Staying competitive in today’s market is a mandatory requirement for all working professionals, graphic design is no different. Designers have to be on top of their game if they are going to survive in this cut throat job market. A very basic and fundamental way of staying competitive is by being on top of the latest developments in your field of expertise. In other words, improve your designer knowledge.

We are highlighting 5 very simple and cost effective methods that graphic designers can use to improve themselves as expert craftsmen. So without further ado, here they are:

1.    Follow the Gurus

Graphic design is a field where self proclaimed gurus don’t last long, which is good news for the average logo designer. There are a handful of big names in the graphic design industry who are worldly renowned for their craftsmanship, vast knowledge and practical experience. People like David Sherwin, Jacob Cass and David Airey are the heavy weights of the graphic design industry; they actively post content online and share their experiences. Follow them on social media websites and learn from their experiences. It will be worthwhile.

2.    Attend Webinars

Webinars are a great source of information and can expand a designer’s knowledge. Seminars are also a great option; however they usually cost money and only take place in specific locations worldwide. Webinars are mostly free and those that do cost money tend to be very affordable. The additional benefit of attending a webinar is that you attend from the comfort of your home.

3.    Graphic Design eBooks

The internet has completely changed how we do things today, particularly when it comes to learning. Buying expensive books and hauling them back and forth seem to be a thing of the past. In comparison, graphic design eBooks are extremely cheap (if not free) and easily accessible from the internet. Plus, you can carry them around in your iPhone or via USB flash drive. There are many websites that you can download free eBooks from, which are loaded with good information.

4.    Follow Graphic Design Blogs

You will find no shortage of graphic design blogs online but not all of them provide worthwhile content. There are only a handful of good ones that have established themselves over the years as an authority platform on the subject of logo and graphic design. Subscribe to their email newsletter or follow them on Twitter and other social media sites.

5.    Affordable Design Tutorials

This is one of the best methods to not only learn new things, but also to check and recheck your existing knowledge. YouTube is one of the best places to find affordable graphic design tutorials, along with various blogs and forums that provide such info. There are many Edu channels on YouTube for graphic designers and videos available online which you can easily benefit from as well.

We hope that you will find the above given information helpful. If you are a graphic designer, you should already be practicing these methods. These approaches are meant to set you apart from the competition and give you an edge over other designers who are also competing for the same projects as you are.

As a general rule of thumb, a good graphic designer should ask as many logical questions as possible about a particular online design project. The more they know beforehand, the better off they will be in producing a concept that the client will appreciate.

The very first step is to seek answers by gathering information. An elegantly laid out design brief will take care of most of these questions. However, designers should always keep their creative trait active and inquire about subjects that may or may not be covered by the client in the project brief.

In this post, we will highlight the questions that designers should ask before entering a design project. The answers to these questions will determine the direction of your design, while broadening your knowledge arsenal.

1. Who Is the Target Audience?

Aside from design specs, having a thorough understanding of the target audience can help a designer greatly. It could give them an idea of what color schemes to utilize in their drafts (unless already specified by the client). A younger audience will respond to bright colors whereas, an older, more mature audience might be keen on sober color schemes. The target audience can greatly impact the style, content and theme of the online design contest. Therefore, it is extremely important to identify who the audience is.

2. What is the Message?

Graphic design is an art and every piece of art carries a specific message. It is absolutely imperative to know beforehand what that message should be. The message can be very simple and straight forward, from celebrating a milestone to creating a powerful brand image. The way the message is delivered is also important. Clients are likely to tell you what they want to communicate through their design. In case they haven’t, do contact them and ask about the message and feel the design should portray.

3. Are there any other Design Specifications?

Every design project will have a design brief, but sometimes it will not have everything you need and that’s normal. A good designer will take the initiative to ask questions based upon the information provided in the contest brief. For example: If it is a logo design project, a few important areas to inquire about would be:

• Background color to use.
• Color schemes for the logo.
• Tagline to go with the logo.
• Specific symbol or image to use.
• Symbols or images to avoid.
• Simple design or abstract?
• Are there any other special considerations?

4. What is the Client’s Competition?

If the client doesn’t mention their competition, there is no harm in asking about it. Looking at the competitive companies’ designs will give you an edge and help you understand the client’s business better. This way you will know what your client is up against and will be able to create a design that will stand apart from any competition.

5. Are there any Specific Instructions?

It is always helpful to get a sense of creative direction from the client themselves. Ask them about the features that they would like to see or how they want their design to be perceived. Some clients are keen on incorporating certain elements or attributes that symbolize their company, brand or product. Therefore, this particular information is extremely valuable.

If you are about to undertake a design project or are participating in an online design contest, the questions mentioned should get the ball rolling. Bottom line, you should be aware of these things when starting a project. If the design brief does not provide you this information, then ask your client. The more you know, the more likely you are to produce something dazzling that the anticipating client will surely appreciate.

Everyone loves free stuff. After all it’s free right? Well, sometimes these freebies can end up being extremely costly. Take graphic design for example. Logo designers can easily find dozens upon dozens of graphic design brushes and symbols on the internet absolutely free. They’re great. They’re fun. They make the creative process easy and save designers time. With so many advantages, it may seem like a no-brainer to use free graphic design symbols when designing professionally, right?

Wrong. In fact free graphic design symbols and brushes come with potentially career ending risks that many designers ignore, overlook or underestimate. And that is the risk of trademark infringement.

Don’t Design a Nightmare Scenario for Yourself

Trademark infringement. These are the two words that keep every graphic designer up at night. It is a scenario no designer wishes to be confronted with because even such a simple allegation can bring a designers career down tumbling.

Graphic Design Brushes – Limit Your Use

Free design brushes are NOT trademarked; meaning that anyone can use them in their designs. This is why graphic design brushes should be avoided. However, if needed, these should be used scarcely and only as a supporting element. Don’t heavily depend on them. Instead, only use them for giving slight touches or adding effects in a logo. Your overall design should be unique in every sense. Graphic design brushes can be used to provide the finishing touches (if you will) to further compliment your design.

Graphic Design Symbols – Avoid at All Cost

Brushes are one thing. Graphic design symbols are another. These should never be used. Period. Graphic design symbols come free with any licensed graphic software thereby creating a false impression among some designers that the symbols are licensed as well. This is not the case. Every graphic design software comes with the same free symbols by default. Using them is an open invitation to copyright infringement.

So What Should Logo Designers Do?

What you should be doing in the first place is to come up with your own designs, symbols and your own brushes. This will give your design drafts the one element every designer strives to achieve – uniqueness. Avoid free brushes and symbols all together. Using them can lead to a bad habit of taking short cuts and utilizing and manipulating existing design patterns to your advantage.

Graphic designers must always remember that there is no place for free symbols and brushes in professional graphic design. Designers are encouraged to browse samples, experiment with certain brushes and symbols and then come up with their own unique ones to compliment their work. Being unique is worth its weight in goal and should be second to none.

As graphic designers we are always learning new techniques, increasing our knowledge and experimenting with tools to create original designs. While creativity and attention to detail is a significant quality of a graphic designer, there is no denying that good graphic design tools also play an important part in the success of a design.

Learning a new tool or software might appear daunting to many which is why today I have for you a collection of some very useful Adobe Illustrator Tutorials. These will not only help you learn new techniques easily but also provide you with useful tips that will come in handy the next time you design.

So without further ado, here are 20 Free Adobe Illustrator Tutorials.

1. Swirls and Flourishes

2. Vintage Art Deco Poster

3. 3D Tomato Illustration

4. Western Type Treatment

5. Vector Sponge Art Effect

6. Blue Print Style Text

7. Crazy Cool Logo

8. 3D Newspaper Text Effect

9. Colorful Abstract Wavy Ribbon

10. Tracing Photo

11. Vector 3D Lighting Text

12. 3D Graphs

13. Simple Organic Shapes

14. Swirl Mania

15. Soft Water Color Brushes

16. Creating a Ribbon

17. Draw an Ornate Bell

18. Create a Perfect Diamond

19. How to Create a Starfish

20. Abstract Background

Have you created a tutorial that you would like to show off? Do share it with us!

There is a saying that if you want to be good at math, you’ve got to know your formulas. In that same context, if you want to succeed in graphic designing, you have got to know your colors. Colors are the buildings blocks of any artistic design and graphic designers must know how they work, what impact certain color schemes can have and which color combos should they use for various businesses and industries.

Being a good designer means you must be aware of color standards. These are color scales that are used for various printing and digital viewing purposes. They are known as the RGB, CMYK and Pantone color modes.

RGB – RED, GREEN, BLUE

RGB is the native color display mode of CRT monitors, LCD screens and plasma displays. Cameras and scanners also use the RGB mode. Website designs are designed in RGB. This color standard is best for designing website designs, digital images, blog templates and online brochures.

CMYK – Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Key

CMYK is a four color mode that is used especially for printout purposes. Whether it is a billboard poster, a greeting card or magazine print, all make use of CMYK colors. Black cannot be produced in RGB, and for printing, it is one of the most essential colors. The K in CMYK stands for KEY (black). This color standard is best for business cards, stationary designs, t-shirts and other marketing collateral.

PMS – Pantone Colors

Pantone colors are vibrant and solid, which makes them perfect for logo designing. In fact company policies of Logo Design Guru strongly stress that logo designers submit drafts only in Pantone color standard. This is mainly because Pantone offers true solid color which gives the flexibility to convert them into RGB or CMYK, as needed. This saves precious time and money. The best part is that colors will appear the same in print form as they do on screen.

We hope that now you have a much better understanding of colors standards. Knowing which color standard to use is one of the most fundamental steps that many graphic designers get wrong. The information mentioned above will prevent that from happening and ensure that you start every project on a positive step and in the right direction.

Aristotle, the great philosopher, once said, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence therefore is not an act but a habit.”

Graphic designers cannot attain excellence unless they develop good designing habits. Unfortunately, there are many designers out there who do not follow good designing habits and end up creating problems for their professional growth. This post highlights 13 bad habits of graphic designers. Read on and make sure you do not practice any of the following habits:

1. Reacting on Criticism: Good designers never react to criticism, be it constructive or otherwise. Bad designers take criticism personally and may even get downright rude with the client.

2. Unaware of Industry Updates: Bad graphic designers hardly know about the designing world let alone the people who make up the industry or the newest software updates and trends. If a designer is lacking in essential industry knowledge, s/he cannot be described as an innovative designer.

3. Not Sketching Designs: Professional disaster. Every graphic designer must know how to sketch at least a rough draft of the project and have a proper design process they follow.

4. Procrastinating: Procrastination is a bad habit and those who stick to this habit often come up with substandard work and are unable to meet deadlines.

5. Disorganized: Losing important details, forgetting dates, mixing up project details etc. won’t make you look good as a designer.

6. Lacking Creativity: Not bringing new ideas to the table, not learning new tricks or trying out new schemes because it requires extra effort. Using common derivative concepts is a sure sign of lack of sheer creativity. No one wants to hire such a designer!

7. Careless Attitude: Lazy graphic designers don’t care about a client’s deadlines or their project completion. They delay deadlines, give substandard work and absolutely don’t care about clients.

8. Submitting Low Quality Images: Sending clients low resolution images which are difficult to scale and impossible to enlarge. Submitting images in both vector and raster format is the right thing to do. You never know when the client might need to print the design on a different medium altogether.

9. Being Smug: One of the characteristics of bad graphic designers is that they are smug and overconfident about their work. They consider themselves the best and even charge an exorbitant price for their substandard, derivative designs.

10. Copying Work: Wannabe designers are the most active at copying concepts. They lack a creative drive which is why they prefer to copy other designer’s, claiming it as inspired art, instead of creating their own.

11. Not Using Correct Software: Bad graphic designers fail to understand the significance of using specific software for various services. For instance, they will create a logo design in Adobe Photoshop and send the client raster files.

12. Lack of Color Understanding: Designers must have a strong understanding of colors, contrasts and combinations that can appeal to the viewers. They must also know that web design templates are preferred in RGB while Pantone color standard is the best for logo design.

13. Being Unprofessional: When dealing with clients, being professional is necessary. This includes using a formal language rather than using slang. Designers who practice an informal code of conduct harm their reputation and gain popularity as being unprofessional.

Unintentional mistakes are forgivable, but continually practicing these poor habits makes you a bad designer and bad graphic designers are NOT allowed anywhere in the professional world!

Ever had one of those days when it seems impossible to do anything productive? Ever felt completely down in the dumps and failed to come up with the simplest of solutions? If you are suffering from symptoms similar to these then don’t fret, it’s nothing uncommon – You are simply down on your Mojo.

If you are a graphic designer experiencing creative loss, there is good news! It’s temporary and you can get your mojo back. Here are some tips and tricks that will help you get back on track.

1. Breathe – Now Get Up and Take a Walk!

You can’t get your creative mojo back by sitting and staring at the computer screen. Once you realize that you are facing a creative block you need to do something refreshing to overcome it. Many designers tend to go into denial and force themselves to work on a project. If your creative juices aren’t flowing, let it be! Get up, shake yourself, put on your shoes and go out for a walk. Wander around your city for hour or two. Sometimes vigorous exercise helps too.

2. Relax – Grab Your Pillow and Sleep

If walking doesn’t work then simply shut down your computer, switch off that loud TV and take off the thundering headphones. Staying away from the digital demons sometimes helps take a load off of your mind. Opt for a good and relaxing sleep instead. You will wake up refreshed and perhaps even calmer. The main idea is to let your mind move away from work for some time and sleep is one of the best ways to do it.

3. Identify Triggers – Deal with Stress

You cannot relax if you don’t deal with the triggers that cause you to stress and keep you from working properly. Most of the times, our personal problems and conflicts are the reasons behind a creative mojo loss. Could it be a recent breakup, a conflict with someone close, a failed exam, a lost project or even a dissatisfied client or job? Any of these can trigger a block.

4. Hang Out – Go See Fun People

The best thing to do when you are low on your mojo is to find people who can motivate you without adding to your depression. Spend time with fun people (be it family or friends) go watch a movie, enjoy a drink, or just relax – it won’t be long till you have your groove back.

5. Believe – Trust Yourself and Your Abilities

Just because you have had a few ups and downs lately doesn’t mean that you are a failure. You need to believe in yourself and in the fact that no one is perfect. Trust in your abilities and know that you can handle the problematic issues of your life without losing your self confidence. This will help you take a breather for a while.

Take it Easy – The next time you lose your creative mojo, don’t panic. Take a few days break from designing and just relax. Most of the time a mojo loss is just your mind’s way of asking you to take a well deserved break. You need to understand that a creative block is just a bad phase which will evaporate if you let your mind off work for a while. Look at your loss of mojo as a temporary blessing in disguise. You get time to enjoy and do things which you would not have done otherwise!

What helps you get your Creative Mojo back? Share your story with us.