Amateur designers - non-graphic artists uses computers for graphic design - Workstyles - Column

Home Office Computing, June, 1994 by Nick Sullivan

I RECENTLY GOT A LETTER FROM a reader who took offense at an advertisement for Corel-Draw on the back cover: "Thanks to CorelDraw, my sales are as hot as my salsa!" says a cheerful woman in red. "Let's face it...I'm pretty hot in the kitchen, but I'm no artist." Nonetheless, Corel-Draw gives her "all the right ingredients to create sizzling menus, appetizing ads, business cards, labels, signs, and more."

Being a graphic designer, the letter writer was upset by the implication that a single software package could turn a nonartist into an artist. "In my experience, desktop publishing and word processing programs. have created far more bad work than good in tse hands of amateurs, with the worst of the worst coming from people who simply say things like, 'Well, I have a Quadra and PageMaker 5.0, so I can knock out an ad in a few minutes.' Please! Just look through your mail one day and notice all the poor designs and poor writing being unloaded upon folks these days."

I have been looking through my mail nad coming to quite a different conclusion. Today's software is not exactly idiot-proof, but I think it makes most people look better than they really are.

Just last week I received three good-looking, well-written newsletter put only by individuals promoting their businesses. A few years ago, newsletter like this would have been awash in a sea of fonts fighting to outdo each other--or deadly dull text-only broadsheets with nary a graphic. I know there's bad stuff out there, but that's been true since Gutenberg.

My correspondent agrees--in part. "A lot of attention has been given to the empowering aspects of technology, and the attention is certainly justified," he writes. "But I have begun to feel more strongly that not enough attention has been paid to the pitfalls associated with this increased power. Many people now feel quite comfortable handling things that they probably ought to leave to professionals." What he means to say is that magazines such as this one should warn readers that they many spend an inordinate amount of time producing something that looks second rate.

Well, it's true, cursing and manufacturers bashing are key ingredients ikn the concoction of any given newsletter, presentation, or spreadsheet chart--partly because people in a remote-control society like to push buttons and get results, partly because both publishers and the prese that covers them sometimes get overly excited by the potential of new technology. But I don't think anyone ever said that booting up PageMaker would take you into a designer.

Instead of comparing amateurs with professionals, why not compare today's computer user with yesterday's. A few years, ago, many people used computrs as glorified tgpewriters or calculators. They didn't experiment and extend themselves. Today people who may have bought a computer for one main application are using it for multiple tasks. Moreover, they're doing things they've never done before, primarily online communications and reseach, in addition to creating presentation and promotional materials.

In the meantime, businesspeople are having fun. Rather than just processing words and crunching numbers, they're using their computers as tools of communication and expression. In the long run, that interdisciplinary way of working and connecting to the outside world will make them better marketers, if not better businesspeople.

So, forget the design police. It's silly to own a high-powered computer and use it like a typewriter. Mess around, create stuff, have some fun. Just don't get too fancy. Keep in simple--and add a dash or salsa for flavor.