Every year, Shutterstock customers across the world make billions of searches for images, footage, and music, their data and creative teams analyze this search and download data to discover the biggest year-over-year changes, and with the information gathered – plus expert knowledge from content, design, video, and music teams – the company identifies the trends that will continue to grow throughout 2018. From major trends that will dominate popular culture to trends to watch that will burst onto the design scene, the Shutterstock team has identified the top 11 styles to emerge in the coming year. Here are the 3 major ones — Fantasy, Minimalism, and Space — and you can read more about these and explore the others on the Shutterstock blog:
Trend 1 : Fantasy
Searches are increasing for recognized fantasy characters – unicorn up 297% and mermaid up 145% – and epic, orchestral music is growing in popularity as marketers and creative professionals look to add a bit of the supernatural to our everyday.
Trend 2 : New Minimalism
Minimalism is evolving from its modest roots to a look fit for modern times. While searches for continuous line increased 432%, a new contender in minimalism, neon circle, was searched for 387% more.
Trend 3: Space
The creative world is taking note of box office hits with an emphasis on space. Searches for solar are up 991% and interest in astro has increased 671%, while the popularity of the unmistakable sci-fi synthwave sound has increased 494%.
