Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 74 posts

Re: Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

#41

Post by oneplusone »

unavoidable wrote: post #34
oneplusone wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, if you don't know Photoshop very well then you could code it faster. Except you will end up with sloppier code and a weaker design. It is the equivalent of building a house without blueprints. You can do it, but if you take the time to plan things out before you break ground you will end up with a stronger product. Now, if you already have a design style locked down and code you can just puzzle together then su…

I understand your general gist... but I find sketching the design by pencil and paper much faster than photoshop - obviously I don't get pixel perfect results, but the intricacies of CSS mean that it's difficult to match a photoshop design pixel-by-pixel anyway. I agree that it's much better to have a visual plan in place first, but photoshop would definitely slow me down, and I've designed dozens of web sites.

Pen and paper should be used as a tool to help in the thinking process, but it is not a replacement for real computer mockups.

Sketching doesn't give you a realistic sense of space and feel for web design. Very often you can sketch something that looks good on paper, but once you put it on the screen it just doesn't translate well to a pixel medium.

Sketching is great if you are working with a physical medium like brochures or posters though. Then it doesn't suffer from the same translation cost.

Re: Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

#42

Post by tel »

unavoidable wrote: post #34
oneplusone wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, if you don't know Photoshop very well then you could code it faster. Except you will end up with sloppier code and a weaker design. It is the equivalent of building a house without blueprints. You can do it, but if you take the time to plan things out before you break ground you will end up with a stronger product. Now, if you already have a design style locked down and code you can just puzzle together then su…

I understand your general gist... but I find sketching the design by pencil and paper much faster than photoshop - obviously I don't get pixel perfect results, but the intricacies of CSS mean that it's difficult to match a photoshop design pixel-by-pixel anyway. I agree that it's much better to have a visual plan in place first, but photoshop would definitely slow me down, and I've designed dozens of web sites.

It depends a lot on where you're iterating. If you're iterating concepts and structure, sketches work perfectly. If you're iterating the size of a shadow, the exact color pallet, the exact shape of a logo then you'd better be in Photoshop.

For all 37s likes to talk about not using Photoshop they don't have pixel-perfect design at all and yet still had somebody slaving over Adobe products while putting those logos together.

Re: Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

#43

Post by bia »

unavoidable wrote: post #34
oneplusone wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, if you don't know Photoshop very well then you could code it faster. Except you will end up with sloppier code and a weaker design. It is the equivalent of building a house without blueprints. You can do it, but if you take the time to plan things out before you break ground you will end up with a stronger product. Now, if you already have a design style locked down and code you can just puzzle together then su…

I understand your general gist... but I find sketching the design by pencil and paper much faster than photoshop - obviously I don't get pixel perfect results, but the intricacies of CSS mean that it's difficult to match a photoshop design pixel-by-pixel anyway. I agree that it's much better to have a visual plan in place first, but photoshop would definitely slow me down, and I've designed dozens of web sites.

Maybe the goal of working in Photoshop isn't to mimic the design pixel-by-pixel, but instead to "sketch."

Mocking things up in Photoshop can be really productive because everything you sketch (all of your background images, buttons, and art) can be used as an asset on your site with minimal effort.

Re: Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

#44

Post by kls »

oneplusone wrote: post #21

Well first off, CSS and design are related by they are not the same thing. You could be the best CSS guru out there, and still not know how to design. Don't believe what 37 Signals say, if you skip the Photoshop step in the design process then you will end up with crappy looking designs, and most likely, badly functioning ones as well. If you do hire a designer you should know that there are really two different clas…

99 Designs is not the place to go

you know, if I am at that point, I just go buy a template and am done with it. at least a good portion of the templates, on reputable sites, have clean code underneath them. I saw some work from a 99 gig and it was the most atrocious thrown together, to save time, job I have ever seen.

Sometimes you need cheap and fast, I am of the opinion that when you do, it is better to adapt to a purchased template than to try to fix slop code from 99.

Re: Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

#45

Post by faramarz »

Ideally if you have a designer friend in your circle, you should go to them for a discounted/better rate.. but there's no question that you need somebody with an eye for great design coupled with skills and experience who can design rather than "put together" a template.

I personally think your first step in having a great design and web experience for your application is to approach it from an Interaction Designers perspective.

Get on the white-board and start putting together all the necessary elements you need for every process of your app flow.

Once you have a clear picture of what you need and don't need, and how the user interacts with your application, then you can easily communicate those needs to a creative talent or a design shop. This way every design decision is made with a purpose, not just because it looks nice.

Re: Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

#46

Post by lionhearted »

oneplusone wrote: post #21

Well first off, CSS and design are related by they are not the same thing. You could be the best CSS guru out there, and still not know how to design. Don't believe what 37 Signals say, if you skip the Photoshop step in the design process then you will end up with crappy looking designs, and most likely, badly functioning ones as well. If you do hire a designer you should know that there are really two different clas…

> don't expect to get a great website for less than $5,000 if it is a small one and $15,000 if it is medium sized. Good design takes a lot of time and iteration.

This is totally true, I paid $12,000 for a top of the line design on a site ~5 years ago, but that was after the business was already profitable and the better design/domain/branding would pay for itself. If you're not profitable, funded, or growing really rapidly, just get a functional CMS and a functional, decent design to start. The better design will help later, but it's the wrong place to put your resources if you have no users and no money.

Edit: Wordpress is totally decent and more versatile than people think. I was introduced to GetSimple recently by Yifei Zhang, it's open source and it looks pretty decent out of the box. http://get-simple.info/

Edit2: Also depends on what your business or app is. Share more details? Maybe a link if you have a rough version somewhere?

Re: Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

#47

Post by jackowayed »

oneplusone wrote: post #27
zacclark wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with most of your points, except that you can't skip photoshop. Depending on your skill levels in various tools, it might be way better to simply start into html + css. I know a couple designer/developers who can go from an idea to visuals dramatically faster in code than they could using photoshop (myself included). Additionally, you get the advantage of being able to style simply effects in right away (ie,…

Sure, if you don't know Photoshop very well then you could code it faster. Except you will end up with sloppier code and a weaker design. It is the equivalent of building a house without blueprints. You can do it, but if you take the time to plan things out before you break ground you will end up with a stronger product. Now, if you already have a design style locked down and code you can just puzzle together then su…

It's a lot easier to refactor a website midway through designing it than it is to move the walls of a house midway through building it.

Re: Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

#48

Post by wdewind »

Travis wrote: post #37
oneplusone wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, if you don't know Photoshop very well then you could code it faster. Except you will end up with sloppier code and a weaker design. It is the equivalent of building a house without blueprints. You can do it, but if you take the time to plan things out before you break ground you will end up with a stronger product. Now, if you already have a design style locked down and code you can just puzzle together then su…

I think what unavoidable is saying is that photoshop, specifically, isn't a necessary step. Personally, I hate mockups in it. I try to use paper and pencil, if it needs to be formal, I use balsamiq. I do agree that you need SOME sort of mockup, but I actually think low res mockups are more effective because people aren't distracted by the fact that an underlined link in PS doesn't quite look right.

thats not a mockup thats a wireframe

web designers absolutely should use photoshop, because they are essentially providing the "theme" around the wireframe, that may be designed by the UI designer.

Re: Ask HN: Do you design your own website?

#50

Post by lsc »

I did... http://prgmr.com/xen

I'm profitable.. does that mean design doesn't matter? or does that mean that a minimalist, web 1.0 looking design can lend credibility in some markets? I don't know.

I used the YUI css and layouts, and probably spent maybe an hour working on the design, including setting up ssi include files to pull in the content. (haha. xbithack on!)

Post reply on HN