28.02.20 Taking shortcuts
Tags Design Advice Reflection
I used to be caught up in making things the 'authentic' way. Say I had this aim to code my portfolio from scratch and learn HTML/CSS/JS just because I wanted the creative variety of knowing the source code.
I noticed this with a lot of projects as well. We tend to overkill on parts that are not necessary to our research.
Design permeates through, like, everything and most of the projects I observe do not have to do with design in vacuum; they always include some other discipline. Fashion, mental health, national identity, politics etc. It doesn't help all that much that being in a BA course means that nothing you do can be 'surface-level' and you must have some degree of knowledge and authority in the subject matter you're posing within. That's why I think it can be quite easy to veer off into that other topic.
I probably fell into that trap, where I got too caught up in the coding side of things I felt it not authentic to ask others for help with my work. Say Andreas or Yos for help in languages that took them years to learn. Instead I attempted to execute my lofty ideals in a matter of months.
It's okay to ask seek the expertise of others for your work. As a designer, your expertise should be in the very choice of other known expertises and the ultimate repertoire of choices that make your final deliverable.