I recently read an article that someone I follow on Twitter posted the link to and I thought it was pretty interesting. It summed up a lot of work I have done for clients in the past, and in fact, I was writing an article myself about just that. Here is the article:

It’s actually pretty easy to get awesome artwork from a professional graphic designer, animator, or illustrator. In fact, it’s so easy that I can sum it up in just two steps:

1. Tell the pro what you want.
2. Accept the result.

If you hired a pro, then they’ll probably work with you to tweak a few things and correct any errors. Otherwise, accept it.

Oddly enough it takes more steps to get mediocre design. It’s much more complicated. Are you with me? Here’s how to get your crappy art:

1. Make sure the artist follows all those rules you read about in your Graphic Design for Dummies book. Don’t let them get away with bending any rules.
2. You loved the artist’s portfolio. That style, it just spoke to you. You can just see your project in that style. Now… change it. Why shouldn’t you have your say?
3. Change your mind. A lot. Better if it’s in the final phases. If you change your mind early it still might wind up awesome. Don’t risk it!
4. Ask your sister what she thinks about your branding, identity, and layout. She just took that scrapbooking class. She’s practically an expert.
5. Assemble a team of non-design experts to comment on design elements. Stick rigidly to their suggestions, even if they don’t make sense.
6. If you need it in August, ask for it by Monday morning. Then drag out the approval phase three months. You’ve got plenty of time, but why share that knowledge? You need to control artists, they just don’t have those time management skills like the rest of us.
7. Make sure everything jibes with your focus groups. Especially that orange text. It might have to be a shade darker to keep the teen crowd. Not too dark!
8. Ignore the advice of the artist. I mean, who has time for that shit? Just fucking make our changes and stop thinking already, right? Jeez.
9. Suggest some changes. Make sure they’re ambiguous enough so you can tell your boss it’s not your fault. Stupid artists.

That’s it, you’re done! By now your design, illustration, or animation should be flat, homogenous, and pretty okay.

If it’s awesome, edgy, different than anything else out there, and completely original, then you must have skipped a step. Go back and review everything.

Taken from: http://sparkyfirepants.com/blog/2009/07/07/how-to-get-mediocre-work-from-an-artist/

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