North Rockies Design

We’ve all heard the interview process of a small child: Why this? Why that? Why? Why? Why? But, what does asking “why” have to do with design? Simple: everything. Now that I have your attention, I’ll give the not-so-simple-yet-still-fairly-simple answer.

I recently watched a talk on ted.com from Simon Sinek. The premise of his message is that we all do whatever it is we do backwards. He defines the “golden circle” of leadership and communication wherein we typically know what we do. Some of us know how we do it, and very few know why we do it. The problem is that we should instead figure out why we do what we do, then develop how we can convey why that matters into what we do to accomplish our purposes.

This got me thinking. Do I know what I’m doing? Yes, easy, I design things. Great, I fit in with the rest of the world. Do I know how I do it? Yes, I think I do. I strive to perfectly meet the needs of my clients, be fair and honest about what works, what does not. I follow certain guidelines and procedures when coding, shooting, editing, etc. Great, I fit into the elite category of those that know how.

Why do I design?

That one caused me to ponder a bit more. I design for a paycheck. Ah, but as Simon pointed out, that’s a result. I design to accomplish some marketing purpose for a product, person or idea. Oh, don’t I just sound like the happy little cog now? Hmm, need more meaning to why I do it. Then I realized it. I’ve been drawing since I was four. I’ve been interested in design since I was young too. I wanted to design my own car when I was sixteen. I’ve wanted to create my own clothing line, home plans, T-shirts, swords, guns. You name it, I’ve probably wanted to design my own. I just like design. I like the process of coming up with something original, following plans, or just “freestyle” to see what I can come up with. I like taking the plan and putting it into action. Whether it’s building a website or a Hummer replica.

I like website design because of its power to reach a worldwide audience. I like graphic design because I like to give an abstract idea or message some tangible mode to accomplish a desired purpose. So, now that I’ve discovered why I design, what to do now?

Moving Forward

If you are like me, you can’t merely be satisfied with focusing on one aspect of design. I mean, there are dozens of completely different design fields: culinary design, interior design, graphic design, website design, UX design, industrial design, instructional design, engineering design. What if I like them all? What if I know how to do something of each area? How do I make a career of it? Or is it merely, I have a bunch of hobbies?

Thomas Edison said, “If we did all things we are capable of doing, we would literally astonish ourselves.” I’m reaching a point in my life where I have the realization that I can’t do all that I want to do, either for reasons of time or money involved. But, can I do all things I am capable of doing? Does the answer lie in the area of specializing in something?

This post just leaves more questions than it answers. I guess I’ll end here for the sake of leaving some self-induced confusion for another day.

Popularity: 28% [?]

So you’re starting a design career, and you’d like to know what to specialize in. Stop right there! That’s got to be the quickest way to guarantee your own defeat. I don’t know how many times I’ve been working with someone just starting out, and they say, “I only do book jackets,” or “don’t ask me to design websites.” To me it sounds like they’re saying, “I don’t ever want to learn, grow, be better, or make more money!”

My first “design” job while still in school was working for a company in St. Paul, MN, that published magazines full of home plans. I helped with layout work a little, but mostly, I just used the eraser tool in Photoshop 4–I know that dates me, but I’m OK with it–to clean up dust and smudges on hires black-and-white scans of plans, elevations, and artists renderings. There were times I thought I could fall asleep doing that! But I persevered and I’m now grateful for the attention to detail that first job taught me.

My next “design” job was in Denver, CO, working for a company that did websites and specialized in multimedia CD-Roms. It was while employed there that I got my first freelance job converting annual reports from print to web version for Barker Design, Inc. The combination of print, website, and multimedia design work really expanded my options later, and taught me some principles of design that could translate from one medium to another–and just as importantly, what could not!

Why try new stuff?

The first reason to try new stuff: you don’t know what you don’t know. Let’s pretend that I had stopped with that first job, doing image clean-up for the home plans company. I had a good skillset in print work, and an eye for detail. I could have worked in print forever for say magazines, newspapers, or doing brochures and flyers. Back in 1996, the Internet had just started picking up steam, blogging was a dream at best, and video on the web would have been mocked to scorn. I could have stayed in Printville forever…until the newspapers and magazines started going digital. I didn’t know I could have lost my job/career/skillset to obsolescence.

Too many people have an unwillingness to learn. In this industry–or any field for that matter–you’ve got to be willing to learn from everything. Have you ever had someone ask you, “How do I do [insert basic computer task],” and you could answer, and therefore teach, because you took the time previously to learn? Have you ever needed another’s opinion to help solidify something you already thought but were a little fuzzy on some detail or another? I think you’re already in the learning mode, else why would you be reading this?

I’ll draw from personal experience to illustrate the point. I was working for I.E. Productions as a multimedia designer back in the days of doing CD-Roms for sales presentations. Gary Stewart, partner and Creative Director, asked me if I’d ever done motion design for commercials before. I said no, but I can learn. I immediately installed the copy of After Effects 3.1 on my personal laptop and began playing with it in my off-hours. I worked on the graphics for my first commercial within a month, and within a year I helped work on a spot that received a Silver Rockie award, doing all the post in After Effects.

When to start thinking about specializing

Now that I’ve convinced you to stay away from specializing when you start out designing, you’re probably asking yourself, “Is there a good time to start specializing?” The short answer is yes. It has to be the right timing, and circumstances. In my experience, I have had times where I had to specialize for a while. But there are a few things to remember when choosing a specialty.

Start broad, like I’ve been telling you so far. This will help you more than you can imagine once you pick something to specialize in. You’ll have alternate perspectives to draw from. You’ll be able to talk the lingo of those with whom you’ll be dealing on other parts of the project. You might just have a better or faster process developed for something completely different that you can bring into your specialty. For example, my hobby of metalwork helped me when planning to design a moving entry gate for ranch property developer Monviso. I was able to draw from experience with tensile strength, combining diverse metals, and structural mass for the steel and aluminum gate.

I’m not suggesting that waiting to specialize should make you a “Jack/Jill-of-all-trades, master-of-none.” Nothing could be further from the truth. It would be a terrible waste of your time and energies if, in your attempt to build a broad base, you become fodder for the handicapper general a la Harrison Bergeron. No, get a good base. Then build on it. Learn from others’ mistakes. Build on successes. Become a “Jack/Jill-of-all-trades, master of at least one!”

Keep your options open

Yes, I just suggested you master at least one trade. If you’ve some sense about yourself, you’ll find something relating to your first specialty, or in line with the process of your craft. Look, if I were designing cars for a living, I’d want to learn a little more about engines, drivetrains, etc. Then I’d be more prepared to not only design cool cars that could actually be built, but I’d know how to minimize costs and maximize performance. Job security.

Never settle into the “I only do” rut. How much more majestic is a mountain range, than a sole peak. When you do specialize, make sure you’ve got solid footing in other areas that you may build a mountain range of abilities. Look at Leonardo Da Vinci. He did it all from painting, to sculpture, to engineering. Be like him! There’s a quote I like from The Last Samurai. Tom Cruise’s character, Nathan Algren, is observing the Samurai people he is living with and makes the comment: “From the moment they awake, they devote themselves to the perfection of whatever they pursue.” He’s talking about the way they discipline themselves in not just their training, but also cooking and gardening.

Finally, once you’ve decided on a specialty, realize that you’ll probably change your specialty before you retire. It has been said that our generation will have at least five different careers–not jobs or employers–before we retire. With the amount of effort it takes to start a new career, you’ll be much better prepared if you start with a broad base, specialize in one or two things, and when necessary, jump from one to the other as a career. You won’t want to reach that point and have to start all over in something completely different.

Popularity: 10% [?]

“Education is advertising a specific viewpoint to a specific target audience to influence a desired outcome. Advertising is educating a specific target audience about a specific product or service to influence a desired outcome.” I’ve said this many times when asked why, after years of work in advertising design, I would choose a Masters of Education degree in Instructional Technology. To me, it seems like the next logical step in my career. I’ve always wanted to teach, to include my technology and design background in the discussion, and to improve existing educational outlets.

What is advertising?

Advertising can be defined as what we say about some product, service, or idea to get someone to make the choice we want them to make. While most traditional definitions focus solely on the nonpersonal communication media of advertising, I’m going to lump in everything including “word-of-mouth” advertising and personal sales pitches. Why? Well, it fits my purpose to relate it to education because education usually involves face-to-face contact supported by various media.

What is education?

This, to me, is a little harder to define. I’ll include the definition from Webster’s online: “to train by formal instruction and supervised practice especially in a skill, trade, or profession.” But to tie education to strict formal settings seems to limit it unnecessarily. In today’s world of the Internet, social networks, and web-enabled devices, I’ll add education as a construct to any situation where learning can occur. For example, part of my education in advertising design has included self-paced trial-and-error working through projects on my own, looking at others’ work as case studies, and reading up on trends and ideas through online blogs.

If education includes media and social networking outlets, the formality of the instruction and practice gets thrown out of the definition. In my education I’ve gone to blogs, news sites, critiqued completed ads or campaigns, and the like. It’s not a question of whether the blogger, creative person, or advertiser had the intended purpose to educate me. It becomes a question of whether I can learn from other’s ideas, successes, and mistakes. Education is personal. Why not look at it in a sense of how one becomes educated?

Education = Advertising

How can we use principles and techniques of advertising to enhance education, and vice versa? I’ll start with a look at something as simple as the television commercial, the 30 or 60 second spot, as a model for topic introduction in a lesson.

Anatomy of a TV commercial

A successful television commercial will effectively and concisely convey a message to a segment of the public called a target audience. The intended outcome of the communication is for that audience to understand the message and then comply with the call to action presented in the commercial. The underlying outcome of the communication is for that audience to become further educated in regard to the product, service, or idea presented in the commercial, along with any implied or suggested messages accompanying that message. These may be emotional ties to the brand, rationality to the how, when, or why of the message. The ad is merely a piece of educational material wrapped up in some persuasive message.

There is actually a formula or format by which all ads should be created. It’s called the AIDCA (alternately, AICDA) format. The acronym stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, Credibility, and call to Action. As you study advertising design, you’ll come into contact with this format and start to recognize which parts of the formula are present in a given advertisement.

• Attention – The advertisement will attempt to get the audience’s attention. This may take the majority of the ad, or, if strong enough, it will hit and stick with as the ad maneuvers into the other aspects of the formula.
• Interest – This may be tied into Attention, but it further retains the attention. Interest is not equivalent to Attention. For example, a car accident might get one’s attention but not necessarily interest, if one turns away from it to avoid becoming part of the accident.
• Desire – This is what develops if the advertiser has successfully kept the Interest of the viewer. Desire begins to tie the viewer to the subject matter, to the brand or product.
• Credibility – Credibility solidifies resolve in the audience. If one feels one can trust the advertiser, one is more likely to buy in to the intended outcome.
• call to Action – The intended outcome of the commercial. This may be communicated outright – “Buy now!”, or implied “Choosy mom’s choose Jif”. Without a clear, unmuddied call to Action, a commercial will fail.

With the understanding of the AIDCA formula, teachers would be better prepared to introduce a new topic of instruction. Yes, but give me an example. OK.

Welcome to my class today third-graders. Today we’re going to start something that you’ll use for the rest of your lives. It is a practice that has been handed down for generations. It will increase the speed with which you can write to your friends. It’s artistic and fun! Who wants to know what it is?! Yeah! OK, get your pencils and paper ready, because today you are going to start writing in cursive!

Did you see all the pieces? Do you think it would be successful in motivating at least the start on learning cursive? Now, its all up to the teacher to keep the motivation. The only tough part–easy for me to say of course, since it’s a whole field of study–is the research to know what will get the viewer/student’s Attention, how to develop Interest into Desire, establish Credibility, and then what specific call to Action will work to get the student/viewer to do what one wants them to do. I leave that up to you.

Get out there and start advertising and educating!

Popularity: 23% [?]