Creative Beats Cookie-Cutter Any Day

In today’s world, if you can use a computer, you can be a graphic designer. Open up Microsoft Word and you are offered a bounty of items to help create your masterpiece.  There are templates for brochures, newsletters and even invitations. Click on “insert”, then “clip art” and you’ll see thousands of images for you to download and use for free in your projects. Just pop a .jpg file onto your page and you’re halfway there.

Many trained and schooled graphic designers loath Microsoft Word. Word is the antithesis to all things creative when it comes to anything other than typing. I don’t have enough hands to count on all the times I’ve lost out on a freelance job because someone decided their receptionist could just go ahead and create the office newsletter. This is not to say that they don’t create a perfectly respectable newsletter, but it’s usually missing that certain something. Replacing a headline and the “lorem ipsum, etc” text isn’t the same as channeling the true creative process and coming out on the other side with something original, eye-catching and memorable.

It doesn’t matter if I’m creating a black and white newsletter or a fun logo for a local restaurant, all my jobs begin with nothing and end with my best work. Creating something out of nothing can create artist’s block. Hopefully, my client has given me something to work with. Maybe some rough idea of what the vision of their company is, or at least be able to tell me what colors they have in mind. It also helps to spend time chatting with a client and getting to know them personally. This way I won’t walk into a presentation with a bubblegum pink-loud logo and try to sell it to a suit and tie boardroom.

But even before I’ve got a job in hand, I’m already working on my creative process. In order to stay relevant in my field, I need to know what the trends are. A few years ago, grunge was king and the 70’s were back in style. Right now, things are more retro and vintage than ever. It’s true even in the graphic design world that what once was, now is. Keeping an eye on what’s current gives me a starting point when I’m presented with little to go on. I imagine this holds true for any industry. The need to constantly educate oneself is one of the best ways to stay on top of the game.

But even with that knowledge, I still need to stay true to my design style. I don’t consider myself to be a groundbreaker. I love unique and funky design, but I also can pump out elegant and classic without being bored. When I open up Adobe Illustrator, I try not to let the blank page stall me. Like a writer with a blank sheet of paper in front of them, I too have to put something on my page to get things rolling. It might just be the name of the company in Helvetica, but it’s a start. From there I pull out my trusty “Color Index” book by Jim Krause and play around with colors, design elements, then fonts, then deconstructing of said fonts…and the creative process is underway. It’s even more fun when I’m using Photoshop. The ability to manipulate anything and come out on the other side with a product the client falls in love with is exciting.

There are days where I am tempted to pull out a template and drop in text. To grab an image off iStock and call it my own without any deconstruction or manipulation whatsoever would save me a lot of time. But could I truly call myself a graphic designer? I suppose that’s debatable.