I have also seen people build them in Excel.

Just having one of those days.

---

I sit on a man’s back, choking him and making
him carry me, and yet assure myself and others
that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his
lot by all possible means — except by getting off
his back. - Leo Tolstoy, novelist and Philosopher
(1828-1910)

Because it allows them to embed macro viruses in there.

Revenue.

---

More like someone doesn't want to spend some revenue.

---

I sit on a man’s back, choking him and making
him carry me, and yet assure myself and others
that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his
lot by all possible means — except by getting off
his back. - Leo Tolstoy, novelist and Philosopher
(1828-1910)

don't forget to include MS Publisher.

Because they think "I have a computer, I can do my own ads. Hmm, which program that I already know can I use? I don't need no stinking Quark."

When i was working for my last publisher, I would get frustrated with the salespeople because they wouldn't emphasize strongly programs which we didn't support. Then I'd call them and tell them we can't print the clients ad and they better do something about it. "oh, what program should I tell them to use?"

Arggh.

---

And we should consider every day lost on which we have not danced at least once.
—Friedrich Nietzsche
Western Massachusetts

My favorite is when a client says "No, we won't need you to set it up for us. My (insert relation to client here) is a Graphic Designer. He/she will give you press-ready artwork."

Whenever I hear that I know damn well I'm about to receive an abortion of a design created in Publisher, Word, PowerPoint, or Excel.

---

Worse yet, they will grab their logo GIF from the company website and then can't understand why it appears jagged and negative when printed.

I actually see these all the time in the local free papers.

Yeah that kills me too.

---

I feel your pain. I worked at an advertising specialty shop (swag) and constantly had to rebuild logos from scanning in cocktail napkins and thermography business cards.

Seacrest,

That urks me the worst.

That is probably the biggest problem when things went digital. No way for the average guy to comprehend the difference between screen resolution (ppi) and print resolution (dpi).

They're lost.

So I try to tell salespeople...Look, if the file size that comes in is 92kb; it's way too small to print. That should be a dead giveaway that the file is too low of resolution.

Do they get it? No freakin' way.

---

I sit on a man’s back, choking him and making
him carry me, and yet assure myself and others
that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his
lot by all possible means — except by getting off
his back. - Leo Tolstoy, novelist and Philosopher
(1828-1910)

I was once asked if a customer could fax in his camera ready artwork......


Feelin all your pain.


3P

People are lazy and dont want to have to search for proper files. They also dont want to spend money on good software. I get business cards designed in ppt all the time. Its worse when they dont even have it sized right. People dont understand bleeds and are just ignorant of it and dont care to understand.

I love when they call simply refer to "Adobe" as the program. Many people think "Adobe" is one all encompassing program. There are also the people who have their ill begotten copies of Adobe "insert program here" and dont understand how to use it. We get people who design entire booklets page by page in photoshop at crazy high resolutions.

The key is that they don't have the:
Knowledge
Software
Understanding
Experience

But that's why you guys have a business, so quityer biotchin !

Quote
Stavs
I love when they call simply refer to "Adobe" as the program. Many people think "Adobe" is one all encompassing program. There are also the people who have their ill begotten copies of Adobe "insert program here" and dont understand how to use it. We get people who design entire booklets page by page in photoshop at crazy high resolutions.

That's happening to me right now. I have a client how bought "Adobe" so they can edit some labels I made for them in Illustrator. I asked what "Adobe" they bought and their response was "Adobe, the best one." I'm thinking they must have gotten CS3 Premium, it's the best one right? Well they had no idea what they bought so I wasn't about to get it out of them.

A week later they called to say they couldn't edit the files I emailed them and asked for them on a disc instead (like that would matter.)

To make a long story short it turns out they bought Adobe Acrobat.

---

We have moved from times where trained professionals were enlisted to create and fabricate things to an era where the DIY concept that "everyman" (or "everywoman") can replace those professionals now exists.

If you think about it, whether it is motivated by a desire to save $ or because the DIYers are interested in the topic, this whole trend encompasses many trades and occupations now, especially in media and arts.

Think of how music is created and recorded now, video, websites, etc. It is obvious that the trend would effect DTP and design with the advent of PC use.

Check out these Word newsletter templates Xerox is providing:
[www.office.xerox.com]

Of course this stuff has its place in business, especially for Xerox, but imagine when some paper pusher MBA manager sees this kind of stuff. A light blub can go off in their dim witted heads and suddenly Gertrude, the $24K clerk now becomes the company "designer".

You all probably know at least one of these types. They're the guys that always tell you how "easy" it is to do whatever they want done.

---

JoeM

Quote
JoeM
We have moved from times where trained professionals were enlisted to create and fabricate things to an era where the DIY concept that "everyman" (or "everywoman") can replace those professionals now exists.

If you think about it, whether it is motivated by a desire to save $ or because the DIYers are interested in the topic, this whole trend encompasses many trades and occupations now, especially in media and arts.

Its a desire to save money pure and simple. The majority of people I see who DIY it are not interested in the topic. They want to save money and thats it. The gif file looks great on screen so they figure it will print right when blown up to 18x24.

I also love the people who put text right up to the edge of their materials and wonder why our cutters cut them off.

People are cheap-plain in simple. Just look at our own and people at dealmac. Its all about savings!

Quote
cbelt3
The key is that they don't have the:
Knowledge
Software
Understanding
Experience

But that's why you guys have a business, so quityer biotchin !

cbelt just stuck the landing.

90% of the time it's nothing more than cluelessness. They open up "Adobe" or "Microsoft" or even "Windows" (Yes, I've even heard that one), start flailing about, and whammo they get something that "looks good." Looks good to them on screen. Looks good to them when they print it on their inkjet printer. And, yeah, they couldn't quite figure out how to make the page the right size, but how hard could it be to make it t'he right size'? The people at the print shop know how to do that stuff, right?

And so we either do the sow's ear into a silk purse dance or we kick the job back to the customer to fix (With that ever so slight possibility we might not ever see it again when they decide to print it themselves in their office or take it to another printer who manages to make it look "good enough".).

It's that "good enough" that saddens me the most; even if it makes my job a little bit easier. Yet another phenomena of the DIY era, the lowering of quality to the "good enough" level. When people put things together themselves, suddenly too close to the edge, kind of fuzzy, too close together and a whole platoon of other oopsies make it under the bar. And we won't even get into the idea truly good design overall.

But God bless her, I did actually have one customer who struggled with Word for awhile and finally asked me which "Adobe" she should buy to get the job done better. I gave her a few suggestions which she dutifully listened to and off she went. Her next job comes in a mess, but at least I could open the file and fix it. The next job, well, not quite such a mess. After a little bit of time, she only needed a little tweaking and not too long after that, a lot of her files were just fine.

Hallelujah!

My favourite is when people send me little JPEGs of their logo.

I ask them to send me a vector version like an eps.

They take the file they sent me, open it in Photoshop and save it as an eps and send it back to me.

Arrrrrgh!

---

Quote
Mike V
My favourite is when people send me little JPEGs of their logo.

I ask them to send me a vector version like an eps.

They take the file they sent me, open it in Photoshop and save it as an eps and send it back to me.

Arrrrrgh!

I hate that as well! It is so aggravating. I actually tell me people not to do that when I ask for an eps because I know thats what they will do.

Oh, one last thing...

I hate when people say "make the logo fit in that space" regardless if it's horizontal dimensions in a vertical layout. "Just stretch it."

How many times have you seen a logo, or photo for that matter, just stretched to fit and it's all disproportionate?

Gotta love it.

I'm on vacation for the next 7 days. No more shop talk from me! Later suckers!

---