Sleeping Monkey Presents...
Am I a poor designer?
Apr 12 2007
When designing for myself? Or is it just a “personal creative block”?
It’s always very hard to design for myself a site that I am happy with, and designing one that I will be happy with for more than a couple of months is nigh impossible. Why? Why do I find it so hard to design for me; is it just me or do other designers find it hard to design for themselves too?
I try and start at the very beginning. I look at sites like Elliot Swan, Veerle Duoh and especially Komodo Media, and I think “wow, they’re great sites, I love this idea and that part, maybe I could incorporate that into my own.”
And then I sit down, either at the computer with Photoshop open, or somewhere else with a notepad and a pen, and I think. I’ll draw a tad, scribble a tad, write a tad, and think a tad more. And then nothing comes. Or, I’ll get this idea in my head, that I’ll try and draw on paper or screen and it ends up as a mess, or just bland and boring. Either that, or it looks great on paper but when I try to translate it onto screen it just looks wrong (is that saying something about my Photoshop skills?).
I can design sites for other people with only minor design blocks standing in my way, that can soon be broken down by a bit of thinking and talking over ideas with the client or other designers. Yet with myself, there should be so much more dialogue and scope for new ideas and fresh designs that look good with barely any restrictions; and there isn’t.
It took me ages to come up with this design of this blog, All That Jazz, and even now there’s a part of me that says “Are you sure this is how you want your blog to look? I mean, did you prefer it before? And isn’t it a bit boring?”. So now that I’m trying to think of a fresh new look for my portfolio site, I’m getting a bit fed up!
Ben
I think your very over-critical of yourself. Even, at a subconscious level. Your a talented designer, and your skin before this was awesome (with the green image down the left hand side).
Cut yourself some slack, or think about making a website for another web designer. If designing for yourself is hard, give yourself a scenario, what the site is about (forgetting its for you) and work as if it was a client. Then you might get something your happy with?
Dan
I’m with Ben that you are probably being over-critical, however being critical isn’t a bad thing all the time. I think Ben is right and imagine yourself as the client and design for that client and perhaps that’ll help, of course it could also lead to schizophrenia (yes I did get Google to check that spelling) :P
Ineke
Ben, your websites are amazing, each website you’ve done, be it for yourself or others has been great.
You tell me not to be so negative about myself, maybe you should take your own advice :P
Bens idea seems good though, step out of yourself for a while and see what happens :)
love you xxxx
Ryan Fait
I experience the exact same thing. I’ve been trying to redesign my site for a month now and I can’t come up with anything I like. When I do a website for a client, I get it done in a few hours. It’s so frustrating.