Important Update
Graphic design forms part of the art world that is used essentially for communication purposes. Graphic design is used as an outlet for advertising, from logos to murals, graphic designs are primarily used for spreading messages in a catchy and punchy manner.
It has been argued that in the web design industry experience trumps qualifications and a simple mistake is likely to cost the image of the company or organization that is being advertised. Graduating from a top school with the best instructors may not be guaranteed that one is very good at designing.
There is a need for new graphic designers to gain experience by working on projects repeatedly to be able to garner the best skills for executing their jobs.
It is important to have clear and communicating designs for logos, brochures, websites, blogs, packaging, and other designs because consumers make purchasing decisions directly or indirectly based on what they see.
It is expected that the designs are packaged in colors that are evocative to the emotions of the customers to bring about a gut effect of wanting to purchase the item. When the designs are right it means that they will be giving the consumers the right signals drawing the consumers towards the purchase of the products.
Designs that are done casually and carelessly are likely to invoke a feeling of unprofessionalism from the audience and that business or organization may not be taken seriously.
The mistakes might even encounter an experienced designer, and to overcome them it is important that one proofreads his work at the same time have someone look at the work before releasing it to the public. The common mistakes for beginner designers may include the following;
It is important to keep the promises that one gives within the time that one can deliver quality work. Some new designers overpromise when it comes to time and when caught up with time, they decide to deliver something shoddy.
It is important to ask for a considerable amount of time, assure the client that you will have your best, work on the design, evaluate it and even have some time to have someone evaluate the work before sharing with the client. It is good to ask for more time and then surprise the client by delivering early than expected. New designers should avoid working under pressure as this will jeopardize the quality of work.
It is the responsibility of the client to provide clear instructions to the designer, and the designer is under obligation to ensure that all instructions are well understood. If the instructions are not clear it is the responsibility of the designer to ask for clarification however how many times the communication has to be made.
It is also the responsibility of the designer to advise the client on the choice of themes and even colors, this becomes a challenge for upcoming designers as they sometimes are unable to advise the client. Beginner designers at times may encounter confusing issues in the directives they have been issued with, and they fear getting back to their clients for verification of issues for fear of seen as not knowing what they are doing.
Simplicity is very important in design, and overdesigning can mislead your audience. The use of too many Photoshop filters renders one’s work copied, and one should be original. When there are a lot of designs one, has to overthink to get meaning from a communication. It is important that designed communication should not be crowded with images, fonts, and colors for it to be readable and communicate easily.
Graphic design should be a creative process, and a designer has to think outside the box of whatever instructions are provided by the client. As a new designer one is supposed to try out things and play around so that they get to understand a number of things. Staying within the box will limit the creative nature that is desired by a designer.
The use of so many fonts within a paragraph shows you’re a joker and limits continuity. It is advisable to limit the number of fonts to the utmost three in a single paragraph and for business designs, one should keep to one font type.
Kerning helps to create space between letters and this renders wording more legible and pleasing to the eye and can be done either manually or automatically to reach the desired effect. Nevertheless, sometimes kerning might be misused, and if a designer is not experienced it may give room for misinterpretations and may destroy a design’s cohesiveness.
The use of stock images is good but can be misused, and can be misinterpreted. The use of many stock images renders a designer’s work cheap and in some cases unprofessional. Some stock images to have some connotation from the community to community, so the choice of a stock image should be looked at denotatively and connotatively visa viz the audience that one target.
When designing the spell check systems may not be able to point out some spelling mistakes. The mistake might be from the client or the designer, and that is why we discussed above that it is important to countercheck everything with the client if unsure. Work that has spelling errors will be counted as unprofessional and the product or service one is offering will be taken as a joke, like the spelling error itself. There are some spelling mistakes that might lead to loose of meaning completely.
The grammar should be correct hence the need for someone to proofread your work. A misplaced or missing part of speech or issues of the subject-verb agreement will be seen as lack of seriousness more especially from the native speakers of the language that you are designing in and some of them may disregard the whole idea under communication.
Organizations and individuals ask for designer ideas when looking for fresh ideas of conveying a brand or conveying a promotional message to their audience. The designer is expected to provide a graphic that not only attracts but also engages the audience. Some new designers fail in visualizing their design to real life. It is important to ensure that a unique design is adopted to meet the requirements of the client and the audience.
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