the problem line up There is a very specific moment in almost every project when someone realizes there is a problem. And there is an equally specific moment when they decide not to tell the designer. Why? I have no idea. Perhaps they think the problem will become embarrassed and leave on its own. It will not. Problems are remarkably self-assured. They sit quietly in the corner, grow several heads, invite friends, order cocktails, and wait until the deadline is six hours away

The drawer test: because everything looks brilliant at 2 am. There’s a very simple test for whether an idea is actually good. Put it in a drawer. Not literally, although in the days before everything lived on a hard drive, I suppose that was exactly what we did. You work on something. You love it. You’ve stared at it for hours. You’ve moved the headline three pixels to the left, changed it back, changed it again, convinced yourself the first version was better, and eventually

Payment Obstacle Course Freelancing comes with a lot of jobs nobody tells you about. You are the designer. You are the account person. You are the scheduler. You are the bookkeeper. You are tech support. You are collections. And apparently, sometimes, you are also expected to finance the privilege of receiving your own money. That last one is where I draw the line. I Already Gave You a Deal Freelancers do this all the time. We shave a little off the estimate. We throw in one

Everything starts somewhere. Even original ideas. A few days ago I saw a post about an AI-generated song that had made its way onto the charts. The reaction was furious. The machine had stolen every riff. Every lick. Every vocal inflection. Every musical thought from the human artists who came before it. And I found myself thinking about Mark Twain. Which is probably not where most people go when discussing artificial intelligence. In 1903, Twain wrote to Helen Keller after s

Artificial Intelligence. Occasionally HEAVY on the Artificial. I use AI all the time. I use it to brainstorm, organize information, proofread, summarize, research, and help me work through ideas faster. Sometimes it saves me an enormous amount of time. Sometimes it helps me get past a sticking point in seconds. Sometimes it takes a task I really do not want to do and gets me halfway there before I’ve had my second cup of coffee. And sometimes it confidently tries to move Oreg

My Voodoo Doll is a Colorful Dude There are moments in every creative career when professionalism requires… accessories. Not the glamorous kind. Not a new laptop. Not a Pantone book. Not another beautifully organized set of markers you will absolutely swear you needed. I’m talking about a voodoo doll. Now, before anyone gets nervous, this is a metaphorical voodoo doll. Mostly. Because if you have worked with clients for any length of time, you know there are moments when some

Get it in Camera!!!! Or spend hours trying to just fix it!!!!! There was a phrase I used to say on almost every photo shoot: Get as much as you can in camera. It didn’t mean we couldn’t retouch. Of course we could retouch. It didn’t mean we couldn’t manipulate an image, composite something, enhance it, clean it up or do any of the hundred other things that happen between the moment the shutter clicks and the moment an ad appears in the world. It meant something much simpler:

Part Designer Part Client Psychologist Clients rarely begin by telling you what the actual problem is. They tell you what they think the solution should be. “Make the logo bigger.” “Use a friendlier font.” “Put more information on the front.” “Can we make it pop?” A designer’s first instinct may be to open the file and start moving things around. But if you immediately do exactly what the client requests, you may solve the wrong problem beautifully. The best designers are par

DID YOU PROOF YOUR COPY TODAY? Why Are You Still Reading? In the early days of desktop publishing, designers routinely used lorem ipsum as placeholder copy while waiting for the real words to arrive. And clients routinely asked me the same question: “What language is this?” Explaining lorem ipsum over and over became tedious, so I created my own placeholder copy for QuarkXPress. Mine was written in English, intentionally humorous and impossible—or so I believed—to confuse wit

A small change in how you frame a thought turns an ordinary concept into a brilliant one. "There is no such thing as a wholly original idea. We simply take a lot of old ideas and put them into a sort of mental kaleidoscope." — attributed to Mark Twain Whether Mark Twain said those exact words or not, the image has stayed with me. A mental kaleidoscope. As children, we were fascinated by those little cardboard tubes. Inside were only a handful of colored glass fragments. Noth

One of the biggest mistakes people make with AI isn't that they don't know enough. It's that they think more words equal better results. They write prompts that read like grocery lists: "Make it modern. Make it exciting. Make it bold. Add energy. Make it luxurious. Sophisticated. Cinematic. Award-winning. Viral. Stunning. Emotional. Premium. High-end. Trendy." By the time they're finished, they've described everything. Which usually means they've described nothing. As someone

For years, marketers have searched for the next shortcut. Keywords. Hashtags. SEO tricks. Algorithms. Now I hear a new question almost every day: "How do I get AI to recommend my company?" My answer usually surprises people. You don't start with AI. You start with your reputation. That may sound old-fashioned, but in reality it's the newest marketing strategy of all. AI is becoming the world's biggest researcher. When someone asks, "Who should I buy from?" or "Can I trust th

For most of my career, brand mapping meant understanding how people saw a company. Was it trusted? Innovative? Affordable? Luxury? Friendly? As an art director and creative director, we spent countless hours shaping that perception through advertising, design, photography, and storytelling. Today, there's a new audience we have to think about. Artificial Intelligence. Not because AI buys products. Because people are increasingly asking AI what to buy, who to hire, where to ea

Early in my career, I worked for one of the best creative directors I've ever known: Stanley Becker. One afternoon, he walked into the creative department and simply said, "Come on." We all looked at each other. "Where are we going?" "The movies." It was the middle of the workday. After the movie, he took us to Katz's Delicatessen in New York. I remember sitting there thinking, This is work? Finally, I asked him why he had taken us away from our desks. He smiled and said some

teaching AI to whisper and shout I believe the next person who figures out how to bring beautiful typography and true editorial pacing to online storytelling will win the prize. Not by recreating paper magazines on a screen. By bringing back the thinking behind them. Imagine a web page that doesn’t simply scroll. Imagine a story that unfolds. Typography whispers when the moment is intimate. It shouts with excitement when the story calls for it. White space creates anticipatio

Dig Deeper. Tell the Unexpected. One of the biggest mistakes I see creatives make isn't bad typography, poor color choices, or weak layouts. It's telling the obvious story. If the assignment is to promote a medical device, they show the medical device. If it's a toy, they show kids playing with it. If it's a building, they show the building. But the obvious story is usually the one everyone else is already telling. The real opportunity is to dig deeper. Years ago, while worki

Toss the manuals, solve the creative problem first. People often ask me how I learned Photoshop. The answer usually surprises them. I didn’t. At least not the way most people do. I never sat down with the manual. I didn’t work through tutorials from beginning to end. I opened the program and started creating. If I wanted something to happen, I kept pushing buttons until I figured it out. To me, software has always been a puzzle, not a class. One day, while experimenting, I ac

AI had great ideas. I just had to teach it how to count to 20. Recently, a client asked me to design a commemorative jewelry pin featuring ivy, diamonds, gold strands, and exactly 20 pearls. That last requirement mattered. Not approximately twenty. Not “about twenty.” Exactly twenty. Like many designers today, I turned to AI to help explore the concept. Within minutes, it produced elegant gold vines, luminous pearls, sparkling diamonds, and intricate ivy leaves. It generated

Lessons in Listening Long before I became an art director, I learned how to listen. I could not always see the board clearly, so I paid closer attention to tone, intent and what was not being said. Years later, I realized that the same skill mattered in a conference room. That became my own creative acronym: LEAD — Listen before you Execute. Analyze before you Direct. Because good creative direction does not begin with giving orders. It begins with understanding the problem.

Creating a website as a graphic designer is more than just showcasing your portfolio. It’s about crafting a strategic platform that communicates your brand, attracts the right clients, and drives business growth. When you design your site with intention, you set yourself apart in a crowded market and make it easier for potential clients to understand your value. Let’s dive into how you can build a website that works as hard as you do, using a clear graphic design website stra