Annoying Requests A Designer Gets
Original post is on Zarget
As a present-day designer, I have learnt that creative freedom comes hand in hand with annoying design requests and suggestions. We designers understand that it is quite common that everyone is intrigued by design and requests can come in different shapes and sizes. Communicating your ideas and thoughts to your designer while briefing them is not a bad thing, but there are certain awkward conversations that take place between designers and their clients, usually non-designers. These are very often, pure gibberish.
Here is a compilation of some of the most annoying requests to designers. Let’s take a light-hearted look at these cringe-worthy requests and suggestions.
“Can you make the logo bigger and brighter? A little more… A little more…”
Bigger the better works well only in some cases. In any design, the logo is an important part of it and the design of the logo as such, adds credibility to your website, but whoever said that how big the logo is matters, was wrong. Massive logos that stand out from the design can be overshadowing and cheap. So the next time you think of bugging your designer to make the logo oversized, remember that the best logos are the ones that are simple, small and can be accommodated in the design with ease.
“I like it. But it’s missing the WOW factor!”
It’s beyond the scope of the designer to read your mind and understand what you mean by ‘The wow factor’. While it’s alright to have high expectations for how you would like the design to be , keep in mind that vague feedback doesn’t help. And it is really annoying to hear statements like “make it pop” or “I’ll know it when i see it” . To turn an ordinary design into that impressive, extraordinary one that you want, be specific about the “and then some more” you want us to add. And remember the more specific your suggestions are, the better, always.
“Thanks for sending along Final_final_v5.jpg. Here’s the list of final changes. It’ll take only a few minutes.”
It is important that you respect your designer’s time and schedule. And It’s never a good practice to put your designer in that ‘unlimited changes’ loop by bombarding them with design requests. Because not many changes can be minor or quick, and quick fixes almost always don’t work. A lot of time and effort is put in a single change, so be reasonable and limit the number of revisions, keeping in mind that the designer doesn’t feel like a workhorse.
“I don’t have the content ready yet. Can you design it first?”
There is an enormous difference between building a design with ‘lorem ipsum’ and designing with the real content. Before starting the design a designer needs to have the actual content, only then he can bring a coherence between all the elements that constitute your design and put forth a pretty looking design. Without knowing the text that goes into the design , the designer cannot possibly know what to design. It is always best that content should drive design and your design should revolve around the content. Jumping the gun and beginning the design before the content is ready can be an expensive mistake. It would end up a mess. So the mantra should be “Content before design requests“.
“On second thought, an Elephant would be better. Take your time, but finish it tomorrow!”
Change is inevitable and any designer is okay with making changes and throwing a few fixes here and there but changing the full design is every designer’s nightmare. Most designers work on multiple designs at the same time, and sadly designers are not minions, so you can’t expect your design in the anticipated time if you impose last minute re-designs. If you really need to get the design out on time, then asking your designer to pull off a last minute entire re-design is unreasonable.
“Studies show including images of Cats can increase the response rate. Can you add a cute one?”
We human beings, are visual animals and we judge every book by its cover. Irrelevant images in your design give a misleading notion about the design. It is important that every image is aligned properly with the purpose of your design. The last thing we need is people laughing at us for the pointless choice of images.
“Can you photoshop and make me look like Kylie Jenner?”
When mastering photoshop, designers did not sign up for drastically changing the way someone looks. Removing hair fly-aways across your face or eliminating random background audiences from your images is one thing but design requests to add abs or any other unrealistic beautifications are more than annoying. Before making these bizarre requests, take a look around the web and you can see photoshop backfires all over the internet.
I’m quite sure every designer out there would have got ridiculous requests and it is never ending. Add your own stories of annoyingly dumb requests in the comments section below.