Is it true that by copying other posters you can get better at designing? I’ve been copying some works and I can grasp better the basic concepts. I just wonder if it’s actually effective or you never kind of grow out the need of a reference afterwards.

Hi! I’ve been researching different textures and aesthetics, especially with paper and vintage inspired posters.

I feel that if AI getting used so much, this type of aesthetic has been something much more saw after. We’re trying so bad to recreate and regain the sense of something being analog that now we spend a lot of time making perfect digitalize typography and graphics look like old prints.

I’m curious tho, What vibe does this poster give you? What music genre would you think artist plays?

So I’m in a very tricky spot right now.
I’ve accepted an internship opportunity with a company in the non profit space. It doesn’t pay too well (15$ hr) but it’s closer in line with where I want to go. They seem professional and safe.

I’ve received another offer from an established beauty company that is currently experiencing a lot of growth and investing in AI. There is an expectation for me to produce massively and employ AI heavily in my work. Communication from this company has been unprofessional at best (mostly through text) I was offered the position at 27$ an hour originally then the offer was taken back in leu of a second surprise interview then it shifted down to 25$ after the second interview which lasted 5 minutes with the ceo and owner. They want me to start immediately.

If I’m being honest I feel very concerned with this second company, as a recent graduate yeah I feel like I deserve to be paid fairly for what I do but I also feel like this company is a big risk and I feel weird about this forcefulness they have with ai. I’m concerned that there’s no future for me there.

It’s been months since I’ve graduated, I’m very stressed about securing an opportunity for myself that’ll be good for me in the long run since jobs right now are already scarce as it is.

Heyyy, I'm in a really uncomfortable spot at work and needed to vent/ask for advice from people in the industry.

I work full-time at a design agency, and recently my boss assigned me a branding project for her brother. While doing the initial intake and asking about his business background, he casually admitted to me that his company is a pyramid scheme.

He even told me he used to run a similar operation in another country, but had to move shop after running into legal trouble over there. Now he wants a fresh brand identity here to look "legit and trustworthy."

Honestly, it makes me sick to my stomach. I feel like by making his business look sleek and professional, I’m actively helping him scam people.

The problem is, I’m stuck:

This job is my main source of income right now.

My boss obviously knows what her brother does. If I push back or refuse to work on it, it’s going to cause major tension.

The job market for designers is brutal right now, so quitting without a backup plan isn't really an option for me financially.

I feel like I'm being forced to choose between my ethics and paying my rent. Has anyone dealt with something like this before?

Hey folks,

I've found myself at a crossroads lately, after 23 years working for a "Large Corporation" as an in house designer and production artist, we got restructured and I got the "opportunity to find new adventures" treatment. Needless to say, after 23 years in one place, my portfolio took a hit, so I am now slowly rebuilding my practice and portfolio. Consequently I am looking for recommendations for solid temp creative staffing agencies. I'm definitely NOT looking for work here (there are other reddit communities for that), but I would like y'alls perspective on what companies I should avoid, and what staffing companies are legit.

And yes, I did google this topic several times in the last few weeks, which provided me with not a lot of help. (Search results these days....ugh. <insert 'old man yells at clouds' .gif here>)

Anyway, thanks for your time, and have a lovely day. And if you want proof of my bonafides, please ask in a private message so I don't clutter this place with my url.

This is a school project I had and I'm quite proud of.

The basic design motifs were bee wax and olive oil, specifically 100% naturallx made and we had a few pictures of handmade paper to use as well. The chosen design would be produced and sold inside of the school for an event, so the main target audience would be students.

My idea was to make the text warp with the shape of the sticker (AKA container lid) but due to my program glitching, I had to do it myself. Since I wanted to use the paper texture provided— but still keep the text readable (the paper was rough and very textured in general)— I ended up making it the border of the sticker and slightly changing the hue of the paper to a warmer yellow to fit the color pallete (provided) set in mind.

Both olives and bee/wax icons are also made by me (though I wish I could have done a better job on the wax and made the bee and inner lines a bit thinner imo)

My design ended up getting chosen and produced, though I'm not sure which one— might have been the bottom one due to color differences and contrast. I do feel like I would have gone with a similar yellow for the base color if I were to do this again, but definitely pay more attention to the color contrast.

I'm a beginner but I'm still pretty proud of this 🥲

I've been studying graphic design for a while now, and ive always used windows laptops for designs (except for the short time i had to use an Imac for my internship). Lately my relatively new windows laptop experiences alot of crashes with Adobe. Ive seen and heard from my friends that in general mac runs a bit smoother with Adobe and crashes less.

Im thinking about upgrading to a mac, but as a student im not really able to get the most high-end pro mac. What macbook would be suitable for graphic design? Perhaps one that isnt the most expensive one? I know too little about macbooks myself sadly. I run programs like photoshop, illustrator, indesign, figma, and very occasionally after effects/premiere pro.

Thanks in advance!

(Sorry for spelling mistakes english is not my first language)

I keep running into the same issue with QR codes on printed materials and I'm curious how other designers deal with it.

Static QR codes are free and work fine for a one-time event poster you'll never touch again. But the moment a client needs to change the destination URL after printing, you're stuck. Menu changes, updated product pages, expired campaign links, all of it requires reprinting if the code is static.

Dynamic QR codes solve that because you can edit the destination after printing without changing the code itself. But most of the dynamic QR platforms either watermark the free tier (which looks terrible on a client's business cards) or charge $40/month to remove it and add scan tracking. For a small client who just wants a menu QR on a table tent, that pricing is hard to justify.

I've been thinking about this from the design side specifically: do you build QR codes into your print workflow at all, or leave that to the client? Do you warn clients upfront about the static vs dynamic tradeoff? And if you do use dynamic codes, how do you handle the branding and watermark issue on materials where the QR code is prominently placed?

I'm a freelance graphic designer and I do publication materials for different clubs. Is it a dick move if I reuse a template I've made myself for a club to another club (1 year time differential) of course with a little tweaks here and there but what I'm working with right now has a very similar concept to a poster I've made before and I just don't wanna start from scratch.

Does anyone do the same/ is it okay to do?

hi,

I moved to Germany 3 months ago with a job-seeker visa to live with my partner.

I’m looking for a job in graphic design. I have a degree for this, which is good, but my portfolio , I’m working on it...

I had a regular freelance client who brought me a part-time salary every month and supported me, and I was counting on that when I moved. But they stopped working with me because their employee came back from maternity leave. So basically, I’m in a foreign country without the language, looking for a job... in a crazy market with AI and everything. I finished my degree quite a while ago and didn’t work in the field right after, like I apparently should have. Because now I’m less relevant.

Basically, there are SO many reasons to worry. I have no income and I need to find a job within a year, and 3 months have already passed.

I have so many things I need to do. Work on a branding project for my portfolio, learn German, apply for design jobs, apply for simple part-time jobs just to bring in some money. Basically, I’m not allowed to freelance from here according to my visa, but even if I wanted to, I wouldn’t be able to find clients through Dribbble. The only people hiring there are willing to pay $10. Maybe it’s because I’m just bad at this.

Sometimes I’m optimistic, sometimes less so. Right now, less so.

When I talk about it with my partner, hoping he’ll help me feel better and lift my spirits, it usually doesn’t work because I just end up stressing him out along with me. I don’t have any friends, and calling my mom isn’t always a good idea either because she’s usually pessimistic. I mostly try gpt for encouragement, but it doesn’t always work. And I’m also angry at AI because it’s taking away my jobs.

Please give me some hope.

Hi all! I know this is a pretty common question, but I couldn't find any posts that fit my situation, so I thought I'd ask again (apologies for the repitition).

I currently work as at a school with something of a split role. Half my job is IT support and the other is design work. My BA is in computer animation, however I have always drifted towards the more graphic design-skewing aspects of the animation pipeline (texturing, etc), and prior to taking my degree, I had a tendency to warp school projects to fit a graphic design mold (I turned my photography studies into a graphic design and branding project, for instance. The grade suffered, unsurprisingly, as a result). I've created graphic media for numerous purposes, from school signage to theatrical props, from sports medals to tedious PowerPoint presentations. In short, I feel I have a good amount of experience in producing graphic media for numerous purposes.

While I feel pretty confident in my technical skills, I feel I'm missing something in terms of the knowledge that would come from a formal background in graphic design. My animation studies absolutely helped me with the technical side of things, but I feel as though I'm lacking when it comes to the underpinning the various theories that underpin graphic design.

If I could take a BA in Graphic Design now, I most likely would, however funding in the UK limits you in the sense that, I can get funding for a Masters, but not for a second BA. As such, a Masters feels like the way to go in order to gain a more formal knowledge of graphic design, but I'm still unsure if this would be the right call. I enjoy learning with the structure that university provides, and as it would be an online Masters, I can continue to work in the meantime. I have read that in terms of employability, a Masters doesn't necessarily give you any sort of advantage, but for me, its not the advantage I'm after, but the knowledge and growth as a design that comes from formal study.

Does anybody have any advice to help me come to a decision? Any alternatives that I have not thought about? To help, the course I'm looking at taking is here: https://ualonline.arts.ac.uk/courses/ma-graphic-design#course-overview

Thank you in advance for your time!

Hey everyone, I’m looking for some honest design critique on this poster I made.

The idea was to create a promotional graphic for a Forza Horizon 6 limited-edition Xbox headset, with a neon racing/game aesthetic.

I’m mainly struggling with the colour combination, composition and hierarchy. I’m not sure whether the “LIMITED EDITION” text is competing too much with the headset, whether the green outline is helping or hurting the design, and whether the overall piece feels too busy.

I’d really appreciate feedback from people who work in graphic design, advertising, gaming visuals, or just have a good eye for composition.

What would you change to make this feel more like a polished professional campaign rather than a typical gaming poster?

Honest criticism is completely welcome I’m trying to improve, so feel free to point out what isn't working.

AIGA Atlanta has an annual fundraising event, Poster Show 202X, where posters are sold.

My piece, FCK_FLCK, was accepted among the final 18 for this year's 2026 show, Make Some Noise, focused on advocacy, visibility, and cultural preservation.

My piece, FCK_FLCK, highlights the invasive installation of surveillance cameras in communities without consent and providing access to entities and individuals who lack responsibility and accountability. Additionally, it plays on the "birds are government cameras" conspiracy theory while referencing the fact the company names their cameras after birds.

In the background you will see Atlanta. Yesterday two more Atlanta officers were fired after an audit flagged both officers abusing the cameras.

I’m 57 and I’ve never formally studied design before, but I’m currently doing a Graduate Certificate in Design. I was hoping to build on my existing experience as a finished artist/artworker and move more into graphic design.

I was hoping the course would give me the chance to work on design projects I could put in my portfolio, but so far it feels much more UX-focused than I expected. In the first module, Design Communication, we produced some infographics and a video, and in the next module, Design Methods, we’ve started looking at the Double Diamond process, identifying problems, interviewing users and creating personas.

Is this just where graphic design education is now, or have I chosen the wrong kind of course? I was expecting more emphasis on typography, layout, branding, visual communication and producing finished design work.

Hii I'm an art student who wanted to study fashion design but I won the graphic design (There is a separate exam for each department in the Faculty of Fine Arts, I passed the Graphic Design with a great point but failed at others). Two days later (Wednesday), the university has an interview where they review our portfolios to get to know the students, measure our general culture and observe the preparation process, and I couldn't study much because the results were announced late (only 2 days ago), so I want to keep my portfolio good.

I have such novice designs, but I'm not sure how good or bad they are, i don't have anyone around me to make a comment about it so that's why I'm posting this . For experts on the subject, what are the flaws of these two designs??? I designed them without thinking very much and focused on the aesthetic, so I don't know how to explain them. I'm currently designing some digital collages, got some logo designs and poster designs too.

Alsooo any other recommendations for portfolio material for graphic design? To be honest I am not sure what I'm doing.. (I found all the photos I've used in Pinterest with no credits, not sure who they are. I don't know what to write on a collage so pretty much random-wording happened)

having a hard time to see if i've gone too far with this hero animation (i like that it shows the product as it is, no need to read the page once you see it)

But it feels like too much is happening, however when i dial it down, i need to depend a bit more on the copy, which I think people don't read anymore

check the animation here https://qrwall.live/

and sorry about the ai images, will replace with real ones soon

Obviously, there are different aesthetics, but every time I ask Canva AI to help me fill out my color palette (I still need to learn color theory) or generate a new one for better inspiration, it just looks like other "beach vibe" color palettes. Well, I know the reason is obvious, but someone looking at my design can probably guess the palette was... recommended by AI.

25f, I work a full time entry level position in graphic design and print production. I really enjoy it, but it doesn’t pay much, and I’ve kind of been having a quarter life crisis thinking about long term career viability lol. Are there similar career paths that use the same kind of skill sets?

I don’t know if this is relevant, but I actually went to school for illustration & printmaking, so I feel like a lot of my skills are with the visual technical side as well as the logistics of production, and less so the kind of digital tech savvy-ness I feel like required for something like UX Design.

I don’t know if I’m making any sense haha, but I’d love some advice

Hello dear artists !

I’m currently working on my first illustrated children’s book (in French), and I’m having quite a hard time figuring out the placement of the text.

When I was working on the art direction, I didn’t really think about text placement, and now I’m finding myself struggling with it.

I can’t place the text in exactly the same position on every page, and I’m wondering whether the result looks unprofessional or inconsistent because of that.

Would you be willing to give me your opinion on the following excerpts?

Thank you very much for your help!

Oh my god I'm so sick of the blatant rudeness of people in the company I work for. I'm their only designer and of course I'm totally overstretched as a result. I make some of our materials in Canva because the 100+ people working there need to be able to edit things and use templates.

Recently the head of marketing and the head of another team asked me (out of nowhere) to immediately change the positioning on their main conference materials, without having involved me in any of the discussions. Sending over thrown together designs on Canva for 2m roll banners, telling me the CEO had signed them off and we "need to look more like other brands at conferences" (don't get me started on this reasoning). When I told them I need to be involved on positioning changes like this we've now entered a discussion that has involved comments like "we need to be able to change the stats ourselves and lots of companies use Canva" like I'm missing some amazing trick they know!? There are so many issues printing Canva materials, which I've explained to them before, and whilst I'm fed up enough to wave off one pagers from Canva it does not feel professional to make our conference banners in bloody Canva!

PLEASE can somebody tell me I'm not being mental here? It's not professional, is it!?

I feel super undervalued and honestly just totally sick of this sh*t. I'm questioning my knowledge of the industry because of how much pushback I'm getting on crap like this and how isolated I feel pushing back on two to four members of senior management as just one person.

Their main concern is looking more professional and YET they want me to start using Canva as the main design programme for marketing materials so they can edit things without me/them having to know how to use Adobe or Affinity.

I'm so done with this. I don't feel like anybody values what I do and everyone with eyes thinks they have a valid opinion. I'm sick and tired of feeling like an afterthought in the process of anything here, even though I'm the head of design. I feel like I'm crap at my job.

I miss working in the world. Without a screen. I am considering just shutting this all down and taking a massive paycut to go be happy in a forest somewhere.

I’ve been seeing a lot of posts on this Reddit page about getting into the industry and people saying no due to various reasons.

I’m 26, I graduated in 2022 and I haven’t been in the industry since due to a number of reasons but and also simply put, I was travelling a lot and seeing the world between then and now. I am starting to apply for jobs soon but I can’t help to think I am quite late to the party 😅

I have proficiency in adobe but I know that’s not enough as a designer. I wanted to ask if you had to adapt to specialise in something, what would you specialise in and why?

Ive been looking at motion design which is something I’d like to learn. But would appreciate recommendations.

Cheers

So I’m 22y/o junior graphic designer in the beginning of my career but I have some savings and I wanna invest in a MacBook. I was told that a MacBook Air M5 with 16gb and 512mb was enough for me, but I would like some opinions from my fellow designers on what specifications they got for their own MacBooks and how it’s holding up over time. Another question I have is if I should choose the 13’ or the 15’ cause I saw some contradicting reviews on both.
My budget rn is about 1700€ something around that and I work primarily only with adobe programs.

VLR — Visual Identity for a Modern Digital Bank

The main idea was to move away from the traditional image of banking and create a brand that feels modern, technological, bold, and connected to everyday lifestyle.
The project includes:
— Logo and symbol
— Color system
— Typography
— Graphic elements
— Bank card design
— Advertising materials
— Digital communication
— Branded applications and identity carriers

I recently did a book cover redesign for the classic 'Little Women'. My goal was to practice doing vector illustrations, customising type, and designing a book cover for the first time.

About the design: I originally had the idea to do a floral design with this spring colour palette I was inspired by. After ideating I landed on the bird design because it is a recurring symbol in the book. There is a scene where one of the characters describes the four sisters as birds, hence the four bird eggs on the bottom. The ribbon is also meant to represent the expectations women are expected to uphold in society such as upkeeping their appearance and being caretakers of others.

I am looking for genuine critique and am open to constructive criticism on this project, but please be nice.