50 ways to become a better designer .. from 1-25

[Jopicasso]

The ideas stage
A blank canvas can be terrifying, so where do you start? Our experts reveal ways to force your ideas into motion

01 ROUGH COMPS
“I put a rough composition together using scans or low-res images found on the web. This enables me to use the assets I like without worrying whether I have them at the right size or in the right colour. Once the rough is complete, I recreate it in a high-res format – shooting, recycling or buying any photography I need to complete the piece.”
SUPPLIED BY: DARREN FIRTH

02 METAPHORS
“Themes and metaphors are great platforms for ideas and I try to develop them both from a holistic perspective (ie, basing a site around a playground metaphor) as well as a design perspective (colour schemes and layout styles, for example). If you can hit a decent theme that allows you to convey and house the content, it’s a good place to be.”
SUPPLIED BY: LAITH BAHRANI

03 FROM WORDS TO PICTURES
“When I receive a commission, the first thing I do is read it and underline key phrases. Then I draw some very small rough thumbs for each. Once I’ve got a bunch of little thumbnails together, I look at them all and see which ones make good symbols and which are identifiable and relevant to the content of the story.”
SUPPLIED BY: DEREK LEA

04 BRAND THINKING
“I would recommend going on any brand courses run by the likes of the Design Business Association. Brand thinking is essential; it encourages you to develop a visual way of thinking and helps you develop keywords to hang everything off – the essence of the idea. Above all else, keep it simple. If it gets complicated it isn’t going to work.”
SUPPLIED BY: JAY ARMITAGE

05 KEEP YOUR BRAINSTORMS REALLY SHORT
“When coming up with ideas it’s essential to bounce ideas around with a colleague, but the secret is to keep the brainstorms as short as possible, otherwise they’ll get stale. It’s better to have a couple of smaller sessions than a single mammoth session.”
SUPPLIED BY: JASON ARBER

06 USE A SKETCHBOOK
“I usually plan my work in an A4 hardback book, which I carry with me at all times. Any ideas I have (often when on public transport staring out of the window) go in here, and they can then be referred to at a later date. Diagrams, sketches, thoughts, book titles and reference URLs go in, too.”
SUPPLIED BY: OZ DEAN

07 GET AWAY FROM YOUR COMPUTER
“I find the worst thing is to sit staring at a blank canvas on screen. Get out of your chair and take a ten-minute walk in the fresh air. If you can’t do that, I find it helps to grab a Thesaurus and look up synonyms for the key words in the design brief.”
SUPPLIED BY: RIGEL

08 JOIN A FORUM
“Freelancers walk that lonesome road, but that shouldn’t stop you from seeking feedback while in the concept stage. If you have creative friends, great! If not, join an art forum to bounce ideas off of your peers.”
SUPPLIED BY: DAVE CURD

09 TAKE A SHOWER
“I get a lot of my thinking done in the shower. Running water increases brain productivity, apparently, which explains why some of the best ideas are hatched in the shower. I try to read a brief well in advance of working on it, allowing ideas to gestate in the run up to the actual work.”
SUPPLIED BY: OZ DEAN

10 SPECS!
“Taking into account the different media that will be required in your project is really important. If there will be photography, illustration, 3D renderings, charts or diagrams then all this has to be taken into consideration and planned for. The printing spec should be explored as soon as possible with the printer – it’s pointless waiting until the last minute, because some processes always take longer than others to complete.”
SUPPLIED BY: JEFF KNOWLES


Best practice
Work smarter, not harder, with advice for best working practice

11 KEEP A LIBRARY
“When working with Flash files, I always make a point of giving my layers and symbols relevant and self-explanatory names. I also keep a file called ‘library’, which contains timers, loopers, buttons, code snippets and symbols that I use regularly. This really speeds up production.”
SUPPLIED BY: OZ DEAN

12 WEB STANDARDS
“When designing websites you can save loads of time by using Firefox extensions such as Web Developer, HTML Validator and Fangs. Each will reduce the time it takes to create standardscompliant, accessible websites.”
SUPPLIED BY: ODOG

13 KEEP IT CURRENT
“Visit sites such as pixelsurgeon.com or designiskinky.com and read Computer Arts. Staying up to date with design doesn’t mean just looking at the work of others, you should know the industry and stay ahead of the software curve. Don’t fall behind as many designers do, but don’t chase fads either.”
SUPPLIED BY: JJ JOHNSTONE

14 KEEP IT SIMPLE
“My illustrations can be quite complex, so I always place one limitation on myself. If I have an illustration with a lot of visual elements and textures, l force myself to use a simple colour palette. If I want to use loads of different colours I ensure that the illustration is kept simple. That way colour and design don’t fight against each other.”
SUPPLIED BY: DEREK LEA

15 RECORD YOUR ACTIONS
“If there are procedures you do repeatedly in Photoshop, it’s worth recording them as an Action. I only learned this trick recently, and it’s a great time-saver.”
SUPPLIED BY: RIGEL

16 SAVE, SAVE, SAVE!
“Computers always seem to know when you’re hitting a deadline and choose that moment to crash, destroying any unsaved work. So hit Save as often as possible.”
SUPPLIED BY: JASON ARBER

17 STORE YOUR ASSETS
“Everyone has their own way of doing things. I like to keep lossless versions of all the assets I’m going to be using in a piece to allow for any last-minute changes of size/format by the client. This is helpful should someone decide to take a postcard design and turn it into an A0 poster. Keeping things at maximum editability is handy, too – don’t flatten layers in Photoshop until the very end, for instance.”
SUPPLIED BY: JON BURGERMAN

18 COLLABORATE
“Since there are only two of us, nothing gets released without approval from us both. If the other person thinks that it still lacks something, he/she will work on it. Or if one of us doesn’t like the first draft, we start from scratch. Being on the same page makes the work easier and, more importantly, fun.”
SUPPLIED BY: INKSURGE

19 GET IT RIGHT FIRST TIME
“Even if you factor-in time for testing a website into your initial workflow, problems and client vacillations will inevitably eat into it, and it’s not unheard of for sites to go live with only cursory testing. For web designers, however, this quality assurance process is worth its weight in gold, even if project managers start sweating at the expense. Getting a site right the first time is the kind of cherry on top that can ensure you get more work from the same client.”
SUPPLIED BY: JASON ARBER

20 PRACTICE ALWAYS MAKES PERFECT
“The more projects you work on and the more time you spend using programs, the quicker and more efficient you become. You learn not only from your mistakes but also from your successes, and these will help raise your standard of production.”
SUPPLIED BY: LAITH BAHRANI


Software skills
A bad workman blames his tools, so make sure your software works for you, not against you

21 ALPHA CHANNELS IN PHOTOSHOP
“Take the time to experiment with Alpha Channel-based selections. I find that Alpha Channels are often the key ingredient to bringing real-world elements and textures into my artwork. Once you get into the groove of working with channels it changes the way you observe things in the real world.”
SUPPLIED BY: DEREK LEA

22 BUY MORE RAM
“My number-one tip would be to buy as much RAM as you can afford, because Photoshop will devour as much as you can throw at it. I tend to use lots of layers and so small jobs, such as designs for websites, can quickly grow into mammoth files.”
SUPPLIED BY: JASON ARBER

23 GRADIENTS IN PHOTOSHOP
“To prevent gradients from ‘banding’ when printing, add a small amount of noise to the layer, varying the amount depending on the size and resolution of your canvas.”
SUPPLIED BY: RIGEL

24 MORE LAYERS
“From past experiences, my best suggestion when producing work in Photoshop (especially complex compositions) is to use as many layers as possible, avoiding merging objects together if you can. There is nothing worse than merging something together that later you wish to delete or change – especially if you have gone past its History state.”
SUPPLIED BY: DARREN FIRTH

25 AIRBRUSH IN ILLUSTRATOR
“Lowering the Opacity of a path, adding a Gaussian Blur and combining them with a Clipping Mask in Illustrator allows for wonderful airbrushed styles to be built up with a level of control that isn’t found in Photoshop.”
SUPPLIED BY: INKWORM

[Chung Dha]

Why didn't you just make a website with it and ad graphics to explain everything more and just post a link of that. This is way too much boring text without any graphics to comply the text better.

[_Redrum]

Nice tips. And to whom do we owe this list? ...URL?