Storage
File storage is one the most important features Dropbox offers. There are little-to-none items that Dropbox cannot store. The platform provides a generous amount of free storage space, with the option to upgrade for additional capacity and advanced features.
Synchronization
This is one of Dropbox's unique tools. The synchronization of Dropbox allows its users to share multiple filed across different accounts and devices such as computers, tablets, and smartphones. When a file is uploaded with the necessary permissions, it can be accessed instantly by those with the shared permissions.
File Sharing
Dropbox users can create special links that allow them to send and share files with whomever they like. The Dropbox system also allows for it's users to adjust and control the permissions for every file, and folder - making sure that you have total control!
Access Anywhere
Dropbox is a cloud-based software that allows anyone with an internet connection to access the files uploaded.
File Versioning
History is recored and stored on each edit of the file uploaded. This helps retain important information if files were ever deleted or corrupted.
Security
Integration
Dropbox has the capability to integrate with several applications (like Shift Worship), making it a unique and versatile asset.
Free & Paid Plans
What’s Included in Collections?
Everything You Could Need for Any Worship Service
Worship services are a backbone of the modern-day church. It is a time and place for the church and congregation to come together to learn and grow their faith. Visual elements are a great way to keep the engagement of current attendees, as well as retain new guests. The days of boring backgrounds are over! You now have the capability to choose the best media for Sunday’s topic and make yourself look like a media pro with a service full of cohesion.
Several years ago, we stopped making “backgrounds” for churches and started making Collections. In the early days of video projectors, our backgrounds were a hodgepodge of cool-looking nature shots and abstracts we made in Photoshop. Building a service for Sunday morning involved scrolling through endless pages of backgrounds on our site and others and picking out your favorites to mix and match on Sundays. We knew there was a better solution to save time and upgrade the service at the same time.
After seeing the results in our own churches (and lots of others), we decided there had to be a better way to do this. Instead of throwing up an assortment of unrelated backgrounds, it made much more sense to us to create sets of backgrounds—similar but varied—designed to be used in the same service to tell the same story.
That’s what a Collection is. It’s a way of keeping any service cohesive, intentional, and connected. We believe visual media should help make the entire service better. For us, that means the background on the opening song should be connected in some way to the background on the closing number—and the announcement slides, sermon notes, countdowns, and sermon bumpers should all look and feel connected, too. Every service is one story. Collections help you show that visually.
Since then, what is included in each collection on our site has grown as we have added elements to cover everything any church might want to do visually in a service. We have also added more and more ways for churches to customize our media into every Collection.
Bottom line: Every new Collection on Shift Worship provides everything you need for any one service.
So what’s in a Collection now?
1-Click Sync to Dropbox – Pro Feature
Don’t waste time downloading the media you might need for a service one-by-one. This button will send everything, all at once, to your connected Dropbox folder so it’s ready to go on your computer when you’re ready for it.
Motions/Stills
These are the foundation for any service. They work as backgrounds for the lyrics, yes, but they also include pre-made slides for Welcome, Exit, Communion, Offering, Prayer, and Upcoming Events. Majority of our collections also include Triple Wide versions for Environmental Projection.
Countdowns
Not every church uses these to start the service, but those who do will find one to match the rest of the set in each Collection. Countdowns serve as a great way to assist with time management. Staff, volunteers, teams, and the congregation have a visual of when service will begin-honing in their attention to the service. Use it with the music on the video or turn down the audio and use your own.
Editable Photoshop/After Effects Files – Pro Feature
For media folks comfortable with the software, these files allow them to quickly and easily customize the text in motions and still backgrounds.
Transparent Text Layers – Media/Pro Feature
This is kind of the reverse of the editable Photoshop and After Effects files. Instead of putting your text on our images, you can use that software to put our text and art elements on your images.
Quick Editor – Media/Pro Feature
Brand new! Now anyone can customize the text on motion and still backgrounds without Photoshop. It works right on our site inside the Collection-no extra software need. Make any and all edits needed, and then download straight to your computer or Dropbox account. So fast and easy, there’s no reason not to make every visual you use in a service fit the look of the Collection.
Licensing – Media/Pro Feature
Everything we make comes with permission to project onto screens during your church services, but it’s not legal to stream our content or put it on your web site without these licenses.
Editable Sermon Titles – Pro Feature
Need title screens for a sermon or sermon series? Our professional designers have already laid one out for you. You can use it as is, of course, but quickly make it your own in Quick Editor.
Editable Bulletins & Postcards – Pro Feature
Going all out for a special series? Don’t lose the look and feel with your bulletins and postcards. These files are big enough to customize and print (or send to the printer). Bulletins and postcards are another great engagement tool that your congregation can benefit from! Use these to help guests follow along with the sermon, or share special announcements.
Social Media (also Editable!) – Media/Pro Feature
Feed your feeds the same look and feel your people will find on Sunday morning. We’ve added ready-to-send text to these so you can use them any time or edit the text in Photoshop to fit your series or special announcements.
Mini Movies/Sermon Bumpers
Many Collections include a very short video to kick off worship, illustrate a sermon topic, or recognize a holiday. This is a great way to inspire and reiterate important faith-based messages.
How to Modify Title Screens in Photoshop
In this Shift Worship Tutorial, we take a look at how download and make simple edits in Adobe Photoshop to the Editable Title Screens found in each Shift Worship Collection.
If you’re not a Pro Member, yet, you can try this out right now for free on the Geo Pop Collection.
How to Modify Title Screens in After Effects
In this Shift Worship Tutorial, we take a look at how to download and make simple edits in Adobe After Effects to the Editable Title Screens found in each Shift Worship Collection.
If you’re not a Pro Member, yet, you can try this out right now for free on the Geo Pop Collection.