Let’s imagine a simple scenario. What if you could draw a site just in a same way as you normally would with any other project and make it work straight away, with just a click of a button? Without having to worry about coding it, browser compatibility issues and many other aspects of web design that usually cause endless problems and headaches. Wouldn’t it actually be great? Would you not be at least slightly tempted by this?
Unfortunately when it comes to web design things are never that easy. I have actually seen many graphic designers falling into a trap of such thinking and as a result deciding on using Flash to create simple html sites. Of course those sites contain hardly any code apart from the one that flash outputs while publishing the movie. And even that code is not always to a standard required from a professional website.
Yet those sites are easy to create and thus are very tempting from a designers point of view. All that you need to learn is how to create artwork in Flash, which with it’s current integration into the CS suite is now easier than ever.
As much as success-promising the whole idea seems to be there is one thing worth remembering. By doing so you under-deliver to your client offering him a solution that is not up to a standard he requested. This ultimately is damaging not only to your reputation but the whole industry’s as well.
So what happens if you don’t want to learn CSS and plan to focus on designing websites only?
Decide on outsource coding to a front-end developer. As obvious as it seems still there are many designers who don’t go for that. Not at the early stages of their venture into the web design anyway. One of the reasons seem to be cost but the other I noticed is a fear of losing control over a final project.
The latter is especially true in situation where you may not have enough knowledge in all aspects of designing for web and may feel insecure about handing a project to someone else. In fact though if you find a good and trustworthy front-end developer the quality of your projects will grow significantly and you will gain hugely from the advice and help he can offer.
And when it comes to the first obstacle, a cost, these days front-end development is not expensive anymore and you usually pay for the technology you use, therefore you can control costs even during the design stage by using the technology you can afford.
The most important thing to remember is that to no matter how much you dread coding and all those technology related aspects of web do not cut corners and go for something you know, rather team up with someone who can compliment what you do and help you to deliver projects to a highest web standards.
Let’s face it, there is nothing worse than a website which is nicely designed but put together in an amateurish way.