Thoughts of a Web Designer

i had thoughts of shutting down this blog as it’s becoming apparent that my interest in blogging is dwindling. but then again, this site has allowed me many opportunities in voicing my thoughts, engaging in various discussions, making new friends, and having jobs and projects of many kinds, with design being the main.

that said, designing for clients can get extremely frustrating. people don’t realise the amount of work that is put into each and every element of the page layout. they expect work to be done and changes to be made at the snap of the finger. adding small shadows and shading, choosing the perfect font out of thousands others, hours and more hours of trial-and-error in aligning and spacing all the elements, and tons of other stuff not mentioned. all these cost a lot of time and effort but usually go unnoticed and unappreciated anyway.

whenever i design a website, i use hundreds of layers in photoshop. literally hundreds. yet after all this jumbo work, clients would always want to make amendments, simply because they don’t “like” the design. and the same process is repeated all over again.

so, i started this website as an avenue of showcasing my design exactly the way i want it. people tend to like the outcome, which is surprising considering the fact that whenever i do any form of design for clients, they would come up with various reasons why my designs are wrong. but when it comes to designing my blog, people always love it.

probably where money is concerned, people have to nitpick at every possible thing they can. take for example a simple web design that’s pleasant to the eye, looks professional and perfectly suitable for a corporate website. the client feels that the simple design does not justify the amount of money paid. they lose sight of things and demand a graphic-intensive design instead. they start to lose their faith in the designer.

anyway, my point is that i would not shut down this blog. i would keep it going for as long as i can. it is the only place where i can churn out design the exact way i want it, with minimum restrictions and maximum appreciation. it’s probably the only thing that i can truly call my own.

something else that i find damn annoying is when people who are totally clueless brag as though they know a lot about web design. it belittles my work, and cheapens my skills. it’s been done countless times by friends and acquaintances alike, and the dialog tends to go like this:

annoying person: so what are you doing now?
me: i’m designing a website for someone.
annoying person: oh web design? i know how to do it too!
me: oh yeah?
annoying person: yeah. HTML only mah. so easy. no big deal.
me: so you know HTML coding?
annoying person: yeah. i know how to do it on microsoft frontpage.

now, that is INCREDIBLY annoying. i can bet that such a person has never properly designed a website from scratch. he probably doesn’t even know what CSS is. firstly, he assumes that web design is all about HTML, and totally disregards the artwork portion. hello, it’s called web design for a reason. more often than not, such a person does not even know how to use imaging software such as photoshop.

secondly, he assumes that simply because he knows how to use a HTML editing software, it means he knows HTML. microsoft frontpage is a WYSIWYG editor, meaning it is meant to be idiot-proof. using a WYSIWYG editor, people don’t need to know any HTML code to come up with a simple webpage. in fact, it is meant for people who don’t know HTML.

someone who knows web design would be capable of creating a decent-looking webpage from scratch using nothing but photoshop (or paint shop pro, whatever) AND code entirely in notepad without the help of any other editor. otherwise, he is not fit to claim that he knows web design.

i just hate it when people who know nothing about what i do belittle or show little regard for my efforts. they always think they know better, when they don’t even have a clue. the next time anyone says such things to me again, i’m gonna ask them a whole bunch of web design related questions. that would totally shut them up.

Posted by Veron · Design category · 4,168 views