Articles

If I Were Running a Startup, Would I Still Hire a Designer?

I’ve devoted a lot of time writing the subject of jobs, specifically those in the creative industry. I’ve been trying to determine if generative AI a threat to graphic designers and similar professions. I’m a professor of graphic Design and I understand that job prospects are currently bleak for entry level positions, and I’m trying to prepare

Design Jobs Will Always Exist.

There will be a multi-billion dollar wave of investment into Generative AI in 2024. While much of this will go towards the training of Large Language Models and the expected paths of research, engineering, and marketing, a certain portion will always go towards design

AI Art Direction. Vegan Friendsgiving.

It’s the week before Thanksgiving, and I’ve overheard my students making plans for “Friendsgiving”, and frequently talking about vegan options. So I wanted to challenge myself (and my AI tools) with a difficult assignment. Could I get a decent art directed image that conveyed the feeling of “Vegan Friendsgiving”.

Why Usability is the Key Skill to Develop in 2024

In 2024, usability will be the key skill to develop for anyone who wants to be successful in the tech industry. As generative AI becomes more sophisticated, it will be essential for designers to understand how to create user experiences that are both easy to use and aesthetically pleasing.

Building a Brand with ChatGPT, Dalle-3, Midjourney, and Figma

I spent about eight hours over the weekend trying to build a brand using (mostly) generative AI tools. While I had some help from my conventional tools, I got pretty far with Dalle-3, Midjourney, and ChatGPT

Why designers should learn Flexbox while they're learning Figma.

However, I still teach a little HTML and CSS and treat them as building blocks akin to spelling and grammar. You cannot design for the web if you don’t understand how the web works.

28 days with Figma as my Primary Design Tool

In January of 2022 I wanted to freshen up my rusty art direction skills and design 28 beverage cans in 28 days. . Each day I would write a short creative brief or set some constraints about fonts, colors, or content. I would make a cursory statement on branding guidelines, and I would use only Figma as my primary design tool,

Why I'm Switching from Wordpress to Webflow

I’ve been building websites and teaching front-end development for the last fifteen years. For the first few years, I was pretty impressed with myself and my static HTML skills (and my table-based layouts). I didn’t really understand what a Content Management System was, but somewhere in the early twenty-tens, I realized that if I didn’t upgrade my skill set, I would rapidly become obsolete. Clients were asking for websites that they could update by themselves and I wanted to rise to that challenge.