Talking about designers' "passive" and "active"

Design work is a highly professional work. Good design work is not only a perfect embodiment of functionality and aesthetics, but also can greatly enhance the value of the product. The design work is also a very commercial work. It is not only an artwork that is independently conceived and completed, but also must be influenced by the economic strength, development direction, product positioning, and consumer demand of the commissioner. At the same time, it will also be affected by the time and cost. Restrictions on various objective conditions such as printing processes. So every time designers accept a new design task, they will start to feel very "passive." The shackles of various conditions make the designer seem rather helpless, and sometimes even feel unable to start. Therefore, how to translate “passive” into “active” in the design work and create a good work that reflects both the designer’s design intent and the satisfaction of the customer in the limited conditions. The market’s good work is indeed worth every design. Personnel thinking and research problems. Here, I would like to talk about some superficial understanding with my own design experience.

First, it is necessary to communicate with customers in depth to realize the conversion of roles. This is the basis for changing passive design to active design.

To successfully design a customer-satisfied piece of work, we must first understand what the customer wants. When receiving new design tasks, they should listen carefully to the customer's position and requirements for this design and conduct a thorough understanding and analysis of the products to be designed. Then, re-analyze the needs of the market and consumer from the customer's point of view and position, and realize the conversion of roles. Careful thinking and serious work are the basis and preconditions for the designer's work to change from passive to active.

Two years ago, I received a design task to design a child calendar for a photography company in Shanghai. Previously, the company had recommended and introduced my work to the customer. However, due to the first contact, a similar product had not been designed before, so there was some distrust in the exchange. The customer puts forward a lot of requirements: a photo must be placed in each calendar, the cost cannot be too high, and the design of the wall calendar of the previous year must be obviously improved in terms of taste, screen, etc. Even directly put forward how to design how it looks like. In order to be responsible to the customer, I listened to the customer's introduction and requirements, and learned from the customer with an open mind. I repeatedly asked about unclear places, and made detailed records of important places. After going back, I carefully pondered and analyzed the advantages and disadvantages of the product from the customer's point of view, and decided to give up the original design proposal of the customer to imitate similar products and persuade the customer to adopt a new screen effect. Because I put myself in the spotlight for the sake of the customer, I finally got the approval of the customer and opened the channel for myself to actively design and create.

Second, conscientiously do a good job in market research, timely understanding of the status quo and needs of the market, so that we know ourselves.

In addition to actively communicating with customers and communicating sincerely, designers must also do market research on similar products to understand and analyze consumer preferences and market development trends. They must be aware of each other and have a clear grasp before designing. This is a designer's design. the key to success.

Because it was the first time to accept the design of children's themes, I first conducted a serious investigation of the consumer market for children. Not only went to some of the well-known children's stores and specialty stores in Shanghai to observe their colors, patterns, and layouts, but also specially observed in bookstores, toy malls, etc. to understand what kind of cartoon images, painting techniques, and pictures children now like. effect. After some “running around”, the colorful world of children is becoming clearer in my mind. On the other hand, I also took out the customer's previous product patterns for comparative analysis and found that the previous calendar was not bright enough, the screen was relatively simple, the pattern was too adult, and child interest was not enough. In this way, after making horizontal and vertical comparisons of the products before the actual hands-on design, the design direction becomes more and more clear.

Third, make full use of already mastered the performance skills combined with reasonable printing process, and carefully check to make the design ideas perfectly reflected.

In the design, in order to obtain a satisfactory design effect, based on past design experience, actively try to use a variety of performance techniques, and the rational use of a variety of printing processes to make the design icing on the cake.

According to their own adequate preliminary preparations, taking into account the cost constraints of customers, I finally decided that the calendar is still based on four-color printing, printing processes, materials do not make major changes, mainly in color, screen content and performance techniques bold Improve. First of all, set a theme for the calendar, put together six children's photos of different costumes in different fairy tales, and design each photo as a member of the screen, which is both lively and interesting, and makes children's photos into If you are on the ground, it is very new. Secondly, the combination of hand-painting and computer is the form of expression. The cartoon taste is full, and it can reflect children's taste. Use high-purity colors as much as possible to make the composition active and novel, and to increase children’s interest and possessiveness.

After the design draft came out, the customer was very satisfied with the final draft. In order to ensure the accuracy of the colors in the printing, I checked and adjusted each color one by one against the design draft during the process of plate making and proofing, until I was satisfied with the proofs, and I was relieved to print on the shop floor. As the previous work was done well, there were few reprints at the time of printing, which saved the printing cost and provided guarantee for the stability of the quality. After careful checking of each link, the final printing effect was very good. The calendar calendar was immediately welcomed by the children and their parents. Afterwards, the customer added a second and third batch of orders to the company according to the needs of the market.

After his own efforts, the first cooperation was more successful. The customer expressed satisfaction with my design attitude and style. The design plan was booked early in the second year. The customer no longer directly participates in my design. It not only gives me a general market position, but also no longer gives me any restrictions. I gradually changed from a passive situation to an active one. With the increase of the initiative, my creative space It is getting bigger and bigger. Since the customer's second-year selection of costumes was very exciting, I changed the design plan. In order to highlight the costumes and photos, I simplified the background and separated the screen from the calendar text to increase the convenience of use. After some painstaking improvement, the product has once again become a success. The calendar, which is no longer booming, has become the customer's top product each year. Due to the trust and respect of our customers, the degree of tacit cooperation has become higher and higher, and my desire for creation has become stronger. This year I have a new idea and hope that the small calendars will be more refined and more perfect.

Through the design of the children's calendar, I realized that a designer must gain the trust of customers and truly change from "passive" to "active". It is not difficult, except that designers should have solid professional skills. And in the course of continuous learning, charging, and mastering the latest market information, as long as we treat each customer sincerely and earnestly and earnestly complete every working procedure and truly take up the responsibility of the designer, our intelligence and intelligence will surely With full play, our works will surely gain recognition from all parties and achieve success.

Author / Shanghai Bump Color Printing Company Chen Xiaoying

Source: "Shanghai Packaging," 2005, Issue 4,