If we’re communicating graphically we need to understand graphic communication, not how to use Quark
We often make the mistake of assuming that learning how to use a tool will somehow make us good at the job the tool was designed for. I believe our efforts are better spent on first learning the skills and then choosing the tools.
Take Quark Xpress, an industrial-strength tool for graphic design professionals. Professionals. In other words it’s for people who have an understanding of the underlying concepts and principles of typography and graphic design, and not simply a ‘good eye for it’. If we don’t have that understanding we may as well use Microsoft Word. And I don’t mean that derogatorily: with a basic understanding of typography – grids, leading, kerning, proportion, space, etc – an awful lot can be achieved in Word.
Too often we presume that it’s easy, that the tool will do it for us: at best this is naiive; at worst it is disrespectful and undermining both of the professional designer and of the integrity of our own work. We wouldn’t presume that simply learning to use Microsoft Word will make us write good novels: by the same token we shouldn’t presume that learning to use Quark Xpress will make us produce good leaflets.
More of us than ever are using the written word and images to communicate, so we need to start appreciating the hard-won skills required for good graphic communication. Instead of spending £500 on a two-day Quark Xpress Essentials course, people would be much better advised to spend £400 on a week-long basic typography or graphic design course. Then they can choose which tool is right for them: be that Quark, InDesign, Scribus or even Word.
We should be learning the skills to make our communication more effective, not how to use a tool that we won’t appreciate.
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agree. Had the same conversation with someone today. She wanted to make an 8 page booklet to fit in a dvd case herself. I would have done it in quark in a jiffy. But she already knew how to use word. So yes it is possible to do it in word, but it took nearly all afternoon…
Anyone producing graphic type work on a regular basis is well advised to learn a DTP package rather than WP. But if they already know WP then it can be adapted to suit.
chris
cyberdoyle
First learn the principles and then all the tools are easy to use. However the really good tools make the hard ‘professional’ stuff easy for the rest of us, but without the first principles even the ‘consumer’ tools are hard to understand.
mikep
Yes you have to know the principles, but as a professional using both I can honestly say it is a lot harder to do a layout in word than it is in Quark. Its the difference between a toffee hammer and a lump hammer. Both will crack a nut.
Where I live there is not the opportunity to go on courses. Little rural businesses just need flyers, brochures, pamphlets. SMEs have not got the time to go off somewhere to learn graphic design/typography, and they can’t afford to pay anyone to do it for them. So they use word. They already own that programme which also helps!
Most of them can’t even get internet connection so they can’t do online tutorials either. That is why so many contact me and why I know so much about their problems. I really shouldn’t have commented on your blog in the first place, because we are both dealing with a different issue, you are in an urban area where access to most things are available.
soz mate.
cyberdoyle
I don’t think we are talking about different issues: my point is not about resources but about attitude. I would much prefer that graphic design be left to graphic designers, but if people insist on doing it themselves (and they do) they should at least appreciate that it is a skilled job and take the trouble to learn a bit about what it is. That could mean going on a course, or it could mean simply reading (books, magazines, journals, blogs, etc). I think it’s far better to start by learning the skills than by learning the tools; as Nicky Getgood said to me, learn to drive before buying a car.
Michael
I agree with what you’re saying, Michael – especially in the comment above.
It’s infinitely more preferable that design is done by designers (though I am one so I would say that, wouldn’t I!) but some folks don’t have the money to pay someone else, or the time to commission a designer – and/or a host of other (sometimes less practical) factors.
If someone is going to design something themselves, however, I’m certain that learning basic design principles (or even just looking through design books/magazines to see what is considered ‘good design’ by the pros) will help them get a significantly better result than simply working out how a computer application works.
I think there may be a slight hiccup with all this though – there are people who are pretty sure they already know about good design; and could design perfectly well, given the right tools. So the problem is perhaps not so much discouraging the ‘tool will do it for me’ attitude but encouraging those people to understand that they don’t necessarily know about design already?
(P.S. InDesign beats Quark anyday – and don’t get me started on Word …
Katie
OK, here’s the cat parachuted into the flock of pigeons: If you are using a computer to aid you in doing your work, there is a good chance that one day the computer will do your work! There are whole creative careers that have disappeared due to the transformative power of computers, e.g. technical illustrators, typesetters, photographic printers, and even Web designers. Certainly there are some people employed to these jobs but it is very much at the artisan level of numbers. So there will be a need for graphic designers but not at the level there is, or was.
The comparison between Word & Xpress is presenting the extremes of tools – I’ve seen people use Xpress for word-processing and loose the lot with the touch of one key! However there is software for mere mortals like me like Apple’s Pages, Keynote, Blogger & WordPress which have well (professionally) designed templates that I can use. They may not be unique and distinct but they work for 95% of the needs of the rest of us.
mikep
I’m not comparing Word with Quark Express; I’m simply saying that there are definite skills for good graphic design and communication that need understanding by anyone who has something to communicate. It is even more crucial for us to appreciate these as the task becomes more democratic and less professional, otherwise communication will cease to be effective and will become instead ever more saturating, noisy and hard to hear.
Michael
@mikep
I don’t agree that creative careers are at artisan level numbers – but I’ve no stats, so that’s purely anecdotal!
Back to your main point: it’s true that technology (and its ever-decreasing cost) does enable more people to do more stuff for themselves.
Lots of good has (and will) come from this opening-up of opportunities, I’m sure, but simply because the technology’s available doesn’t mean people will use it well (or will want to use it at all, in some cases) – and nor does it mean that it’s doing the same job.
I am not an accountant, a web builder, a pr executive and I don’t run an online homemade jewellery shop – even though there are tools available to enable me to be all of those things, and more.
The simple fact is I don’t _want_ to be everything to everyone; I’m much happier, more efficient and generally better at my job because I’m doing what I love. I have a genuine interest in it and can concentrate on doing ‘my bit’ to the best of my abilities.
If everyone is expected to know the basics of (to put it very broadly
‘everything’, how will anything ever develop further? How much will the quality of ‘creative communication’ suffer? How rewarding will a career be if it entails doing mostly things you’re not really interested in? And as Michael’s pointed out, how effective is communication when it all looks, sounds, feels, smells and tastes the same?
Would the world be a more efficient, productive, diverse, fun and happy place if everyone did everything for themselves … by themselves? I don’t think so. An identikit, templated world? *shudder*
For me, the beauty of technology is that it helps bring people together, allowing them to share things; both personally and professionally. But, errrr, that has very little to do with the original post – sorry Michael!
Katie
Thought provoking post. I like to think I have an ‘eye for design’ but I also like to think I know when to bring in the experts. My tip is take your £500, hire a designer, build a trusted relationship with them and work with them to create the image and brand you want.
Kate Hughes
A two day course in Xpress won’t make someone into a competent user unless they are already familiar with layout and design. Unless it is used on a regular day to day basis then what was learnt in the two days will swiftly be forgotten anyway. I think the easiest way is to google for instructions to do whatever you want to do using the software you already have access to. Unless you have an enormous need for DTP then learning progs such as indesign or quark is overkill. In the same manner a free download of picasa will do what most people need for photos, rather than learning photoshop. It is up to the individual org to decide their needs. Councils and SMEs have totally different budgets and staffing levels. If an SME needs a little job it can’t always budget for a professional. Sometimes an instruction manual can be an A4 page and needs no fancy stuff. As ever in this digital world it boils down to horses for courses.
You choose the right tools for the job, depending on time and resources available.
cyberdoyle
Good post. This is common currency in the design world. I’ve often been asked to ‘take over’ something that someone with a few days training started and then realised they couldn’t do. Design being visual is often seen as being easy: put this there, choose that colour, that looks great. The problem is realisng what works and what doesn’t, what to leave out and what to put in. This comes from experience (studying, practice or both) and someone producing a leaflet or two a year won’t get this. I work a lot with charities and they are usually concerned with control, and bring things in-house to save money. This is always false economy as if something looks amateurish, it loses credibility and will lack effect. Quite often they then need to bring in design help anyway. This in-house control seems to be cyclical as it soon becomes apparent that “it’s not working”, and we “need to find a good designer” becomes the motto. Then a few years later there is a restructuring review and it comes in-house again. As @Kate Hughes said building a trusted relationship with a designer is key: they will help you out over the long term (perhaps longer than staff last) and understand your goals and objectives.
Quark is just a tool; learning how to hold a pencil won’t make you Leonardo Da Vinci. Democratisation of technology has always had similar issues. Computers help us do things but it doesn’t make everyone an expert at everything. Realising this is the important point and you make this well. I find that the big problem in my job is people/clients often don’t realise what is good and what is bad. We lack a basic design education.
Sorry to be a pedant but Quark Express is spelled and written as Quark XPress. An eye for detail is key to being a good designer!
Dave MCourt
Oops! Thanks for pointing out the spelling mistake Dave; very slack on my part. (Now rectified in the main post.)
I’ve worked in the same charity for a long, long time, and can verify every point you make. I don’t know quite how to challenge the idea of control and of design being ‘easy’, but I really think it needs doing.
Michael
Too right. Worse, people spend too much time ‘designing’ badly, when they should be concentrating on content first, and document/information structure second. Which in our office at least, is their, y’know, job… it wouldn’t be so bad if their cack-handed efforts didn’t make the entire organisation look amateurish.
Rather than installing ever-richer applications (can’t believe this conversation has gone on so long without anyone mentioning ‘Powerpoint’…), enterprise-level organisations should just give non-specialist staff Notepad or equivalent and the rest (OK, they can have an email client and a browser).
When I’m in charge, things’ll be different… etc.
Simon
Simon
That should’ve been:
Simon
yes Simon, content is King. Always.
(when you are in charge that is)
If you have the content then it can always be put into the right format by someone else. No harm in them having a go though? I have had kids knocking up some brilliant work, maybe a bit of encouragement and constructive criticism? If the org can afford to outsource then fine, but many don’t have the money to spare, and still need to get flyers out or instruction sheets. The lady I was helping just wanted words, no graphics apart from the cover, simple, content rich, just the pagination had her beat.
I would rather have a simple manual that told me what I needed to know than a fancy well designed booklet which told me bugger all.
Content. Can’t beat good content. Keep the stick handy and make em do what they are good at.
cyberdoyle
A good designer knows content is king. Beatrice Ward wrote of the crystal goblet: a wine lover wants to see and appreciate what they are drinking. Someone who doesn’t care about wine may choose a coloured glass goblet or a solid gold chalice. To them the wine isn’t important.
This metaphor of typography being invisible, revealing the message – not hiding it, being a means-to-an-end and not an-end-in-itself is the most important design lesson I have ever learned.
Content is king but its presentation does matter: a typeset page of hard to read type with no articulation of structure is as bad as a one ‘decorated’ to within an inch of its life. Content does have to compete with other content and presentation is part of that process.
For anyone who wants to read a bit of Beatrice’s Crystal Goblet (it is short), it is here: http://www.nenne.com/typography/crystalgoblet1.html
Dave MCourt
Yes Dave, you are so right, but we aren’t talking about designers here, we are talking about the people with the content, and they aren’t designers. They need the right tools to present their work in the absence of money to pay designers. Or are we drawing to the conclusion that the two roles remain separate?
cyberdoyle
Yes the roles are separate. But it must be remembered that most ‘design’ isn’t done by ‘designers’. Any communication were decisions are made about presentation (mark making) is design at its basic definition. The HR poster on the office notice board doesn’t need a designer’s intervention but this same design approach is often used for an external audience. This was the point of @Michael’s post: if you are going to side-step designers, learn some design.
Most designers I have known/met/witnessed do not know basic design skills. Shocking but true. If you have a Mac and some software you can pass yourself off as a ‘designer’. There is a VERY wide range of quality in design education and if designers don’t get it, what hope for anyone else. As I mentioned in an earlier comment, we lack a design education. Most people don’t really know what design is (my mum doesn’t know what I do for example even thought I’ve been doing it for 12 years) and most people don’t know what constitutes ‘good design’.
This isn’t some snooty design elite view, people just don’t understand what it is for and don’t have the lexicon to describe it. To me this transcends roles. As a designer I find myself more often than not educating clients about what they need, and the best ways to do it. You will often hear designers describe clients as ‘good clients’ and ‘bad clients’. Good clients are those that get it and bad are those that don’t. Why some people ‘get it’ and some don’t is a mystery to me.
Dave MCourt
Dave, that’s because you get it. It isn’t a mystery. I could go on a 10 year course and you couldn’t turn me into a designer. I worked for a fantastic designer, he couldn’t use a computer to save his life. He sketched it out, I brought it to life. I couldn’t produce content. I waffle too much. The customer produces the content. We each have our gift. I thought the original post was to choose a tool for a job, and I don’t think you can learn design easily. – unless you are gifted that way.
So maybe going back to the original…
… a basic graphic course for a gifted individual could be money well spent, but only if the student was that way inclined in the first place. And people producing their own leaflets aren’t being disrespectful of the professionals, they are just doing the best they can with the resources available.
cyberdoyle
I agree entirely. Tools don’t make skills. I guess the key point about ‘getting it’ is knowing our limitations and when it is the right time to call the professionals in. I have no problem about anyone producing their own materials: I don’t feel threatened or insulted as a designer. It’s just that producing something that looks amateurish is quite often false economy as it can lack credibility and probably won’t be read or trusted.
I think you can learn some basics of design and especially typography quite easily. But you are correct, you have to want to learn.
Dave MCourt
I agree with the sentiment of Michael’s post: the key thing is not the software but the principles.
When we teach introductory DTP and web design skills to first year undergraduates at the School of Media now, we are trying to strip away the primacy of the software in favour of these core principles, ie we are teaching the students to learn rather than training them into a functional role.
We do a lot more with paper and pencil then we used to, and we teach the software environment as a set of metaphors rather than a tool that locks you in to a set of tracks that you can;t get out of. The idea here is that the students begin to learn that they can move smoothly from paper, to PhotoShop, to Illustrator, to InDesign as appropriate for their project and that the underlying methods on the computer do not change.
We came up with this approach through reflection on our own teaching methods, the higher skill base that newer students tend to bring and discussion with our visiting tutors (people who still work in industry and come in to teach certain classes).
It was gratifying to then find a new book that was coming out that was essentially the new module we had just written. More excitingly the entire book is available free of charge under Creative Commons license:
http://wiki.digital-foundations.net/
Jon Hickman