If you are a graphic designer, you know how important it is to have a smooth and efficient workflow. A good workflow can save you time, money, and stress, as well as improve the quality of your work. But how do you streamline your graphics workflow? In this article, find some tips and tricks that can help you optimize your design process and avoid common pitfalls.
Before you start working on any project, you should have a clear idea of what you want to achieve, who your audience is, and what your constraints are. This will help you avoid wasting time and resources on unnecessary or irrelevant tasks. You should also set realistic goals and deadlines, and communicate them clearly to your clients and collaborators. Planning ahead can also help you anticipate potential problems and prepare solutions in advance.
Always answer these main questions with yourself or your client before starting a design project: Why? What will this project achieve once completed? (This will reinforce the goal of the project) Where? Where will this project be? Printed? Emailed? Online? City? Country? (This will help you start working within the correct dimensions/colours) Who? Who is this project aiming to talk to? (e.g: Clients of your clients/your client's friend/a particular customer demographic etc) When? When does this project need to be finished by? When will the first draft to be ready? Inspiration? If you or your client has any visual inspiration for the project, the planning stage would be the perfect time to talk through themes and moodboards.
Start with a clear project brief, utilize project management tools, and establish a systematic file organization. Leverage templates for repetitive tasks and maintain a consistent design style. Embrace collaboration tools for seamless communication. Regularly update your skills and stay abreast of industry trends. Streamlining ensures productivity and high-quality results.
Build a symphony, great the orchestral channel of stream. Make your assemble of objectives direct and simple, mix your algorithm with potent skills that levitate your Scape of point and perspective of future. Take your line straight, team your workflow with its core, decide when is the right time to bridge tasks, change modes, or feed your followers.
One of the easiest ways to streamline your graphics workflow is to use templates and presets. Templates are pre-made layouts that you can customize for different projects, while presets are pre-defined settings that you can apply to your graphics. Templates and presets can save you a lot of time and effort, as well as ensure consistency and quality across your work. You can create your own templates and presets, or use the ones provided by your software or online platforms.
From my experience, in complex and fast pace pipelines, templates are game changers. Having layout and technical aspects already defined and ready to use will give you and amazing head start and increase efficiency. Plus, if you have multiple people working on same project, using templates will help you to minimize differences in outcome (as they will be using same templates to start with). Long live templates! ??
If you find yourself doing the same task more than 3 times, you need to template it and ideally automate it. Creative Suite has Batch Processes and tools like Zapier can connect to almost anything. Even if it only saves you 5 minutes each time, the efficiencies add up very quickly.
There are so many templates available online if you need them, however one of the most beneficial things I have added to my workflow and design knowledge is learning how to build my own templates and automation within the programs I use. This gives you a template/system that reacts to you and speaks to you directly, especially if working across different projects with similar constraints for long periods of time. My personal process involves utilising templates and rules in Asana for project management, paired with Components and Design Systems set up in Figma. These have been incredibly useful in reducing time on those repetitive daily tasks so I can focus more on the actual design.
Templates can greatly increase the efficiency of your workflow. You won't have to start from scratch every time a similar project comes up. An added bonus is that templates can create a cohesive and branded look across many graphics.
Another essential tip for streamlining your graphics workflow is to organize your files and folders. This will help you find, access, and edit your files faster and easier, as well as avoid losing or duplicating them. You should name your files and folders clearly and logically, and use a consistent naming convention. You should also back up your files regularly, and delete or archive the ones you don't need anymore.
Organization is always an important factor to keep in mind when starting on any project. One major hack I've learned over the years is that most operating systems actually allow you to create folders to put your files in. Now these folders are not actually real folders made of paper fiber and plant cellulose, but are in fact digital folders that live inside the computer in the digital realm. Use these folder systems to organize your files in a manner that makes sense to you and remember to make sure that your files are not accidently corrupted by a sentient rogue AI that can then access your camera and beam your physical body and mind into the computer where you'll then have to help Jeff Bridges fight evil AI in order to escape.
Organization is a very important part in streamlining any process, designing included. A filing system should be clearly and consistently named throughout. Not only does it help keep things easy to locate but quicker to get to. Most softwares remember where you last saved/exported a document, and knowing where you need to put things will save time navigating to them later. Not only is it making it easier on you but it will make things easier to find for teammates or anyone who has to navigate the files after you. I usually have one main folder for each project with sub-folders for each portion of that project. Each portion folder has sub-folders as well, depending on the project. This keeps everything I need for the project in one place.
I'm always surprised at how many people don't organize their files or give them meaningful semantic names. It's even more useful in web design as it can boost your SEO.
If you find yourself doing the same tasks over and over again, you should consider automating them. Automation can help you speed up your graphics workflow, as well as reduce human errors and increase accuracy. You can use various tools and features to automate your tasks, such as actions, scripts, batch processing, or macros. For example, you can use actions in Photoshop to record and execute a series of commands, or use scripts in Illustrator to perform complex calculations or transformations.
I built an automated work flow using Enfocus Switch that I call STREAMLINE. It preflights, color manages, changes “black” colors (to real black), deletes non-printable items, optimizes, crops data, and renames files using the actual trim size. Oh yeah!
Using artboards and the auto “generate images” feature in Photoshop allows you to pre-name, and pre-export files according to dimension, name, and size requirements. All you have to do is hit command-S when everything looks as you want it to.
This will save you countless hours of repetitive tasks and ensure continuity. It's well worth the time it takes to set it up.
One of the best ways to streamline your graphics workflow is to learn new skills and tools. Learning new skills and tools can help you expand your creative possibilities, as well as improve your efficiency and productivity. You can learn new skills and tools by taking online courses, watching tutorials, reading blogs, or joining communities. You can also experiment with different software, plugins, extensions, or apps that can enhance your graphics workflow.
Learning is necessary component of growth and keeping pace with developing industries. Once we stop learning we are getting into risk of becoming obsolete. Key part for keeping that effort going is nurturing natural curiosity into your work and asking yourself questions: can I do this better, can I do this easier, can I do this faster and more consistent? Bottom line: Can I do it smarter not harder? Everyday some new insight and tool appears. And no matter how much you know and at what level of seniority you are currently, there are things to be learned and to be curious and smarter about. So keep that motivation flame burning in you always - it will get you far.
I think the opportunity to learn new tools, techniques and even technologies is the greatest way to keep yourself not only interested in your job, but it also keeps you relevant, hirible, and valuable.
Finally, you should always seek feedback and improve your graphics workflow. Feedback can help you identify your strengths and weaknesses, as well as learn from others' perspectives and experiences. You can get feedback from your clients, colleagues, mentors, or peers, or from online platforms and forums. You should also review your own work and workflow, and evaluate what worked and what didn't. You should then apply the feedback and insights to improve your graphics workflow and outcomes.
Taking feedback on something you made might be the most challenging part of workflow, especially if you put a lot of effort into making it. We tend to see our contribution and things we build as direct extensions of our value and achievement. No one likes to have those aspects questioned, but being true professional IMO is exactly your ability to see higher and wider and aim for overall improvement, and ask and gratefully accept and implement any valuable feedback that will improve things. More heads can make us work smarter and more fresh eyes can be valuable source of information for improvements.
It's so easy to get personally attached to your work. Always remember that you are an artist, nothing is perfect, and learn more from constructive criticism than praise. We learn more from our mistakes than our successes. Most importantly remember this is business, it's not personal.
organize your files and folders like a meticulous librarian A well structured system helps you find assets faster than a superhero changing into a costume. Time spent searching is time spent designing! ????♂? Let me tell you about an example designer forgot to save their work before a power outage. "It's a masterpiece in my mind," they said. Save religiously; technology can be as unpredictable as a soap opera plot twist! ???? To streamline your graphics workflow, invest time in organizing files, use templates for repetitive tasks, and embrace collaboration tools. Your workflow will be a smooth melody, leaving you more time for the creative crescendos! ????
In my opinion, on top of market practices, and quality of work, understanding how long the tasks take the be completed is important. The regular practice of tracking your time will give you a great notion of how to apply pricing and how many projects you can take concurrently, and deliver them on time and within budget. This will create a solid foundation for your pricing structure.