Are my designs improving enough?

mug2k

New Member
Hi

I've been learning web design for about 3 months, mostly HTML & CSS to start with but lately I have been trying to improve my design skills. I've been watching a few videos and reading a few books here and there about graphic design fundamentals and also looking at dribbble/behance designs daily.

The first design was made about 3 months ago in the browser. The others are mock-ups I made in Sketch over a time period of about 2 months. I have a few more volunteer design projects coming up via Github and other places and will also attempt to code up all the designs I've made into actual sites when I think I am proficient enough.

Before
http://i.imgur.com/IbAs3YW.jpg

Latest (oldest to newest)
https://www.behance.net/gallery/17127175/Arsenes-Invincibles
https://www.behance.net/gallery/17292349/Book-reviews
https://www.behance.net/gallery/18080299/Unsolicited-Redesign
https://www.behance.net/gallery/18518277/Github-page-redesign

Do you guys think my 'design skills' are coming along sufficently? do you have any book recommendations or tips on how I can get better?

Thanks,
Marcus
 
Hello!
3 years is a short time to get a big evolution, but we can see a good difference between the after and the before, but we can see the mistakes repeating... Like many of us, you need to learn a lot... Anyway, my tip to you is start by the theory, about typography on web design, positioning of pictures, structure, styles and more... I don't usually read books, but I love reliable blogs, one of the blogs I like to read is this one: http://webdesign.tutsplus.com/ there we have many thories and many tutorials too...
You need to keep an eye on the trends, always see select some inspirations for you project, good inspirations!
 
Steeph said:
Hello!
3 years is a short time to get a big evolution, but we can see a good difference between the after and the before, but we can see the mistakes repeating... Like many of us, you need to learn a lot... Anyway, my tip to you is start by the theory, about typography on web design, positioning of pictures, structure, styles and more... I don't usually read books, but I love reliable blogs, one of the blogs I like to read is this one: http://webdesign.tutsplus.com/ there we have many thories and many tutorials too...
You need to keep an eye on the trends, always see select some inspirations for you project, good inspirations!
Hi Steeph

I am aware of the web design section of tutsplus, but I never really looked at it much so thank you for reminding me. I had this bookmarked (https://webdesign.tutsplus.com/series/design-school-for-developers--webdesign-13793) and I think now is the time to look through it. Also I have recently started going through the hackdesign lessons (https://hackdesign.org/lessons/), hopefully I will see some more improvement over the coming weeks/months.

For my designs I didn't seek inspiration so I will try to look around more and be inspired before I start my upcoming projects.

Could you tell me about the mistakes I have made so I can try and fix them and further my learning and understanding.

Thanks,
Marcus
 
mug2k said:
Hi Steeph

I am aware of the web design section of tutsplus, but I never really looked at it much so thank you for reminding me. I had this bookmarked (https://webdesign.tutsplus.com/series/design-school-for-developers--webdesign-13793) and I think now is the time to look through it. Also I have recently started going through the hackdesign lessons (https://hackdesign.org/lessons/), hopefully I will see some more improvement over the coming weeks/months.

For my designs I didn't seek inspiration so I will try to look around more and be inspired before I start my upcoming projects.

Could you tell me about the mistakes I have made so I can try and fix them and further my learning and understanding.

Thanks,
Marcus
Sorry about the "years" in my comment, I mean "months"...
Inspirations can give you ideas for something new... Behance is a great place to find good projects for inspirations...
Abou the blog, I never saw before, seems to be great! I'm from Brazil, so I don't know so many blogs from other countries, only the most popular... lol Other one I like to read is http://speckyboy.com

What I saw, they are all aligment, positioning, colors and typography.

I'll use this one as an example: https://www.behance.net/gallery/18080299/Unsolicited-Redesign in this one, I think you could use a more trend modern style, the only mistake I see is in the colors...

I see that the page doesn't have many content, but sometimes this is a thing that can come from you. The client sometimes doesn't want to say much about for the web site, you can sugest some text... But for a page with less content, you could use this style: https://www.behance.net/gallery/18418205/Nixon-Creative-One-Page-Multi-Purpose-Theme
 
Steeph said:
Sorry about the "years" in my comment, I mean "months"...
Inspirations can give you ideas for something new... Behance is a great place to find good projects for inspirations...
Abou the blog, I never saw before, seems to be great! I'm from Brazil, so I don't know so many blogs from other countries, only the most popular... lol Other one I like to read is http://speckyboy.com

What I saw, they are all aligment, positioning, colors and typography.

I'll use this one as an example: https://www.behance.net/gallery/18080299/Unsolicited-Redesign in this one, I think you could use a more trend modern style, the only mistake I see is in the colors...

I see that the page doesn't have many content, but sometimes this is a thing that can come from you. The client sometimes doesn't want to say much about for the web site, you can sugest some text... But for a page with less content, you could use this style: https://www.behance.net/gallery/18418205/Nixon-Creative-One-Page-Multi-Purpose-Theme
I knew what you meant :)

Yes hackdesign looks like a great resource and it looks like it'll teach a little bit of everything. Thanks for the speckyboy link, I'll bookmark that too.

I've learnt some basics regarding alignment, positioning and typography but know nothing about colours and I've heard that's one of the harder things to learn. I guess I will have to delve deeper into each topic to get a more fleshed out knowledge and understanding of each part. You are correct about the styles/trends as I have noticed myself that my 'style' all looks the same and I need to diversify a little.

I have a long way to go but good advice from people like yourself helps a lot so thank you for taking the time to reply.

Thanks,
Marcus
 
I think some of the designs show promise. Three months is a blink of the eye in many ways but these are your formative years and you’re doing the right thing by seeking feedback, that’s something you should never stop doing. Design is subjective so no matter how good you think you are there is always much to be learnt, even from beginners.

Behance is probably the best open portfolio website and getting involved within its community was very beneficial when I was learning. Just remember not to judge yourself based on the featured projects, they will just make you feel crap. That being said, by building a network of creatives of different levels will allow you to gain feedback on your work and observe how others progress around you.
 
wac said:
I think some of the designs show promise. Three months is a blink of the eye in many ways but these are your formative years and you’re doing the right thing by seeking feedback, that’s something you should never stop doing. Design is subjective so no matter how good you think you are there is always much to be learnt, even from beginners.

Behance is probably the best open portfolio website and getting involved within its community was very beneficial when I was learning. Just remember not to judge yourself based on the featured projects, they will just make you feel crap. That being said, by building a network of creatives of different levels will allow you to gain feedback on your work and observe how others progress around you.
I have about 10 followers but nobody has commented on my designs yet. How do I get feedback on my work other than posting forums like this one?
 
Comment on other peoples work. Add people to your network and then they’ll see your new projects in their timeline.

Be aware though, Behance comments are some of the most vacuous pieces of feedback you will get. They will always be brief and given that they have a portfolio responses will always be positive. Forums like this are a much better bet for feedback although the fact peoples profiles still have a pseudo-authority (e.g. post counts) then it’s still not ideal. I had an idea for entirely anonymous design feedback platform that would work a bit like sites like these in order to provide unbiased feedback but I havnt got around to doing anything with it yet.
 
I've recently updated a few of the concepts on my Behance page, I'm fairly happy with them for now and am going to start getting back into the development side so I can attempt to make them into 'working prototypes'. I'm by no means happy with my current level of knowledge/skill in design but feel it's time to start making something tangible. I'll of course carry on with learning more of the graphic design fundamental/principles and hopefully create better iterations of the current stuff as time passes.

https://www.behance.net/gallery/18906979/Portfolio-Design
https://www.behance.net/gallery/18080299/AF-Redesign
https://www.behance.net/gallery/17292349/Book-reviews
https://www.behance.net/gallery/18778567/Spartan-Fitness-(Concept)
https://www.behance.net/gallery/17127175/Arsenes-Invincibles

Thanks for reading,
Marcus
 
These designs show potential but I think they’re a little too generic and interchangeable. You could almost remove the heading and put ‘your company name here’. If you’re making something from scratch then you have opportunity to build the website around the brand and not the other way around. Try and think how you can make your sites ooze their subject matter without using any text or images.
 
Could make a more fashionable. Colour like grey in the summer and yellowish white in the winter. Since summer is hot pick a cold colour and vice versa
 
pepsi_tank2 said:
Could make a more fashionable. Colour like grey in the summer and yellowish white in the winter. Since summer is hot pick a cold colour and vice versa
how does this relate to the designs, which one are you referring to etc

Why have you suggested these colour schemes etc
 
Back
Top