JD Photography

I feel most humans are creatures of habit. We go about our daily business like a merry-go-round. We continue in circles because it’s comfortable.

Working in a creative field it’s easy to fall prey to comfort. Doing something that works and repeating. It’s complacent and often becomes boring.

In the book White Space is Not Your Enemy by Kim Golombisky and Rebecca Hagen they highlight 13 amateur errors. They are, “Things that blink. Incessantly, warped photos, naked photos, bulky borders & boxes, cheated margins, centering everything, 4 corners & clutter, trapped negative space, busy backgrounds, tacky type emphasis: reversing, stroking, using all caps & underlining, bad bullets, widows & orphans, justified rivers.”

Here, I must ask for forgiveness because I am a habitual user of all 13 design sins. The first step in any rehabilitation is to admit you have a problem.

I have a problem.

I have improved over time with some familiarity with the software. I’m proud to say I no longer warp photos. Naked photos on the other hand, I’m still in denial about those. I’m sure I’ve made that mistake, but I won’t admit it, yet.

I digress, this is not a confessional for the atonement of my design sins, this is about getting better, improving my creativity, and making quality designs. One baby step at a time.

In Graphic Design For Everyone, Cath Caldwell writes, “White space can make a powerful statement, exuding confidence and authority. It is often associated with luxury – think of the way some high-end restaurants present food arranged at the center of a huge, white plate.”

One of my constant battles is, my desire to fill the page with content. I force too many elements and don’t let the white space work it’s magic.

“White space doesn’t have to be white – the term refers to the room that is deliberately left with the blocks of text, between design elements, or around the margins of a page. Master the use of space, and your designs will both look more professional and work better,” writes Caldwell.

Back to my jumbled mess of design sinfulness, I wasn’t in control of the information. The information controlled me.

Caldwell writes, “The designer’s role is to take a jumble of information and organize it so that it’s easy to understand. Hierarchy – showing the relative importance of different elements – plays a key role in achieving that goal.”

I’ve learned there are three levels to ranking text. Level 1 is most important (kind of obvious). Level 2 is more like a subheading but needs to grab the audience into reading the main text. Level 3 is the main text and the balance is to make this body readable while fitting in the space of the design.

There is so much in designing that I often feel overwhelmed by all the options. Do I do this or do I use that? Serif or san serif? It makes my head spin. What I know is I am adding tools that make me a better designer. I’m not at a level of top tier designers, but I am slowing becoming a better designer.