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Designers. Epic fail.
Got an epic fail of a file through today, from a ‘Designer’ on Word format. WTF? When I asked for an Ai file, he said he couldn’t do it to scale as the sign was too long (7 mtrs) & Illustrator only allows a max page size of just over 5 mtrs. How do you sign makers do it?
Er… scale it down to 10% for a working file? 🙄
Then came epic fail number 2. As he’d designed it to fit on an A4 piece of paper, when it came to working to scale, it was miles out & the whole design is scrap. Top Tip: When designing a shop front – or anything for that matter – always work to scale.
Honestly, it’s not hard is it?
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15 Replies
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That’s why I don’t like dealing with designers. They rarely listen and you can tell when your talking to them they think they’re above you.
A few customers that come in here insist on employing a graphic designer.
Then you find it’s there son or daughter that’s just started senior school who doesn’t really have a clue. Life’s hard enough. 👿 -
Having been in the trade for over 20 years I have seen this almost 3- 4 times a week!
As I’m now working for a trade supplier I see it even more………you would not believe the crap that we have to work with & some of it comes from well established sign companies. -
I did laugh when I read this post, had a Deja vu moment. . same thing happened to me earlier this week ! ! Unfortunately these days everyone with a ripped copy of adobe creative suite instantly becomes a designer. . . . in exactly the same way as the cheap plotter revolution has doubled the population of sign makers !
I think Darron makes a valid point, after all you only have to look at some of the shocking posts in the design help forum 😳
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I’m with Darron. I constantly get sent web site gifs as artwork for the side of a bus. Designers must face the same situation, only worse.
Anything ‘major’ in artwork sense I send to a dedicated graphic designer, but some of the stuff I get back is the same as I’d do when I first started in this game 15 years ago….
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LOL ! I know what you mean !
I once had such a huge fall out with an International design house regarding layouts for vehicle wraps. In the end the manager asked me to come in and show them how to do it……. Despite me working on a lowly PC and use Corel (NOBODY uses Corel anymore…..) Dont they teach designers about perspective anymore ??
IMO a Graphic Designer should do an internship with both a Sign Company and Print House for at least 1 year each. That way they will at least have a clue about the difference between a computer monitor and a tangible end result.
BUT, there is hope. This week I had to print some roll-up banners for a client with a tour / safari company. His daughter (in high school, but going to study graphic design next year…) made the designs. GULP !! In the end the designs were clean, professional, up-market, relevant, AND supplied as PDF to size. I just RIPed and printed. Maybe I should offer this girl a scholarship, with the provision she works for me after her studies!
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Here’s a good one for you……….
About a week ago I was sent 2 pdf files from a sign company (Lets call them Signs Veryqiuckly) that a designer had sent to them.
A set of flat cut letters on curved rails. All very nice to look at isometric views but none of the drawings had the texts laid out flat/ face on view. So when the customer said can’t you use this to work? from I explained the above, his comment was "oh! I’ve not had a look at them, just forwarded them on to you"
Still waiting for some "proper" artwork………… :lol1: -
Gert,
My sons school has a Roland vp540 and teaches the CS3 suite and how to produce signage, posters and brochures etc. Not ideal for me as they compete with me for work, and I can’t compete with their costs – all the stuff to run the printer is donated by a builder who gets the school to produce his marketing and signage stuff FOC 👿 but they come up with some good concepts sometimes – bit grungy but not bad.
My son will quality for the sign class next year as he is in the top grades in the graphic design class this year, but he’s not interested 🙄 Reckons he’d rather learn on the job with me, WHAT!!! I want HIM to learn everything about PhotoShop and teach ME in exchange for a roof over his head at night!
I use Corel too, and the school teaches them that Corel is for amateurs 👿 He thinks it novel that I don’t use a ‘real’ graphics program at work… If I was a bit taller I’d reach up and give him a clip under the ear. 😛
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quote Shane Drew:Gert,I use Corel too, and the school teaches them that Corel is for amateurs 👿 He thinks it novel that I don’t use a ‘real’ graphics program at work… If I was a bit taller I’d reach up and give him a clip under the ear. 😛
I got that said to me by a ‘designer’ mate a while back, about corel being a useless design program, i showed him some of my better work that i’ve had to draw from scratch, and also some brochure stuff i’ve done and he didn’t believe it was done with corel,
when i showed his how simple the designs were when broken down in to their smaller pieces he was quite impressed at how simple corel made some jobs when editing vectors etc.
I hate a lot of AI files, got sent an vectored owl for a customers artwork earlier this year, looked great but it was in about 200 seperate pieces when i wanted to edit and bastardise one of the designs to suit part of the job, even when i downloaded a trial of cs3 and opened it in that, it was the same, far too many layers!
give me corel and a hand drawn layout to work from and improve upon any day!
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Very typical now – people who call themselves designers make up some logo or design in photoshop with loads of flashy effects, light bursts and shadows etc… then save it as a 72dpi JPEG around 5cm across ( "but it looks great on my PC screen !" ) and the customer expects us to be able to print it out 1m wide.
And plenty of times I have told the customer we need a vector copy of their logo as we cant work from a tiny JPEG, they go to the designer and we get emailed exactly the same JPEG embedded into a document and saved as an EPS !
I find a lot of the time we end up having to recreate peoples logos and designs from scratch as proper vectors, and charging them for it because their ‘designer’ didnt realise that the logo may be used for something other than business cards and websites at some point.
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And as a p.s.
I HATE Illustrator snobs ! I have Corel and Illustrator, but because I learned how to use Corel first, I find it quicker and easier for me to use, but in essence, both programs are exactly the same and do the same thing ( I havent found anything in Illustrator that I cant do in Corel ).
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I’ve always said Illustrator may be a great programme but I don’t want to be at a disadvantage by using it.
Most designers who slag off Draw either have never used it or are comparing a very early version. X3 and X4 are now very strong and for the sign and print markets offer unbeatable value for money when you consider you get PhotoPaint, quality fonts, clipart etc in the package.Alan D
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Oh no, don’t get me started on the jpeg saved as an eps!
Had a heated discussion with a customer once regarding that!
"but i’ve sent you an eps file"
"yes but it’s your original crappy jpeg saved as an eps file"
my get out of jail card was that I’d asked for a vector eps…
he went back to the designer who didn’t have a clue…………………..I too hate Illustrator snobs……..CorelDraw has been my main weapon of choice for years.
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Funny how I run a successful business, and employ 12 people, while using the dreaded "Draw" – The snobby designers who wants to belittle my choice of software all drive a 10 year old Toyota Tazz (Corrolla?)-or similar – and fill up their wee 40 litre tanks on account!..
I play all weekend long in my V8 ‘Cruiser, FLINTSTONES RULE !!
I started in the trade 15 odd years ago using Corel 3. I still use Corel, simply because I know it. One of my employees insists on using "In-Design" – Everything he takes 2 hours to produce, I can duplicate in 30 minutes while making coffee, and smoking a cigarette….
But then, I’m the Boss, and nobody argues with me….
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For me Coral will always play a big part in the business. It’s come a long way over the years and probably still be here when most other software has gone.
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haha I must confess to being a bit of an illustrator snob 😛 ! ! !
I don’t have anything against coral, just don’t see the need for it when you have illustrator. . . ! :lol1:
Still I’ll never be a proper designer I don’t have one of those cool looking apple mac G-whatevernumbertheyareonnows !
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