How to find design inspiration? To the newly-entered designers (from UI China)

How to find design inspiration? To the designers who just started

How to find design inspiration?

This time, I want to talk to you about how young designers are looking for designer inspiration in the absence of so much experience. (Hopefully this article will also help you to empathize) each designer has his own knowledge of the design, some people treat it as art, some people treat it as a craft, someone put it as a technology, and some people take it as a commercial realization, I agree that when you have not become a master, design is only a career. Business and art are mixed, but the part of the business is far greater than the art part, so don't take yourself too seriously.

In a limited amount of time (usually without leaving any time for you to think about) there is a need for a lot of solutions for your customers or leader, and if the new designers don't accumulate so much experience, it is necessary to cultivate a quick inspiration accumulation method.

Several years of work down, I tried the most basic and effective methods are probably a few:

1. Daily industry website and material accumulation (your creative granary)

This is one of the most basic and effective ways to accumulate design inspiration as a professional designer. Internet era, information can be through the network platform, in the field you are engaged in the domestic and foreign sites you often go? Do you have an online industry circle of your own? Where to find the regular material? (most designers like photography) photography and photo sharing which one do you have? Wait a minute......

The era of mobile Internet makes communication and sharing more convenient and rapid, can easily absorb the world's top designer works of the nutrition in the same era, there is a peer analogy, let oneself know and the global counterparts compared to their own gaps and advantages.

In addition to being able to come to UI China for inspiration, you can also go to the SDC Designer Web site navigation (http://hao.uisdc.com/) to see which ones are right for you.

I like to do the collection classification, the website has the collection, the work also has.

Before the advertising, will be the collection of ads subdivided into like cars, FMCG, digital category, trend sports, real estate, as well as TVC, brand, promotion, creative Award category and so on ... Later, I will do some mobile phone theme class, interface design, web design, ICON, texture, button and so on keyword classification of works and materials collection, when encountered in a certain field of work, no inspiration in some of their own categories to find what they need. This is one of the most commonly used methods of designers, if you are senior people, I must not say too much.

2. The transformation of creative thinking (to the mind to a big change)

I work in the advertising circle, there is a sentence basically all the advertisers know (not the "do not do the president of the Advertisers") "Creative is the old element of the re-composition" In fact, applied to the design is also suitable, a good design can be applied, reference and replacement after becoming a new design (jobs also said, A great artist steals! Before listening to an advertising circle big guy level told us, he went to where, the body has a few mobile hard disk, hundreds of g of advertising collection, TVC, flat, interactive media, outdoor and so on to do a detailed distinction, even classification, car ads divided into cars, motorcycles, electric cars and so on, as I said on the point, When you meet the creative needs of the same kind of advertising, you can do some creative elements of replacement.

The performance of the kitchen knife "thin" application to the "ultra-thin mobile phone", the performance of the car speed of the way to express "express" and so on, the use of good words may become a great idea, if the size of the poor can easily let people feel that there is a suspicion of plagiarism. I also often call this "the big move", if necessary, I can be about the transformation of creative thinking to do a separate experience to share.

3. A certain amount of text reading reserve (each design has its own story)

Recently saw Jonathan biography, in addition to his design talent worship, there is a key word I remember very clearly, that is "design story" for their design to find a fulcrum, this is a piece of work after the birth of the soul part, of course, this is a newcomer to go to the senior process, In addition to the basic design skills and the ability to express and explain their work, which requires the designer to maintain a certain amount of text reading, I stress is the amount of text reading, not pictures, visual works of reading is the foundation, the accumulation of text reading is sublimation, your client's recognition of your work is essentially the interpretation of your work, That's why he thinks the final "picture" is worth hundreds of bucks and tens of thousands of blocks different!

I keep reading every day and I have a book around me to make sure I have something to read around when I have time. The scope of reading is not confined to the design class, from art, fiction, autobiography or methodology have a look, if you do not know what to read, you can tell me, if I read more books than you can also first recommend some books to let you slowly develop the habit of reading.

4. Practice makes Perfect (craftsman thinking)

These two years the word "artisan" appeared more frequently, especially in the field of design, some designers to their own than do craftsmen, the pursuit of the ultimate grinding of the work, the design of the craftsman's statement is not not, I remember a time ago "Helvetica" Font of the father Mike Parker died, Only do this one thing for a lifetime, designed for the world this set of the most classic font, (willing to learn more about the recommended people see "font legend" this book) This is my understanding of the craftsmen's thinking, good craftsmen, in the subdivision of the field to achieve proficiency, proficiency to others imitate not to come, Remember when the first contact with the design software is always curious and like the performance of various effects (what projection, relief, gradient, etc. you understand), the total lack of appropriate time to choose the right form of effect.

When the ability to do all the functions and effects are very easy to come out good design, this is my understanding of the craftsmen's thinking, good craftsmen, in the subdivision of the field to achieve proficiency, skilled to others imitate not to, remember just contact design software when always curious and like the performance of various effects (what projection, relief, Gradients and so on you know), there is always a lack of appropriate effects at the right time to choose the form of effect. When the ability to do all the functions and effects are very easy to come out good design, this is the skilled art, thinking mode needs to be updated, but the performance techniques need to be skilled, skilled in proficiency, which is as important as learning a foreign language sense.

5. Perception of the world (sensory design)

The value of the design lies in the value of "feeling", I remember Nie Yong really have an article said that he did the design, is the feeling of design, if the designer can do the feeling through the works to pass out, the first oneself should have the ability to perceive the world.

The complexity of the world, there are good, but most of it is not satisfactory. Perception of the world everyone has a way, if you like to travel, you use the pace to know the world, if you like movies, follow the lens to feel creative. Again recommend an open-minded book, Li Xinping "24 Life Creative Class" a whole book is telling you how to better understand life and self-improvement, there are books and film recommendations, after reading will feel the world is really beautiful. There are so many wonderful things in life that you should learn and experience.

Write so much, I know most people look back to the past work habits, if you want to change, from the computer to organize their own start. Classify the sites in the Favorites folder and organize the works in the computer. The cognitive and conditioned response to the design needs will not be the same when a task is received, and there is no way to deal with it.

Author's personal design public account: Cenferdesign

Personal Weibo: @ Big Bao-dabao

How to find design inspiration? To the newly-entered designers (from UI China)