Dtpfaq's Blog

Projects – behind the scene

Working as a graphic designer .. hmm how hard is this? I noticed that most people who are not in the business don’t know exactly what this job is about and how things work. We just presume they know but how can they? I don’t know what other jobs are about in detail and I’m not sure I would understand all if someone would explain it.

There is no standard recipe to follow to become a designer. The most important thing to remember is that this doesn’t happens over night. Tones on hours are spent on study and practice. Depending on the specialization a designer  has knowledge of arts, different design software , fonts, colors, printing, branding, media, web and so on.  Talent is another thing that not all people have, “seeing” and understanding how things should look is not coming natural to everybody.

I noticed there is a wrong perception about design projects, people tend to think that if a project is small in size it will be done faster and will cost less.  I wish for things to be so easy but unfortunately they are not. Sometimes the smallest design can be more difficult than a brochure if we think at vector art and how everything is built line by line.

I don’t know if you noticed but most of the time the client doesn’t know exactly what he wants so there is extra work in finding what the project is about. I have to ask the proper questions, adapt the terms to the client understanding, find more about the business and competitors. This part is pretty time-consuming but is necessary to know what road to follow in terms of design.

After this part is completed I must send some drafts. To be able to make drafts I need to gather all available content in one place and start creating. For each sample I send there are at least two or three samples behind that the client never has the chance to see.

After I send the samples I wait for the feedback that is not always very clear. Sometimes I have to meet with the client and talk minutes or hours, this is time-consuming too.

So, a project involves lots of communications, research work, creating sketches and then making digital drafts, making lots of changes until the client is happy and then preparing the files for all media formats. Preparing the file for print is another thing, after the client says OK he wants the file to be sent to the printer in a few minutes. I always have to explain that printers don’t accept files that don’t conform with all printing standards and some preparation of the file is need it.

All these steps consume time, this is something that people should know. When you hire a designer that says he will create a 8 pages brochure in 3 hours I advice you to think twice. Good designers don’t rush, they will give you a fair time estimate because they know what each step is about and how much time it takes.