Designing isn’t as Easy as you Think

I was researching for the Summer Season. What are the style trends of 2012, and of those trends, which did I like? I’m all about designing something I can be proud of. There’s a process to designing – researching, sketching, brainstorming, drafting, re-drafting…Point is: It doesn’t happen over night.

I used to think it did, before I went to design school. I thought you could just have the perfect idea pop into your head and you could take that idea and then poof! There it is right in front of you. HA! Boy was I naive. I thought that I could just open up Photoshop and start creating. HA! I couldn’t even navigate through the program when I first opened it (which I was always embarrassed to admit). To be honest, I’m still learning everything that programs like Photoshop can do. There is so much that goes unused because the program is so versatile.

But still, there’s more to it than that. There’s more than knowing how to “work” the programs. I think what makes a designer unique is their style. What kind of design eye do they have? What are their favorite color combinations? How do they utilize their typography and layout design skill? The art in graphic design doesn’t come from the tutorials your learned off of Youtube, the classes you took, the programs you use; it’s how you use them.

People don’t realize it, but in every design I create there is reasoning behind every placement, color choice, and enhancement. I don’t like to just do it to make it look “pretty,” I do it with purpose. And I think that every designer should have purpose behind their design. I whole-heartedly believe that’s when great art is created.