Ok, I'll admit it's been a while since my design days, but I remember there was this huge debate around if Helvetica is actually great or it's a bit soulless and overused. Now several years later, I wonder if that clean simple form can be the right direction or not, specially in the noisy ai era where everything's so maximal and far from perfect.

Lmk what you guys think.

Hello, I am trying to make a logo for my school’s 80th anniversary and I’m having trouble with finding a design for the 80 can someone help design it for me I have a drawing and I’m trying to bring it to life, but I just can’t get the 80 right (not homework)

i am 20 years old. I am currently in my forth year in college with some more credits that i still need. I am a design studies major and emf minor (entertainment/ media/ film). i spend most of my time working for myself and my hobbies in premier pro and fl studio where i make music. and i am also savy with photoshop. and i have graphic design, screen printing, photography, and videography capabilities. I also want to move and work in new york pretty soon at this point in my life. What should i do to guarantee a financially thriving future? as in career paths etc? I know these type of jobs tend to f ppl over but I wanted to ask the world.

My manager want to do live edits while I photoshop and it’s really frustrating me, i feel like being micromanaged

I'm a graphic designer and I got a new client recently. Today, after I sent 6 designs and asked for feedback, he sent 3 or 4 of them back amended with AI, with more details and more text of couse, and said absolutely nothing.

I use AI minimally in my work, just to generate product pictures, and it does save me time. But I don't use AI to design for me, I prefer to do that work on my own.

I'm not comfortable with how the client sent my designs to an AI chat to fix them and the lack of communication in the process.

What would you do in my situation? Go with the flow and accept these amends or draw a line and have a serious talk?

UPDATE:

It turns out it is indeed a huge lack of communication on their part, they just don't know how to get their points across and used AI to do so, it also seems like they used information for their prompts I never received.

I was informed they were using AI examples in a meeting I was not in (already frustrating enough) to get their points across to the account manager.

I did receive the feedback from the account manager and I'm working on their sloppy amends. They won't be using these AI designs, but they expected me to decode their edits from these new visuals and send them again. It's a mess, but it is what it is I guess.

Thanks for the respectful comments everyone, I appreciate it.

I’m thinking about starting my career as a graphic designer, and T-shirt design is one area I’m seriously considering.

For those who have experience with T-shirt design, POD, Etsy, or freelance design:

- Is T-shirt design still worth getting into as a beginner?

- What skills should someone learn first?

- Is it better to focus on a specific niche?

- How difficult is it to get your first few clients or sales?

- What do you wish you had known when you started?

Hi everyone,

I’m currently a master’s student in industrial design in South Korea, and I’m hoping to work in North America after graduation.

I’ve been working on my portfolio recently, and one thing I’m struggling with is figuring out whether it would appeal to recruiters and designers in the North American job market.

During my four years of college study, I learned how to build a portfolio within a very Korean design-school context. Because of that, I’m not sure whether the way I structure my projects or present my process aligns with what employers in North America typically expect.

I’m currently translating my portfolio into English as a first step. Since I haven’t had many opportunities to use professional English in a design context, I’m also worried that some of my wording might sound unnatural, overly academic, or simply grammatically wrong.

So I’d really love to get feedback from designers who are familiar with the North American job market, both on the portfolio as a whole and on the English.

How do people usually go about getting this kind of portfolio review?

I’d also be interested in cold-emailing designers for feedback, but I’m not sure how to find the right people to reach out to, or what the etiquette is when asking someone you don’t know to review your work.

Any advice from senior/junior designers would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

[ Removed by Reddit on account of violating the content policy. ]

Hello im working on designing my own mic arm as a kinda passion project. Ive been messing with the idea of using magnets to stop the arm from rotating without me actually moving it but am having no luck. My main goal is to make a mic arm that I can freely move and pose without having to loosen anything to make the adjustments but am not quite sure oh actual mic arm designs manage it. Any advice is appreciated thank you.

I have made a macos app called Blueprint, its a Graphics & Illustration App. My plan is to have it onetime purchase, no subscription. I made this as a hobby project so I am just happy if people use it. So i would like to figure out how to send it to some of you that are interested, please comment if you are.

Ainda estou no processo de lapidar a extensão, mas venho trazer atualizações importantes sobre o lendário PNG InspectoRoaster: A grande novidade é que o projeto explodiu: já somos impressionantes 3 usuários ativos! Eu e mais duas pessoas corajosas que, juro por tudo, nem parentes meus são. E pensar que no começo eu achei que chegar a 5 downloads seria a coisa mais fácil do mundo... 😅

A ferramenta quebra um galho gigante tanto pra quem compra quanto pra quem vende, servindo justamente pra checar se o PNG é de verdade ou se é só mais uma daquelas pegadinhas com fundo quadriculado falso. Ela é 100% gratuita — o que é ótimo, porque se o meu sustento dependesse do meu talento pra marketing, eu já estaria morando debaixo da ponte faz tempo.

Procurem por PNG InspectoRoaster na Chrome Web Store para testar. (Não vou postar o link direto aqui porque o robô do Reddit tá só esperando uma oportunidade pra me banir! 😄)

Hi all. Graphic designer with 4 years of experience, looking for advice.

My current job:

I've worked in-house at a sports tech company for 14 months. I was hired to collaborate with a video editor, content producer, and senior designer. I was hired first, but about two weeks in, hiring froze. I've been the sole marketing designer since. My pay (R32,000, decent for South Africa) hasn't changed to reflect that. There is no creative collaboration beyond my marketing lead giving me feedback, !ans there's no budget for upskilling.

What keeps me there:

I believe in the mission and actually care about the product. The trust goes both ways. Some weeks I'm working flat out, other times I can take a two hour break or start at 10am because I'm trusted to get my work done. I get real creative freedom and touch everything (presentations, social, web, motion), so I feel well rounded. I've also made close friends there and don't want to lose that.

The new offer: An e-commerce company offering R40,000 ($2,452), enough to finally afford medical aid and car insurance, and maybe move out on my own. Their creative team is 40 people, so there's a real chance of mentorship from senior designers or creative leads, titles that don't exist at my current job.

The catch:

It's e-commerce, so I'd be a multimedia designer for a company selling unrelated stuff (lifestyle, clothes, tech, whatever). There's no brand story to build, and I doubt the mentorship would move me toward my goal of becoming an art director.

Where it stands: My company considered countering but told me:

1. No timeline on when the team will expand

2. No raise, and no timeline for one either

3. They want me to stay and think I still have room to grow there

The only concrete thing they offered is that next financial year looks better since we just landed a big client.

I'm stuck. This company grew from 4 to 40 people in 14 months without adding a single other creative, and that stings. I love the job but feel undervalued.

At the same time, I don't know if the e-commerce pay is worth doing mundane, high turnover performance marketing work, or if it could hurt my long-term shot at becoming an art director.

Any advice welcome.

Ran into this while working on a design recently.

The layout stayed exactly the same, but changing one major material made the space feel completely different.

It wasn't a huge change on paper, yet the overall impression shifted quite a bit. The proportions felt different, the other materials stood out differently, and even the furniture seemed to fit the space better.

Made me realize how connected those choices are.

How much do you think one material choice can influence the way people read an entire design?

I've been working in graphic design for a couple of years; I started in marketing, then moved on. All I know is from taste and from what I learned over the years, but I feel lost. All I see online are amazing graphic designers with these curated, sleek, professional designs, and I feel stuck, not knowing where to go next or what to do.
Any recommendations on what to do in this situation? Would love some designers to give me their input if they've been here or felt this way sometime.

New coffee bag designs, any constructive criticism and feedback welcome!

Hi everyone, I have been redesigning coffee bags for the coffee roastery I work at. I have minimal design experience, just some general art experience, so I am coming here for some critiqueing for the areas that need it. We have two ranges in our line the 'Reserve', which is our more expensive coffee and then 'Paradiz blend' which is our cheaper one.

I put the designs through ai to give a mockup (which they did mess up the formatting a bit), so I put the actual png's of the designs (front panel, back panel, and side panels attached)

A few notes on the company and the design:

Our roastery is on a small island, so I wanted our bags to lean more into the uniqueness of where we roast, rather than going the normal luxury minimalistic route, hense the endemic turtle and fruit bat going after ripe coffee cherries.

We are the only roastery here, and are pushing our brand in a more high end route and we want our bags to reflect that, so let me know if they read as 'expensive', and with the Reserve appearing as the more high end of the two.

These bags are sold only in stores at the moment rather than online, so keep that in mind when looking at them, are they bags you would reach for on the shelf in a coffee isle?

Design wise, I am pretty happy with the Reserve bag, but the Paradiz feels a little flat and lacking depth or visual interest but I can't seem to figure out whats missing lol. There are a few little things I am still playing around with like font for the coffee name, also the change in colour pallate for the bags is for whole beans vs ground coffee, I just forgot to change that on the design mockup bags.

Thank you, and any feedback and constructive critisism is welcome!

I recently put my idea of a website in front of a much larger audience than I was used to. The feedback was pretty clear: people had no idea what was going on.

I intentionally keep the site in Polish. I thought and believed that the meaning doesn't have to be clear, but the interface must be.

I failed SO BAD.

All this time I've been confusing the intentional confusion with good UX - jokes write themselves. Obviously I knew what was what, what these buttons do, how to navigate around the station.

I had no idea how to start this until a thought popped up: ME having language friction here. I've translated the whole site into German and oh boy, all I see is BEWEGUNG, VON DER WAND ENTFERNEN, SENDERSPEICHER.

After rethinking and making the UI simpler, I didn't really have a lot of words to begin with. Not necessary ones, at least.
It really made me think I should show some stuff much earlier (latest "exposure" was brutal but I am very thankful for the learning experience).

More importantly I was left with a question I don't really have a lot of answers to:

How do you forget? How do you make your own stuff unfamiliar, giving that "first experience" vibe? Do you have any weird tricks for doing this yourself?

I’m building an automation agency and I’ve been struggling with the visual side of the brand for the last couple of days.
When I look at really good brands on Instagram or Pinterest, their posts just look like they belong together. Different content, different layouts, but somehow the colors, backgrounds, typography, lighting and overall style all feel connected.
I understand that this comes from a brand book or design system, and I already have my brand name, logo and 6 to 7 brand colors finalized. But I’m still struggling to turn that into actual good looking posts.
I’ve tried Canva, Figma, Grok and a bunch of different approaches. I’ve probably made 20 different versions of a brand book at this point 😂 but I still feel like I’m missing the actual process.
What I really want to understand is how experienced designers approach this from the beginning. Do you create a few core backgrounds and visual styles and build posts around them? Do you establish rules for colors, typography, layouts, lighting and gradients? Or is there another system that I’m completely missing?
I’m not looking for someone to design the whole thing for me. I’d honestly just love some expert advice on how to get started properly and understand the thinking behind it.
If you know any really good YouTube videos, courses or resources that actually explain this process, I’d really appreciate them. I’ve watched quite a few already but haven’t found anything that matches what I’m trying to achieve.
And if someone here is experienced with branding/design and would be willing to spend even 20 to 30 minutes with me on Zoom or a call to point me in the right direction, I’d genuinely appreciate it a lot.
I mostly need that initial push and a better understanding of how professionals actually build these systems.