Creativity
Posted on: 20 March 2012
It's been some time since I've had to produce a design from scratch. In my day job I'm mainly a back-end developer, and recently I've been getting my hands dirty with the command line and a little sys admin duty. I'm occasionally tasked with putting together a page, to produce a visually pleasing combination of elements. This, I have no problem with. I've noticed lately though, that my ability to simply sit down and produce a design from scratch has been lacking.
Whilst natural talent is an obvious ingredient to good design, I believe practising good design is as important. Although any designer will tell you every design is different and must be approached as such, there will always be common processes, some subconscious, that a designer goes through when producing something. A truly good designer will is consistent.
I've always thought I have a keen eye for design, in fact I made my way into the industry with a more front-end design focus; and whilst I'll never be a full-time designer - I just don't get my jollies that way - I can appreciate good design and I'm aware when something just looks wrong (and can usually offer a fix or two). However, being knee-deep in code for the majority of my working life (and I'm not complaining), my ability to produce a visual masterpiece at the drop of a hat has to take a knock, or at least a back seat.
As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, whilst my job doesn't require me to produce any real design, I've been forcing myself to splurge my creativity recently as I've been dying to redesign, recode and generally reorganise my site for ages. And after knocking out half a dozen half-decent designs over the past few months, the concept of artistic consistency - if you like - has been a bit of an eye opener for me. I'm a little fussy, and don't want to settle with something boring and substandard.
Those hardcore, bedroom dwelling hacker types will always exist and forever be the programmer stereotype. But in this modern world, for a back-end web developer to get by, they need to have - at the very least - a good eye for what looks right. I like to think, with a little practise, I have a bit more to offer than that.