Thoughts on Design

Good graphic design isn't complicated. Even fairly complex designs are, at their base, simple communication. While web design can be more technically challenging, it's also just a form of communication. An aspect of design that's often overlooked is this communication. You use the best paper, you've checked the latest color trends, your layout is perfect... does it communicate clearly? I'm passionate about design, but the wrong design can be worse than no design at all. When all is said in done, step back, look at your design again, and see it as if you've never seen it before. It's hard to do, but it needs to be done. Look at your design as if it was a story... is it good?, is it right?, is it complete? Does your design still say what you think it does? Most of the time it will, sometimes it won't. It's easy to let your preconceived ideas about a design cloud your judgment, and influence your design. To see the design based on your history with it, rather than what it currently is. To see how your perfect graphic matches a headline that the writer has since changed. To see a color choice based on a photo that's been replaced. Worst of all is to see something explained, by something you've removed. Never forget to step back and look at your design again... does it communicate clearly?

The Online Photographer is linking to a Slate post called Can photographers be plagiarists? by David Segal. I'm not a legal scholar, but as an artist I think the answer would be yes. I think the standard for proof of this charge should be set very high, but at some point there is a line that shouldn't be crossed. Letting an artists work inspire you is one thing, but an outright copy is another. Take the Nanpu bridge photographs for instance. If Horst and Daniel Zielske had added something to the mix, I would never have considered given Peter Bialobrzeski's claim of plagiarism any credit at all. Looking at the photographs though, I don't see where they've added anything to the work of Peter Bialobrzeski. They appear to me to be very, very similar. Where is their artistic vision? Where is their modification that made the composition better? The change in lighting, or the change of angle that makes this their work? I don't see it. Again, I'm by no means a legal scholar, but I think Peter Bialobrzeski may have a case. In looking at both these photos, I see only his hard work.

I've recently been playing with a free PHP Script. I'm incorporating a little of the dynamic content of the blog into the main page (since removed in an update) using a PHP script pulling in the RSS feed. It's a very user friendly set-up. The documentation leaves a little to be desired, and the sample template had to be completely redone for my use, but the actual script is quite impressive. If you're looking for this sort of thing, it's well worth your time. The superior quality of the script far outweighs the negatives of the documentation and template. To get the results I wanted, I changed the template file to PHP and removed all of the extraneous coding. Changing the template to PHP allowed me to remove a lot of the HTML in the template, making for cleaner ocde when it was pulled into the home page. Then all that was left was to add the proper CSS selectors and it was ready to go.

Kathy Marks has a great post today called What's Love Got to Do with It?

And because it's the web - and alive and changing everyday - you can never stop studying it, but must always be ready to turn on a dime and take up anything new that comes along. To accomplish all that takes drive and the will to excel. It takes passion

Here's someone who really gets it. Design is about passion. If you aren't passionate about it, why bother? Surely not for the money, there are much easier ways to do that. I particularly like her comment on studying. Web design in particular is an ever changing field, if you stop learning, you'll quickly be outclassed. Show me a designer without passion for their work, I'll show you someone who needs a career change.

Steven at SpyderBlog had a really good comment on my last post. I started to answer it in the comment section, but it soon became clear that it needed more significant attention. I quoted the The Design Constitution which says, in part:

Rather than dictate specific changes to a design--"move this here" or "change the color to,: - let's agree the Client will request a new design or a variation of the original that addresses specific problems.

Steven's response was:

From a web usability and content writing perspective, I know of many times when a small change does not require an entirely new design or a variation of a mostly approved design.

I agree, small changes often don't require that sort of drastic change. It's more of the attitude of the designer/client relationship that I'm considering. The key as I see it, is for the designer to be able to address specific client identified problems, rather than having the client acting as designer. I have no problem with clients identifying problems with a design. I do have a problem with the client trying to identify and execute the solution to the problem. As a designer, I don't want a client looking over my shoulder saying things like "move that up a little", or "a little to the left". That may sound silly, but I've had clients try to do that both figuratively and literally. What I want is to have the client say something like "I think the text is too tight around that graphic", then let me address that problem. I am good at my job, my clients are good at theirs. They are not however good at mine. What I like about this constitution is how it clarifies this relationship. This is my job as graphic designer or web designer, that is yours as a client. That clarity is often missing in designer/client relationships.

You could argue, as some of the commenters do, that his isn't workable. Who cares? This is far and away the best demonstration of the proper interaction between designer and client that I've seen. For me, it's more important as an ideal than as a workable plan. Once the ideal is defined, then a workable subset of these rules can be made. When no ideal exists, what do you work towards? The Design Constitution

Great work results from a near obsession with detail and nuance. Done right, a brochure, a web site, a catalog, and so on, is so carefully structured, changing a single significant element can drastically impact the whole. Rather than dictate specific changes to a design--"move this here" or "change the color to,"--let's agree the Client will request a new design or a variation of the original that addresses specific problems.

Hat tip to Evolution of Intelligent Design.

Cascading style sheets (CSS) can be simple, complex, convoluted beyond belief. While CSS is the backbone of modern web design, it's not fully understood by a lot of people using it. I constantly see CSS with significantly more code than is necessary. More isn't always better. I've always thought it was better to just clearly define what you want and be done with it. Consider this CSS:

body {font-size:medium;} p { font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;} a:link { font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight:bold; color: #660000;} a:visited { font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight:bold; color: #000000;} a:hover { font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight:bold; color: #330000;} a:active { font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight:bold; color: #990000;}

Sure, it would work, but what if you want to change it? If you wanted to make a site wide font change, you'd have to change every instance of the the font specification. By first assigning all general specifications, then listing exceptions, we can significantly shorten this code.

body { font-size:medium; font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;} a { font-weight:bold;} a:link { color: #666600;} a:visited { color: #000000;} a:hover { color: #330000;} a:active { color: #990000;}

By defining the site's basic font on the body tag, we've eliminated any need to use it elsewhere. By defining all links "a {" as bold, we've eliminated the need to define it elsewhere. To change the font on the entire site would now only require changing the body tag's definition. If I wanted some aspect of the site to use a different font than defined in the body tag, it would only be a matter of adding that tag into the CSS with the font defined differently. For instance:

body {font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;} h1, h2, h3, h4 {font-family:"Times New Roman", Times, serif;}

This would make all fonts Arial, except for headers 1-4. First we defined the site as all Arial font, then we changed the headers to Times. My rule of thumb for CSS is first define the general, then define exceptions. This short post won't make you a master of CSS, but maybe it can help you keep it simple.

Indi Young at TechSoup.org had an interesting post yesterday called Is Your Home Page Immature?

So how can you tell if your organization isn't using its home page to best advantage? One symptom is a failure to trust your own navigation and architecture systems to direct customers to valuable information.

I've seen that type of "immature" designing before, but I've never heard it described quite that well. I've always disliked that sort of webdesign, but for purely aesthetic reasons. The "immature" style as Ms. Young calls it is too cluttered and fragmented for my taste. It's the same design theory that brought us "Bold everything, it's all important!" I'm particularly interested in her second step in improving your site:

Think of every pixel as dynamic content. Very little on your home page - ” besides the navigation and logo, of course -” should be considered permanent.

It takes an idea that I've been using, and pushes it much farther that I'd ever considered. "Think of every pixel as dynamic content." I'm going to have to revisit several of my sites with this idea in mind. What content have I been letting sit on the home page, just because it's always been there? Definitely something to think about.

How fast does your site load? One of the most common problems I see with web pages is slow load speed. Most often the problems that are slowing the site down are easily fixable. Unoptimized images, too many images, too many scripts, and way too many domain lookups. Amitav Roy at Web Design And Graphic Design has a great post on this today called Tips on Fast Loading Web pages. A must read for any web designer.

Optimizing page load performance is not just for content which will be viewed by narrow band dial up visitors. It is just as important for broadband content and can lead to dramatic improvements even for your visitors with the fastest connections.

I found an interesting post by the Grammar Girl's called Correcting Other People's Grammar today. One aspect of graphic design that is always underestimated by designers and clients alike is corrections. Clients always think that their supplied copy is perfect, graphic designers know better. Graphic designers know that our design is flawless, customers disagree. Grammar Girl's suggestions for making grammar corrections could just as easily be applied to getting corrections done on graphic design projects.

In any other case, you must ask yourself if the person you wish to correct would actually like to be corrected. If the answer is "no", then you should keep it to yourself. One exception to this is if you are putting together a work product, and there is a grammatical error that would make you or your company look bad. In this case, you should just suggest the edit and your reasoning behind the correction and refrain from delivering a grammar lesson.

Whether you use this method or another, there will always be corrections. It's the nature of the business. Being prepared for them, and dealing with them in an organized an appropriate fashion will save yo time, and clients. Sure, clients don't want to be corrected, but they don't want to look bad either. It may be awkward pointing out a problem to a client, but it's better to do it yourself before the project is completed, than to have someone else inform the client of it after it's completed.