What is the best question to ask in a Creative Brief? If you were only given one question to ask a client about her business, what is the most important?
Duane Kinsey the co-founder of Logobird, an award-winning design studio located in Melbourne, Australia contacted me about doing an interview on his site. I was happy to talk about logos, graphic design, branding, the design industry, and the role of the creative process.
It seems that, as a community, we are feeding off pretty pictures with very few words, creating a daily "show" of work with very little "tell" to accompany it. In the process, we are all missing a great opportunity. Writing is an investment in your own education and it’s a way of expanding your knowledge and awareness in a way that looking at an endless parade of pretty pictures will not.
My creative process has radically changed over my twenty-plus years of designing logos. The greatest change is the shift away from visuals, and towards words for inspiration. Back in college, every graphic design project I completed had to be accompanied by the material that inspired it. As design students, we had to show how we got from point A to point B through the reference materials. We looked towards other designers work for inspiration, and rarely towards things like data, articles, or market analysis.
I think ideas are overvalued. Like billing design by the hour, I believe it is another misunderstanding both clients and designers have about logo design. You certainly don’t need to be a good designer to have lots of ideas. Ideas are relatively easy to come by, but ideas are not the key to logo design. Describe any great logo as an idea and it sounds ridiculous.
Deadlines force designers to act, to focus, and to create. Without a deadline, projects can easily drag and lose momentum and the designer’s interest along the way. I find the most difficult creative projects are the ones for myself. If a client inched a job along the way I do when working on my own identity, I would go nuts. Like many designers, I feel limits are what drive inspiration and creative problem solving.
The first Process Study is by We are Him+Her, a very talented team out of the UK. Their study explores the development of their own logo. My experience is that as far as clients go, it doesn't get tougher than designing for yourself.
A graphic designers’ job is to solve problems. One of these problems is helping clients understand the creative process and in turn the value behind design
