How to Feel Good About Your Design
A while back, there was a brief discussion over at Alen’s Pixelpusher, about feeling good about your website design. I’ve been thinking about it the past couple of days, when I realised I’m not enjoying the design process of a new site I’m working on. I’ll share a tip or two with you which might help you work with more ease and personal satisfaction.
Mantaining distance
I believe it is very important not to put your work under too much scrutiny. If you analyse every detail and look at it too closely, you won’t be able to see it properly. All things tend to become blurry if you’re too close to them. You will grow tired of your design, and may eventually completely waste a perfectly good idea. I know I’ve done it on too many occassions.
Try to keep distance. Throw your idea onto a paper, or make a rough sketch on your computer. Then, allow some time to pass without working on it. After that, try and add to the original idea. I’ve learnt this method gives me the opportunity to see my work from a whole new angle, under a different light.
Don’t Work When Tired or Fed up With Work
I know, sometimes we have to work, even when we badly lack sleep. The tip is, don’t work when you’re deprived of sleep or simply tired, unless you absolutely have to. It’ll only result in a waste of time. You won’t get any real work done, and you’ll still be tired.
Don’t start a project when you’ve bumped into a big creative wall. This is where you need to call a time out. Take a short break and do other things you enjoy doing.
Your First Idea is Often the Best One
It is often the case that your first idea is the best one, or at least a good one. Try not to think too much about the design at the very beginning of the project. Keep in mind to allow things to “go with the flow”. If you do decide to drop the initial idea and go for another, save your work. It may come in handy at some point in time.
Content First, Design Later
I’m repeating the same mistake over and over again; I start with the layout, then code to adjust to it. It really should be the other way around; the layout design should come later in the process and made in such way to go along with the content.
You should try and code as much XHTML (and include as much content) as possible before doing the layout. This will save valuable time. Making the web graphics first is a risk — anything in planning of the site can change, resulting in adjustment of the graphics or even making them from scratch.
As we all know, content is king, so dance to it’s tune.
Give it Your Best Shot
I cannot feel good about my work if I don’t put a lot of time and effort into it. Everything stops making sense if I don’t give it a good shot. Make sure you gave your best, or you may regret it later. The project will be a reflection of your skills. It will serve as a reference to your future employers. If you give it your best shot, there will be no room for regrets.
That’ll do it for this set of tips. Feel free to comment on them and add yours.
Thank you! I needed this article. Recently I felt like nothing I was attempting to create was good. I always tried to create the layout first before coding and no matter how tired I was I would still attempt to create a design, only to throw it out in frustration. This article will go along way in helping me to Feel good about my design. hehe. Thanks.
Peace and God Bless!
Yannick L. on July 5, 2005
I’m glad it helped. I often have problems with that issue, though. Very often, customers demand a layout before giving me any real content. That makes my job a lot tougher, and requires a lot of time to complete the task.
Bojan on July 5, 2005
Thanks for the comment about not working when you are tired, or fed up with work.
It is so true. Unfortunately sometimew when you work for a company it is inevitable. On a recent project we spent 13 to 14 hours a day on a huge project with a ridiculous deadline, draining or creativity each day. At the end of a 65 hour week it was even aparent to our employer that this was just to much, our work quality was suffering. Thankfully the next deadline for the project was extended an additional 2 weeks, and we gradually regained sanity, and our creativity, and came out with a happy client after all.
You speak the truth, most of us know from experience. Thanks
Crystal Watson on July 5, 2005
Thank you for the tips. I feel better already. I try to follow the “Don’t work when fed up” rule as much as possible. Otherwise I waste a lot of time, which could be used relaxing.
Another which I believe in is: Don’t worry about how you’re going to code/style a design at the design stage. I feel that it restricts the creative process too much. This also presents new challenges at the construction stage.
Mat on July 6, 2005
I agree, Mat. I never pay too much attention to my CSS code in the early stages of the project. I tend to keep my focus on the visual part, and concentrate on CSS coding later.
Bojan on July 6, 2005
Good advices!
I guess “Give it your best shot” is the most valuable advice you can get if you wish to feel good about your work.
But, I must say, I always design first and code later :) I created small css templates that I reuse. That saves me a lot of time.
alen on July 6, 2005
Alen, I also use my own templates of various kinds. It’s a tip I was going to use for the second part of the article.
However, I believe the design should come after you’ve gathered the content for your site. As I’ve pointed out, content is king, so you need to adjust to it. If you complete a design and get the content afterwards, you’ll probably have to adjust your design. In an even worse scenario, you’ll have to start all over. Either way, you lose time.
Bojan on July 6, 2005
Bojan, sure you must get all the info about the content that will be included in design before you even touch anything. Without detailed information about that you may merely design a shell (header, footer etc.)
What I was reffering to is that I create a psd document first (based on all the content you must display), then slice it into css, but I guess all of you do the same :)
Alen on July 6, 2005
Alen, now I get what you meant, I misunderstood earlier. It’s my fault, the tip really isn’t clear enough. I think we are on the same “wave length”, though — content first (which is what I basically meant with “XHTML”), slicing the layout second. I’ve made slight adjustments to that tip now.
Bojan on July 6, 2005
I’d ad one more to your list:
Do not accept comments or suggestions from no one in early stages of the work. That could ad some “dirt” into your original idea and, in my experience at least, all those well intended suggestion at the beginning of any design only help to mix things up. No big deal if you have something more or less solid in hands…
Cheers
ViB on July 6, 2005
You speak wisely my fellow friend, I just wanna emphasize one thing that just recently made really clear to me: Deadlines can be your friends!
Though it sounds really spooky, it’s absolutely the truth. Although they are mostly the reason for stress and “rapid losing hair” process, without them, we would be designing one thing for ages, always trying to improve it. Sometimes you just have to stop and say it’s done. For time being, that is - web can always be redesigned!
sale on July 7, 2005
@sale: I definitely agree there.
Bojan on July 8, 2005
I know how you feel. I’m always wanting to change the design of my site as soon as a finish. I don’t know if it is because I enjoy designing and have completed one project and want more or if it’s some kind of obsessive-compulsive thing. Either way it can be nerve-racking.
Caleb on July 12, 2005
I really enjoyed reading your hints and agree with most of them.
But there is just one thing I disagree: the first thing I do when creating a website, is to develop a general layout and design, which makes it easier for me to place the content. But I guess everyone has his own little tricks and preferences.
gerritssen on July 14, 2005
co0l
thanks for attention
zeq on July 18, 2005
Heyho!
Thanks for this fine article. I’m a young german media designer who is often unhappy with it’s design. This “tutorial” would help me a lot with myself.
Greetings from the German Motorcity
Mario A.
Mario A. on July 21, 2005
Some good advice here, nicely done. It seems to me that as designers, we do pressure ourselves to create something amazing when something almost amazing will do ;-) The majority of web users don’t put a site’s design under so much scrutiny - so why do we? I guess because we stare at a site for weeks while developing it while visitors see it for a matter of minutes. Remaining objective is very important.
Duncan Heal on August 8, 2005
Hello. Nice article, so true. I’m gonna give it a try this way. Very nice site too, definitely worth bookmarking for designers and “CSSers”. I don’t even know how i got here, anyway :-)
Dominik on February 14, 2006