Facebook's rather rigid format in Timeline can be a bit off putting when it comes to creating something visual that pops your page. To make this more difficult, Facebook changes dimensions on a whim, so it pays to keep up with their changes to preserve the continuity of the look of your page.
The current sizes for the profile and banner are 160x160 and 851x315 pixels as seen above. When creating your profile image, you'll want to do so in 180x180, keeping enough negative space to be automatically cropped when you upload it to your page.
Now that the sizes are determined, you can create the image identity. There are as many workarounds to this as there are desktop publishing applications. I've decided to use one that isn't, it's a presentation application instead, Apple's Keynote.
The Southern Utah Miata Enthusiasts and Gliding Glen Canyon Expeditions are two pages I'm managing for the purposes of demonstrating for this class. Both needed a makeover in the cover and profile pics to establish a better brand identity.
For SUME, I created a simple slide in Keynote with two separated words, SUME, the acronym for the club, and ZOOM, playing on Mazda's marketing catchphrase, ZOOM ZOOM. I typed out the words independent from each other so I could arrange them vertically (following the 180 ratio of the profile image).
Once I was happy with the arrangement and size - the bigger the better for resolution's sake - I brought the slide full screen and took a screen shot of it on my iPad, turning it into a png file now stored in my photos.
It looks like this.
I then imported the file to my iMac desktop, uploaded it to my SUME Facebook page where I edited the cropping of the image and saved. The result...
Despite the centered text, when it uploads and crops it goes a hair asymmetrical. Were I a bit more anal I'd go back and rework this. But I'm not.
I also changed the cover photo to one that had some negative space wherein the profile image could nest, using the diagonal vectors of the image to draw the eye to the content of the header.
For the Gliding Glen Canyon page I wanted an identity in the context of kayaking. Again, using Keynote on one slide, I created the logo grouping the words "Gliding," "Glen" and "Canyon" using the same font and spacing them creating a word picture. Creating each word as its own design element provides this flexibility. I then added the word "expeditions" changed it to a 33pt Copperplate font in all caps and positioned it beneath the word picture as a foundation.
Next, I added an image that as lots of negative space while incorporating the kayak theme. I should note that all the photography is mine, composing and shooting to the end of using these images in design.
Keynote allows elements to be placed foreground and background. I selected the image, made it go background and placed it underneath the text to get the desired composition.
The result...
I left space around the image knowing I would be cropping this in Facebook. An oversight on my part was not nailing the vertical ratio at something beyond 180, inducing a black edge at the bottom beyond the image's frame.
I changed the cover image as well, to bring in texture and contrast to the blue while keeping with the kayak theme. It helps that the colors are complementary.
And now the page looks like this...
