Should designers Code?

There is a big question in the design world at the moment as to whether or not designers, as a standard should be able to code web pages as well as design them or not. The problem is, to reach a level of knowledge in webdesign where you could build anything a client wanted, would take about 1 or two years depending on how computer savvy you are. While it only takes about 6 months to pick up and be able to build an entire website from scratch. To turn that into a commercially viable trade is another thing. The main problem being how quickly it can be done.

Web development, from my experience is full of small hic-ups and problems, that for the inexperienced can take hours to solve. So in a sense until you become experienced in coding, being able to build  a website from square one just isn't enough.

Does that mean designers shouldn't code?
Definitely not! To have a designer that has the knowledge to build a website is highly advantageous, even if they cannot build one quick enough to make any money from it. The reason for this is that even if the designer doesn't even get to touch the coding side of the story, knowing how the things are put together is vital when it comes to actually designing the things.

So in your spare time in the next six months, learn it.

Presenting information

One part of being a graphic design is being able to pitch your ideas and roughs to other people, over the years this has been done using various programs in various ways. However we've all been on the pointy side of the not so exciting presentations. You know...that presentation that has 30 slides of a word for word run down of what the presenter is telling you. While browsing various blogs, I came across this great video about giving a good presentation. His name is Garr Reynolds and he works for Google. Take a look.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZ2vtQCESpk

Another revolutionary step in presentations is online slide services offered by a few companies now...

Slide rocket is one of these and I believe this holds the key to the future of presentations and how they are moving forward.                  http://www.sliderocket.com/

"SlideRocket stores all your presentations and related assets in one place so you and your colleagues always have the latest and greatest assets. When you make changes to an asset, everyone else sees those changes and has access to them, immediately. And with version control you have a complete history of those changes and can roll back to a previous version any time." - www.sliderocket.com

Minimalist photography

There is something quite brilliant about minimalist photography. The idea that in the majority of situations, that less is more applies to photography as well. Although arguably there is just as much visual interest in a complex photo too. One of the things that makes minimalist photography so good, is that the large amounts of negative space really gives the eye only one option, that is, to zero in on the subject of the photo. To see what im going on about take a look at this... http://abduzeedo.com/excellent-minimalist-photography

Abduzeedo is an amazing creative design blog bringing hundreds of inspiring images everyday onto the web. If you don't already visit this website on a regular basis...do it.