Liquidicity has a nice post with many tips to become a better designer (maybe too many?). I just want to point out those I find particularly relevant. Please read his post, because many other of his tricks are of course valuable.

  • Use a sketchbook: This one you probably heard if you went to a design school. Graphic design teachers can not even imagine working without sketches before getting on the computer, younger designers often hate to grab a sketchbook before sitting in front of the screen. Well, for trying both solutions, I think that the older folks were right, pen and paper help to be creative.
  • Save your repeated actions: Experience will teach this to all the young designers around. Learning to love scripts and automated actions might save you.
  • Simplify: “Perfection is not when there is nothing to add but when there is nothing to take out.” This quote by St-Exupery says it all. Designers, print it and stick somewhere in your working space.
  • Buy a new computer: Don’t be cheap, the money you invest in you computer (or RAM) is worth the productivity bump, really.
  • Proof read: Do it, or you’ll look dumb in front of your customers, but do it seriously, read like every word in the document is wrong.

What about you? What are the things you learned that made you a better designer?

About the Author

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Mirko Humbert

Mirko Humbert is the editor-in-chief and main author of Designer Daily and Typography Daily. He is also a graphic designer and the founder of WP Expert.