Graphic Design AKA Telephone
Graphic Design can be a complicated process. When a graphic designer builds a small business logo, it is like playing a game of telephone, nine times out of ten you don’t get back the same thing you asked for. The company usually has a design already built in their head and wants the graphic designer to make it the exact same. This makes communication a very important part of graphic design. In order for the colors, shapes, and text to be the correct unique design that the company has drawn up inside their head, they need to be very clear and descriptive.
Be Very Descriptive
One assignment that I did in a Digital Marketing class that I am taking, acted as a great example of the importance of communication. We were put into groups of two and had a random flier given to each of us. We then had to describe our flier to our partner, purely through email, trying to get them to create an identical flier to the one we were given. It was a very complicated and frustrating process. I started out by simply explaining the flier very vaguely but I quickly realized that this wasn’t going to work. I decided that I needed to be very specific and give every fact I could about my flier. I worked from the top down giving her the hex code for the colors, the text size and font, and even told my partner how far down and to the right the text box was positioned on my paper. This made it so all she had to do was type in whatever I told her to. When it was time for me to make her flier, she did the same thing as me describing everything she could about her flier. This made it easy for me to copy her flier almost to perfection.
Use Examples
When it came to the text part of the flier, it was easy, but that hard part was the background and objects in the flier that weren’t text. I wasn’t sure how to get my partner to recreate some of the stuff on my flier, so I asked my instructor how to help. He gave me the idea of using examples. This is an amazing tool for communicating what you would like your final product to look like. On her flier were ghosts with party hats that I had no idea what they looked like, so I asked for a few examples. She sent me ghosts that she found on the internet that were almost identical to the ones on her flier. It made the complicated process easy and was a tool that we used often.
Constantly Check The Design
Only a couple years ago, my dad created a brand called Dirt Gear Co. He is constantly having logos made that he can put onto merchandise and sell. This has given me the opportunity to see the importance of communication when hiring a graphic designer to create logos for your small business. My dad is constantly thinking of different designs that he wants to create and put on a t-shirt but he always struggles to communicate with the graphic designer exactly what he wants. Whenever he thinks of a new design he calls the graphic designer and simply tries to talk through the design that he is wanting to create. The graphic designer then tries to remember exactly what my dad asked for. The first couple times that he created the designs, he sent my dad the final product after he had spent hours creating it. When my dad would get these designs back they looked nothing like what he had envisioned them to look like. He had to break the news to the designer which caused him to have to start almost all the way over again. Since the first couple designs, the graphic designer learned to send my dad previews of what the logo was starting to look like so he could decide if he was on the right track or if he needed to switch directions. This caused the design to be closer to what my dad had envisioned in his head and caused the design to be created in half the time it took to create the first couple designs.
The First Design Is Never Perfect
After gaining graphic design experience in my digital marketing class, I have been able to create designs for Dirt Gear Co. I constantly get texts from my dad of different designs that he would like me to create. He sends me examples and tells me exactly what he wants. I work all day long on it and show it to him at the end of the day. We then talk about it and figure out what is bad and what is good with it. I then go to bed and fix the bad things the next day. It makes it a great way to create new logos quickly and get them as close to what he has in his head as possible. Very rarely am I able to get the small business logo to be perfect by the end of the first day.
Making It Easy to Create a Small Business Logo
Communication is the most important thing when it comes to working with a graphic designer. In order for the graphic designer to create what you have envisioned in your head, you need to be very clear with colors, sizes, fonts, everything. A good way to do this is to use examples and design things of your own! Without correct communication your design can turn out like it was the word in a game of telephone, nothing like you wanted it to be. Make sure that whenever you work with a graphic designer, constantly look over what he has ahead of time, and let him know what edits he needs to make before he gets too far down the road. If you do these things, you will have very few problems when working with a graphic designer and will enjoy the process of making a new logo for your small business.